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Returning to School; Long Road Ahead for Newtown; Instagram: Your Photos are Our Property

Aired December 18, 2012 - 10:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Dick's Sporting Goods says it's suspending sales of some semi-automatic rifles from its stores nationwide. But don't expect that to dampen the spirit of gun rights advocates.

Charlton Heston at his best, the late NRA president famous for saying he would give you his gun only if you pried it out of his hands.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

CHARLTON HESTON, FORMER PRESIDENT OF NRA: From my cold, dead hands.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: What is it about guns that cuts to the core of the America psyche? Is it the Second Amendment which says our right to bear arms should not be infringed or is it as former NRA lobbyist Richard Feldman says, that gun owners see their relationship to this democracy through the eyes of the gun issue?

"Talk Back" question for you today: "What does owning a gun represent to you?" Facebook.com/CarolCNN; Facebook.com/CarolCNN your responses later this hour.

Kids in every school in Newtown except for Sandy Hook Elementary are headed back to school today. Our Soledad O'Brien has been in Newtown, Connecticut. She joins us again. Good morning.

SOLEDAD O'BRIEN, CNN ABCGIR: Hi. Good morning to you, Carol.

That's right. The kids will be on a two-hour delay. And that will give the teachers a little bit of extra time to prepare for their classes. Also on hand at every single school, grief counselors. It is a very different world today that they are going back to than the one that they left last week.

Earlier this morning I spoke with Steve Perry, he is the principal and founder of Capital Preparatory Magnet School at Hartford, Connecticut. Here is what he told me.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

O'BRIEN: So if you were among the principals and teachers inside the location where the students from Sandy Hook Elementary would be attending, what would be telling them? STEVE PERRY, PRINCIPAL & FOUNDER, CAPITAL PREPATORY MAGNET SCHOOL: Well, the first things I would tell my colleagues is what I told to my own colleagues, which is when children ask questions, invite them to ask questions and recognize that you need to keep the terms broad because we don't understand what happened. And the best thing that we can do is focus on the broad, almost fantastical terms, like "bad things sometimes happen to good people" and in addition to that, "they are now angels, 20 more angels in the sky who are here to support you."

O'BRIEN: What should the tone this morning be?

PERRY: All positive. All positive. "You're going to be safe. You're safe in schools."

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'BRIEN: We still don't know when the Sandy Hook students will be going back to class, but when they do, they're going to be going to a different school in nearby Monroe, Connecticut. Carol, that school is just about seven miles away from where Sandy Hook Elementary stands.

COSTELLO: Understood.

All across the country, students can relate to the victims of the Sandy Hook shootings. It could have taken place in any classroom and no doubt safety is going to become a big issue in this country. Ken Trump is the president of the National School Safety and Security Services. He joins us now from Cleveland.

KEN TRUMP, PRESIDENT NATIONAL SCHOOL SAFETY & SECURITY SERVICES: Good morning Carol.

COSTELLO: How are parents across the nation reacting to this?

TRUMP: Some parents feel hopeless, helpless and -- and truly powerless in many cases. I am getting e-mails from across the country as well as talking with people in my own backyard. And I think that part of the problem is we are looking at the issue of the school had security. They did the right things and it didn't work.

I am suggesting to people that they take a slightly different look in saying unfortunately we did not have the desired outcome with everyone surviving, but I also believe that the things that they had in place actually contributed to saving more lives and preventing greater losses.

So there are two a couple of different ways to do that. And part of that, again, all comes into helping people feel that they are not helpless and hopeless. Parents are extremely frustrated, on edge, and it's leading to calls for some really far out things, an armed officer at every school. You know things -- police officers in schools are good things, but people almost want a one to one ratio in some conversations I'm having in the --

(CROSSTALK) COSTELLO: Oh yes. Well, I can't say that I blame them. So -- so how can parents address their fears in meaningful helpful ways?

TRUMP: Yes and absolutely. As a school safety professional, 25 years of experience, I am still also a father. And as a father, I like 100 percent guarantee. As a safety professional, I know I can't give that, so I am certainly not criticizing them for that. And what we have to do with kids as they come is look at their physical and their psychological needs.

On the physical security, an adult presence, particularly those adults that they know, having parents come back. Law enforcement, certainly, but also parents, people that they are familiar with. That -- faces they know and have seen for a long time is very important to come in. Those who are coming in from outside to support have some consistent physical identification, arm bands, vests and stuff.

So the physical part is -- is manageable, Carol. The part that is going to be very tricky is the psychological part. How are you dealing with a number of issues on that end? The transfer of trauma when you have children who are going from one building into another and you are mixing, are you transferring traumas psychologically from one to the other? How do you manage the turf issues? Meaning the space issues. Are you bring a group of kids in from Sandy Hook Elementary School and how are the receiving kids going to feel? That are they getting less -- they perceive they're getting less attention?

