Good riddance to it. I think it was a bit more complicated than that, because the chat rooms, in some way, enabled email id's to be heavily "spammed". But frankly I didnt really understand.
My daughter recently set up her 1st email address. She is 13. I had a bit of a pop at her because I wanted to know about these things (and monitor it) and she hadn't told me.
So, she logged on via my laptop at home. It was her first time since setting it up. She had also let on that she had been into a chat room at school, but that this is heavily monitored.
Anyway, the fourth email went something along the lines of
"Hi Alice, I hear you are 13...blah blah ....and I would like to get to know your hot lips". His age was "in his thirties".
I dont care what the law says, the way I felt at the time, had I known how to find him, well..........we couldn't work out how he got the information as her email address did not contain her name (so at least she listened to one bit of advice, even if she didn't tell me!).
Oh yes, and the rest of the emails in the inbox consisted of numerous lurid invitations to porn sites.
Shame - a great medium, but too dangerous for me to let my kids easy access.......or am I just getting an old sad git!