excuses

This page considers use of 'internet addiction' as a defense in criminal trials.

It covers -

• introduction
• precursors
• claims
• studies

It supplements discussion elsewhere on this site regarding computer rage, sexuality, anxiety and other aspects of life online.

     introduction

Responses to claims of pervasive cyber addiction have taken several forms, including -

• scepticism
• provision of corporate network management services
• different therapies, some delivered online, that range from traditional talking cures to behaviourist aversion training or recourse to the power of prayer
• events such as 'shutdown day', discussed elsewhere on this site

One response has been to take addiction as a given and therefore restrict access to the medium.

Websense, an 'employee management service', for example promoted its wares in 2002 with discovery of "one of the most highly addictive activities to scourge the modern workplace", with 25% of employees supposedly feeling addicted and a mere 8% of those polled (some 305 US office workers) claiming no knowledge of workplace web addiction.

Websense concluded that employee personal net usage centres on news sites (67%) and shopping (37%), with 23% of employees indicating that shopping is the "most addictive" online content. 67% access news sites for personal reasons; 37% access shopping and auction sites at the office.

2% of the surveyed employees admitted accessing "pornography" and 2% admitted gambling online at work. Supposedly 70% of "all Internet porn traffic" occurs during the nine-to-five workday, up to 40% of surfing is not business-related and over 60% of online purchases are made during that time.

Websense regrettably did not benchmark those figures against employee use of telephones.

It notes a comment from Marlene Maheu ("Internet addiction expert" and CEO of an organization developing internet and telehealth aids) that

Studies have shown that from 25 to 50 percent of cyber-addiction is occurring at the workplace ... That means employees are getting paid to participate in activities that are not work-related.

Presumably the same staff are taking/making personal calls on company time and indulging in frivolities such as talking to colleagues or visiting the bathroom.

There is recurrent media attention - typically at the end of the year, when news is 'slow' and editors are barrel-scraping - to claims that people suffer withdrawal symptoms when deprived of the net.

It is unclear whether going cold turkey on the net is much different from being deprived of a mobile phone (sometimes characterised as contact addiction), snailmail or a video.

We are underwhelmed by accounts of the latest clinical disorder but if you are an Oprah fan you'll probably enjoy answers to questions such as "Why is the Internet so seductive? What are the warning signs of Internet addiction? Is recovery possible?" The corollary is presumably the 'web rage' featured in a 2001 Roper Starch report: more fender benders on the digital highway.

The Singapore Straits Times reported in 2001 that psychiatrists were touring local high schools, talking to children about the symptoms of IA. Supposedly, three children per year sought help when the disorder was first 'discovered' in 1995. As of 2001 around 80 kids sought help each year.

In 2008 Joseph LaRocca, US National Retail Federation vice president for loss prevention, told Congress that shoplifters retail stores are often driven by the "addictive qualities" of "online commerce". LaRocca claimed that many shoplifters admit to becoming "hooked" on online auctions.

When they run out of 'legitimate merchandise,' they begin to steal intermittently, many times for the first time in their life, so they can continue selling online. The thefts then begin to spiral out of control and, before they know it, they quit their jobs, are recruiting accomplices (some are even hiring 'boosters'), and are crossing state lines to steal - all so they can support and perpetuate their online selling habit.

     precursors

Preceding pages have noted that Australian (and even US) courts have been unsympathetic to claims of 'media addiction' as defences in relation to prosecutions for crimes such as murder and robbery.

In the US for example a claim of 'television intoxication' was unsuccessful in the 1977 case of Zamora v. Dugger 834 F.2d 956 (11th Cir. 1987).

Some of those claims are examined later in this note.

     claims

Claims of 'internet intoxication' were mooted by the same defense lawyer, Ellis Rubin, in 2000. Rubin commented that another client was not responsible for an email death threat -

To intoxicate is to elevate yourself into a state of euphoria, even into madness. You've logged on and gone into this imaginary world, this playland, this make-believe arena. ... That's why I call it internet intoxication. The more they go into the internet, the more bizarre their role-playing becomes.

The claim was not tested in court, with the client pleasing guilty.

In the UK R. v. Bedworth (1993) concerned the activities of an University of Edinburgh student who hacked into computer systems of the European Union and several UK banks. Bedworth successfully asserted that his "addiction to computer hacking" precluded him from having the requisite intent needed to commit the offense of gaining unauthorized access under the Computer Misuse Act 1990 (UK).

     studies

Studies include Patricia Falk's 1996 'Novel Theories of Criminal Defense Based Upon the Toxicity of the Social Environment: Urban Psychosis, Television Intoxication, and Black Rage' in 74 North Carolina Law Review 731.

 

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