Austria uncovers global child porn ring
At least 2,360 people in 77 countries are suspected of trying to
download videos of young children being sexually abused and even raped,
according to authorities who intercepted the illicit material on a web
server in Austria.
The FBI was investigating about 600 of the suspects in the United
States, Austrian Interior Minister Guenther Platter said. German
authorities were following leads on another 400 people, France was
looking into more than 100 others, and 23 suspects were Austrians, he
said.
Platter said the videos included images that showed "the worst kind
of child sexual abuse". "Girls could be seen being raped, and you could
also hear screams," said Harald Gremel, an Austrian police expert on
internet crime who headed the investigation, adding that the children
were aged 14 and under. "One can explicitly see sexual acts with
children," Gremel said.
No Austrian suspects were yet in custody, authorities said, adding
that they shared their information with law enforcement agencies in
other countries in the hope suspects could be investigated.
Gremel said he could not provide details about investigations outside
Austria, but noted that cooperation with Russian authorities had
intensified over the past two weeks.
He said the investigation began in July, when aman working for a
Vienna-based internet file hosting service approached authorities at the
Interior Ministry to say he noticed the pornographic material during a
routine check.
Gremel said the link to the videos was posted on a Russian website,
which is no longer in operation. The videos, hosted on the Austrian
server, were freely accessible, but users had to pay $US89 ($A115) by
credit card to access more pornographic material in a "members only"
area on the Russian website.
Within 24 hours, the man recorded more than 8,000 hits from 2,361
computer IP addresses in 77 countries, ranging from Algeria to South
Africa, Gremel told reporters.
He said the man blocked access to the videos while recording the IP
addresses of people who continued to try to download the material, and
gave the details to authorities.
In Austria, the possession of pornographic material showing children
14 and under is punishable by up to two years in prison. Possession of
material showing children aged 14-18 carries a maximum one-year
sentence." I believe an increase in penalties is necessary," Platter
said. Germany's Federal Criminal Office said about 200 suspects linked
to the case in Germany had been identified and were facing prosecution.
Gremel said that in Austria, the youngest person implicated was 17 and
the oldest was 69, with the suspects ranging from students to retirees.
He said investigators believed the videos - which included images of
girls and boys up to age 14 - were made in Eastern Europe and uploaded
to the site from somewhere in Britain. However, Gremel noted that one
girl also looked Asian.
BBC
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