Analysis > Forwarding Reports
Forwarding Reports
In 2007 the incidence of unique reports (duplicates excluded) assessed by the Hotline and determined as being illegal has increased again compared to 2006. Of the total number of reports received by the Hotline in 2007 26.4% were determined as being probably illegal under Irish law compared with just 15.7% in 2006.
Unique illegal reports 2007
In more than half of reports confirmed as probably illegal child pornography, the severity of content was assessed to be very high. Most of this material was found on the open preview pages of pay-sites that are operated by organised criminals. Other cases where severity is high is where photo or video sharing sites or P2P services have been misused by paedophile rings. Where the content is less severe, it is not unusual for the material to be hosted in countries where the age of consent is lower than in Ireland. Hence while the content may be deemed illegal under Irish law it is not so under the local law and these sites will continue to operate. In such cases the Hotline will forward the report through the appropriate channel to the apparent country of origin. It is up to the receiving country to decide whether or not it also breaks their law and whether it is appropriate to remove material from the Internet.
All reports where the content was confirmed as probably illegal child pornography were traced to locations outside of Ireland and forwarded for action to either other INHOPE hotline members or to An Garda Síochána to be routed through police channels. The fact that no reports received by the Hotline were traced to Ireland shows that the strategy in this country must be working and appear to be preventing such misuse of local Internet facilities.
Location to which reports determined as referring to illegal content were forwarded in 2007.
Most of the reports determined as probably illegal under Irish Law were traced as apparently located in either the USA (222 reports) or Russia (207 reports). As there is no INHOPE member hotline currently in Russia, these reports were passed on to An Garda Síochána who in turn liaise with international police organisations such as Interpol and Europol to forward information about illegal content to the appropriate jurisdiction.
Countries where CP content appeared to be hosted in 2007.
The USA was the highest recipient of reports from the Hotline. The reports are forwarded to NCMEC CyberTipline, the US INHOPE member Hotline, who in turn works with US law enforcement to tackle illegal material found on Internet services.
The high incidence of report forwarding to the USA does not imply that all of this child pornographic content is being compiled in the USA nor that all the child victims in this content are to be found in the USA. The USA has numerous organisations providing hosting and Internet facilities at international level which gives a very open Internet environment. Many innovative web services are hosted on these servers, often based on economies of scale and advertising models supported by the US market, which offer free limited services to users around the world. Despite strict terms and conditions of service, unfortunately, these facilities do get exploited by criminals from around the globe. To change the way in which these facilities do business in an attempt to suppress illegal content, would be to punish the overwhelming majority of legitimate users for the misuse perpetrated by a very few. However, the US CyberTipline, ISPs and law enforcement authorities do act. Often material reported to the Hotline after business hours on one evening will be found to have an "already removed" notice displayed when the Hotline investigates the following morning.