Age appropriate conversations with kids. We are not going to talk to a five year old the same as an eight year old, but you do need to be honest. Understand that people grieve differently. And then there's a huge issue, Carol, that we often miss so much. And when I have gone in, in post-crisis situations, is doing a tremendous job of taking care of the kids and we forget the adults.

And that part is critical. People grieve at different times. I talked personally with a teacher who was in a room where a kid attacked students with a tree saw and a machete and it wasn't a couple of months later that she started having some traumatic experiences.

I talked with another teacher in the school where a kid brought AK-47 to school and fired rounds in the hall way and committed suicide and the teacher months later would freeze at the drop of a book.

And there is one other issue, Carol. Down the road one of the huge issues this community is going to have to deal with is, do we reopen that school? Do we go to a new school? There will be a lot of adult challenges and disagreements on that. And a whole lot of psychological discussions as well, so huge issues on the psychological end.

The good news is we have people who have gone through a great deal of effort to provide that support in lessons learned from past incidents. But it's something that lives for the rest of their lives. And I talked with somebody --

COSTELLO: Sure. TRUMP: -- from a school shooting over a decade ago and this incident last week has opened up the wounds.

COSTELLO: I can totally understand that. Ken Trump, thanks for your insight this morning. We appreciate it.

TRUMP: Thank you, Carol.

COSTELLO: So how do you move on following a tragedy like the one in Newtown? We'll hear from a man who had to do that.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'BRIEN: There are only a few events that have reached the magnitude of what happened here in Connecticut. One of them, of course, was the bombing of the Federal Building in Oklahoma City back in 1995. I had a chance to ask the man who was Governor of Oklahoma at the time how they managed to move on.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

FMR. GOV. FRANK KEATING (R), OKLAHOMA: Soledad, it's an instant cataclysm for the families and for the first responders. But the climb out is long and it's searing and it's very difficult. Today, 17 years after the Oklahoma City bombing with private funds we are still putting children through college, providing counseling and particular to first responders, firefighters and police officers and even providing medical care for a number of the badly injured.

So the one thing about Newtown: it is a community. So sitting together, holding hands together, understanding your neighbor is really your neighbor if not a family member. This is going to be a long time crawling out, scratching yourself out, because it's going to be searing. We've had suicides. Just a lot of agony after the Oklahoma City bombing and I am afraid that the tragedy in Newtown is not going to be dissimilar it's going to take a long time to recover.

O'BRIEN: Oh, it just sounds so brutal. And you know, you've mentioned those first responders. And I remember seeing when the President came to the interfaith vigil and the first responders walked in everyone cheered and clapped and patted them on the back. But I think they are often forgotten sort of in the story of what happened people remember them as heroes.

But we don't think of them necessarily about their mental health and about how brutally difficult it must have been for them to go inside that school and see the massacre with small children. Many of those responders were parents themselves.

KEATING: Well, that's the point, because right now I saw the University of Connecticut is putting together a scholarship fund. Surely there are private checks arriving, private transmissions or transfers of money. I think it's important that a community foundation, or perhaps the United Way, initially put together a plan for how do we address these problems because some people are going to need long term counseling. The first responders, particularly, people need to be very sensitive to those absolutely stunning, searing, shocking unforgettable moments of those wonderful little children.

So people need to sit around the table together and work it out but realize they are going to be in this business for a long time.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

O'BRIEN: 168 people were killed in that bombing including 19 children.

Some social media users have been posting false information about the Sandy Hook case and now police are saying that these folks could face charges. We'll talk about that straight ahead. Back in a moment.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: 45 minutes past the hour. Good morning. Nearly 100 million people use Instagram to share their photos but the social network may force many of them to do a double take. Alison Kosik is at the New York Stock Exchange to explain this.

ALISON KOSIK, CNN BUSINESS CORRESPONDENT: Good morning Carol. So it makes you really wonder what are these social media companies thinking. You know, first there was Facebook which own Instagram. They changed their terms of service and now Instagram is looking to do that. You already look on social media and people are not happy about this.

What Instagram announced yesterday is that it is changing its terms, including saying it can sell your photos to third parties for advertising beginning on January 16th. I want you to look at the key paragraph where part of it says "You agree that a business or other entity may pay us to display your user name, likeness, photos and/or actions you take without any compensation to you."

So for example, if you post a great picture of you on the beach of your beach vacation, the hotel or town that owns the beach could buy your photo to use but you don't get any of the money.

And here is the other problem with this. Yes, guess what; there is no way to opt out of this, Carol, unless you delete your Instagram account altogether before January 16th. Because if you do it after January 16, they can grab those photos, too -- Carol.

COSTELLO: What if it's a little kid in the picture?

KOSIK: Exactly. And that -- you just got on the biggest complaint and that is if you are an underage user you are not exempt from these new policies. So if you are under 18, you are agreeing that your parents know your name and likeness can be used in these ads. And chances are, most parents they don't know that and they wouldn't agree. And once again, on the kids' part that you just mentioned. You know, if I take photos of my kids playing on the beach, that is fair game, too, for Instagram to just grab it and use it, as well.

