By Todd Shields and Scott Bowles
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, February 14, 1996; Page A1

A University of Maryland student acting on hearsay posted a public Internet message last week that accused a Montgomery County woman of mistreating her daughter and urged readers to call the family.

The student's message, which the family said generated threatening phone calls, circulated one week ago to at least 11 Internet news groups devoted to child welfare, psychology, radical left-wing politics and civil liberties. The incident spotlighted the potential for abuse of the vast and unregulated Internet.

Readers around the world who viewed the special-interest message exchanges were urged to call the girl's mother "at home and tell her you are disgusted and you demand that she stops."

The girl's father described the family as sickened by the posting of the message and the half-dozen subsequent calls to the girl's mother, including some threats.

"We can't stop the calls," he said. "I can't stop anything that goes over the Internet. ... It's like a virus. How do you stop it?"

The exposure exacerbated family tensions, the father said yesterday. "It could break up our family," he said. "It could very well break up our family. It's close."

Internet specialists said the incident showed how power, in the form of computers and modems, can outpace users' sense of responsibility.

"You're going to see tons and tons of cases just like this," said Dale Herbeck, an associate professor of communications at Boston College. "In the old days ... I had to have access to some kind of printing press. Some newspaper or editor or correspondent would act as a gatekeeper."

Now, Herbeck said, "there's no editing function. It's maybe too spontaneous. ... You just sit down and, Boom! It's kind of wild. You type it out and hit Control-Z and, Boom! It's out. And all the traditional checks are gone."

The student, who made no effort in his posting to conceal his identity, was unrepentant. "You should be able to write what you want on the Internet, whether it's true or not," William A. White, 18, said in a telephone interview yesterday. Although he said he doesn't know the family, he felt compelled to intervene after he learned of the allegations from a third party.

White, who attended Montgomery public schools, denied that the information about the family came from a confidential session, as maintained by the father and the Montgomery school system. "This came from [the girl], to friends of hers, to me," White said. "It came from nobody else at that counseling session."

Regular users of the global network of computer networks have learned that there are never assurances that any message is reliable. But although specialists said that Internet users sometimes hurl abuse at one another, this incident was among the first reported episodes in which someone published a residential telephone number and invited the public to reach into a third party's home.

Traditional civil laws governing slander, libel and invasion of privacy likely would apply to the case, and criminal law governing harassment might come into play, they said.

Unlike aspiring publishers of an earlier age, Internet publishers do not need much money, a complex distribution network or others' approval to send their ideas to thousands of readers. But, said Herbeck and others, electronic messages carry the same ethical and legal baggage as printed ones.

"If this guy were going around and posting it on lamp posts or in all the 7-Elevens in town, what would one do about it?" said J.A.N. Lee, a professor of computer science at Virginia Tech's Center for the Study of Science in Society.

Last year, Virginia Tech disciplined a student who sent another student electronic mail described as abusive. In October, a New York brokerage dropped a libel suit against a commercial on-line service in return for an apology for a negative message about the firm. But no other well-known case involved posting of purported details of private life within a home.

White's Internet message said the teenage girl was a victim of abuse because for many years she was confined to home, except to go to school or work, was forbidden to use the telephone or have friends, and was fed nothing but peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

The girl's father and Montgomery school officials said White's posting was based upon confidential information that the girl divulged in a private group discussion for youngsters with severe emotional and social difficulties.

Another student in the group discussed it with classmates, who then shared it with the University of Maryland student, said Montgomery schools spokesman Brian Porter.

The breach of confidentiality threatens to undermine a treatment program premised upon privacy, Porter said. "It's just flat-out wrong," he said.

White expressed satisfaction because, he said, the telephone calls prompted the mother to treat her daughter better. "It worked very well. It worked very quickly," said White, who calls himself a publicist for the Maryland chapter of the Utopian Anarchist Party. "The Internet definitely helped. The only trouble is, it's taken some time to stop the phone calls."

White said he asked readers in two follow-up messages to stop calling the family. The mother "had a nervous breakdown characterized by extreme paranoia, fear and shock," gloated one of those subsequent messages sent from White's e-mail account. It thanked the "Internet community" for responding.

White said he never talked with the girl before posting the message, nor had he tried to verify the information before distributing it from his free e-mail account at the University of Maryland at College Park. The father said aspects of the message were true – but blown out of proportion.

Montgomery County police said they were investigating the message and its contents.

Last year, White briefly faced criminal charges of possessing deadly weapons, attempting to escape from police custody and distributing obscene materials. Montgomery County declined to prosecute the case, which White said stemmed from an arrest that occurred as he distributed handbills that used profanity to promote a political rally. The weapon charges referred to a nightstick and knife he was carrying, and the escape to an allegation that he tried to pick the lock on his handcuffs, he said.

Some computer experts said lack of accountability in Internet communication could expand with the use of anonymous remailers – on-line services that disguise the electronic origins of messages from clients. Even without disguise, however, a message appearing under a person's e-mail sign-on may not have been sent by that person, they noted.

Younger users seem more prone to misusing the new computing powers, some experts said.

"It's a common problem with students," said Frank Connolly, a professor of information systems at American University. "Where they get things, they're innocent enough to believe these things lock, stock and barrel. They're committed enough to believe they need to take action."

Connolly added, "We have all the power and still haven't developed the sense of responsibility."

Staff writer Brian Mooar and Metro resource director Margot Williams contributed to this report.