Related News
Europol warns over live streaming child sex abuse
Print Edition
LIVE streaming of child sexual abuse and so-called “revenge porn” is on the rise on the internet, Europe’s police agency warned yesterday, saying vulnerable children are increasingly falling victim to sexual predators.
“Live distant child abuse is ... being reported as a growing threat,” Europol said in its latest annual cyber-organized crime threat assessment, released at its headquarters in The Hague.
Live streaming of child sex abuse “involves a perpetrator directing the live abuse of children on a (pre-arranged) specific time-frame through video sharing platforms,” Europol said in the 72-page report.
“The abuse can be ‘tailored’ to the requests of the soliciting offender(s) and recorded.”
More generally “the volume, scope and material cost of cyber crime all remain on an upward trend and have reached very high levels,” the agency said in a separate statement.
Most illegal activities take place in the so-called “darknet” or encrypted peer-to-peer networks, which offer greater degrees of anonymity to users.
Traditionally live stream child abuse groups were based in southeast Asia, particularly the Philippines, but that “more recent reports indicate that it is now spreading to other countries,” Europol warned.
“Regions of the world with high levels of poverty, limited domestic child protection measures and easy access to children are being targeted by offenders,” the agency said, without naming specific countries.
“The exploitation of children online is a huge problem for us,” Steven Wilson, Europol’s cyber crime center (EC3) chief said.
Wilson added cyber crime investigators have also noticed a rise in so-called “revenge porn”, where sexually explicit images are posted without another person’s consent in order to harm that person or cause distress.
To counter these threats, Europol was working on a series of information videos on the dangers of online sexual abuse, which will soon be distributed in schools across Europe.
The report also highlights other cyber crimes, such as the growing threat of ransomware, that infects a victim’s computer and then captures data, before demanding a payment for the data to be released.
- About Us
- |
- Terms of Use
- |
-
RSS - |
- Privacy Policy
- |
- Contact Us
- |
- Shanghai Call Center: 962288
- |
- Tip-off hotline: 52920043
- 沪ICP证：沪ICP备05050403号-1
- |
- 互联网新闻信息服务许可证：31120180004
- |
- 网络视听许可证：0909346
- |
- 广播电视节目制作许可证：沪字第354号
- |
- 增值电信业务经营许可证：沪B2-20120012
Copyright © 1999- Shanghai Daily. All rights reserved.Preferably viewed with Internet Explorer 8 or newer browsers.