Once again, this would begin on January 16. And once again, people are not happy about this. They're saying they plan to delete their accounts immediately. But I just want to add this: if you are on Instagram and you are only in it for the filters or other options out there, you can go to Pic U and Snap Bucket; Twitter also recently added its own filters. So there are choices out there, if you are looking to just, you know, change how your pictures look -- Carol

COSTELLO: All right. Good advice. Alison Kosik reporting live from the New York Stock Exchange. We'll be right back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: It is hard to fathom anyone would actually do this, but maybe we shouldn't be surprised. Many people -- many have been posting fake information about the Sandy Hook shooter, information that has confused Connecticut police in the midst of a very difficult investigation. State police have had enough.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

LT. PAUL VANCE, CONNECTICUT STATE POLICE: There has been misinformation coming from people posing as the shooter in this case, posing, using other IDs, mimicking this crime and crime scene and criminal activity that took place in this community. Prosecution will take place when people perpetrating misinformation are identified.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

COSTELLO: As an Internet privacy and security lawyer Parry Aftab knows about fake posts and posers. She works with Facebook to protect the real accounts of famous actors and other VIPs. Hi Parry.

PARRY AFTAB, INTERNET PRIVACY AND SECURITY LAWYER: Hi. How are you?

COSTELLO: I'm good. So will the Connecticut state police have any trouble tracking these posers down?

AFTAB: They can probably track them down but it is not going to be so easy to put them in jail. I think the state police very high cyber crime experts in this case. Senator Blumenthal was one of the top AGs in the country on this and he raised them well, need to look offline for more reliable forms of evidence gathering and investigations than online. You're going to see trolls and others who are using this to get the attention that they crave.

COSTELLO: Yes. But police can often find valuable information online. So in their mind they need to pay attention to social media and then you have these (INAUDIBLE) posting fake information just to confuse people.

AFTAB: Yes, they are. But we need to find reliable sources online. There are ways to authenticate that. We need to recognize that a lot of people doing some of these pranks may be covered by free speech of the First Amendment. So we have to be careful how we investigate this. This is a very serious situation and something we need to make sure is never repeated.

COSTELLO: Ok. So you are talking First Amendment rights. It is a free country. You can post anything online I guess to a point. When Lieutenant Vance from the Connecticut State Police says, "You are going to be prosecuted," will you be?

AFTAB: Well, in some cases, yes. If there is a threat against serious bodily harm, against property and there is an intent to affect the police investigation. That they're stealing someone's identity and posing as imposing someone else online, there may be grounds for that.

But if they are just posting information that may be confusing, there may not be. So I want to make sure that they use all of their energy in the right ways and a lot of big networks are very helpful there. And in some ways they're protecting the identity of celebrities who have people masquerading with them all the time. I bet they're somehow, they're masquerading as you, Carol.

What they do is they say things and do things that they hope will be attributed to the celebrity and many of those are fakes.

COSTELLO: As far as Facebook is concerned, what responsibility does Facebook have to kick these people offline?

AFTAB: Well, responsibility or what efforts do they take? I think it is less about responsibility and more about them going above and beyond. When you are dealing with celebrities and VIPs, they are very careful to create a unit so that the management of the VIPs or celebrities themselves can reach out saying those six accounts aren't me. They can authenticate them and make sure no one is posing as you on Facebook.

(CROSSTALK)

COSTELLO: So is Facebook doing something similar to the shooter in this case?

AFTAB: I'm sorry? Are they catching people posing as the shooter?

COSTELLO: Yes. Facebook.

AFTAB: Well, Facebook is working with law enforcement very closely to give them any information they need to do this. They don't to my knowledge have any special watches out for any of the names of the victims or shooting, anyone involved. People may be able to create those accounts. But they are working very closely with Connecticut law enforcement in helping track down things that they need tracked.

COSTELLO: Parry Aftab, thanks as always for sharing your insight with us. We appreciate it.

AFTAB: Thank you for having me back. It is a very sad time and hopefully we can work together.

COSTELLO: I hope so. Thanks so much.

"Talk Back" question for you this morning: What does owning a gun represent to you? Your responses next. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

COSTELLO: "Talk Back" question today: What does owning a gun represent to you?

This from Kiara: "Owning a gun means nothing. I think people who own guns are scared to live life without something that makes them feel powerful."

This from D. David: "Security, protection, self-defense all necessary for living free, period."

This from Bob: "An archaic remnant of the 18th century. A clear and present danger to civilized society. Time to repeal the Second Amendment."

And this from Robin: "We use our guns for hunting food. We fill our freezer with meats and that is what we use our guns for. I would definitely not want my life taken away."

Please, keep the conversation going. Facebook. Com/CarolCNN. Lots of responses again this morning. I sure appreciate it.

Facebook.com/CarolCNN. Thanks for joining me today.

CNN NEWSROOM with Ashleigh Banfield continues after a quick break.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)