Executive Summary

Ireland's excellent record continues

In 2008 the Hotline did not receive a single report about illegal child pornography that was found to be hosted in the Republic of Ireland. This means that Ireland's excellent record continues, which is good news for all concerned who strive to keep the Internet a safer place, especially for children.

REPORTS

In brief, the statistics relating to reports received by the Hotline in 2008 are:

1966 total number of reports processed by the Hotline.
536 of the above were determined as illegal under Irish law.
476 of the illegal reports referred to child pornography,
8 referred to child trafficking and,
52 were other issues (such as racism, threats of violence against individuals and financial scams that had an Irish connection).
39 of the 536 proved to be duplicate reports, resulting in,
497 unique illegal reports.
These are broken down as follows:
443 child pornography and 6 child trafficking which were forwarded for action through INHOPE or to An Garda Síochána for forwarding through Interpol.
48 were other reports, mainly financial scams, which were forwarded as appropriate to Garda, host providers or other agencies.

Reports contd.

All cases where content was assessed as illegal by Hotline.ie proved to be hosted or distributed from outside the jurisdiction. This is corroborated by the fact that none of the other 32 INHOPE member hotlines around the world notified us of any content reported to them that was traced to Ireland. These facts suggest that measures being taken by ISPAI members are proving successful in convincing people that attempting to engage in illegal activity from ISPAI Internet facilities is just too high risk.

Also encouraging is that 92% of all sites confirmed to be illegal by the Hotline Content Analysts during 2008 are now either no longer in existence or no longer contain any illegal material. The effectiveness of Hotline.ie in combating illegal online content was further underscored during the year by the anonymous tip-off from a member of the public which resulted in a network of child abuse sites registered through Australia being closed down.

HOTLINE.IE BACKGROUND

Hotline.ie is a service run by the Internet Service Providers Association of Ireland (ISPAI) to combat illegal content, particularly child pornography, on the Internet. This facility allows the public to submit reports about suspicious content they have encountered online. The objective is to have a rapid response system to remove from public access any illegal content found to be hosted on, or being distributed from, ISPAI members' Internet facilities.

hotline.ie background contd.

It also serves to notify An Garda Síochána of such occurrences so they may initiate investigations. The Hotline is a crucial element in the combination of initiatives aimed at improving Internet safety coming from Government, An Garda Síochána, industry, educational and child welfare bodies. ISPAI members promote and financially support the Hotline service as part of their actions to help protect their services and customers from exposure to illegal content. The Hotline also receives part-funding from the European Commission.

TRENDS

From January 2008 to 31st December 2008 the Hotline processed 1,966 reports. This is a drop of 624 reports on the 2,590 processed in 2007. This 24% decline continues on from the 3.25% decrease seen in the previous year. A very welcome trend new in 2008 was the massive reduction of cases where illegal child pornography was found to be hosted in Russia.

The number of reports assessed as illegal fell for the first time since the Hotline was established. This declinewas from a high of 828 in 2007 to 536 in 2008. It has been observed that the proportion of reports received and verified as referring to illegal content did not change significantly between 2007 (32% illegal) and 2008 (27% illegal).

Analysis of the figures suggests that the decline reflects that the public simply do not encounter illegal content with the same frequency as in previous years.

trends contd.

Similar observations have been reported by other INHOPE hotlines. This could be a turning point reflecting some degree of success due to the sustained worldwide effort to counter child abuse images on the Internet.

INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION

As the Internet today is a vast global entity, national action alone would be largely ineffective against the purveyors of child pornography. To ensure its greater effectiveness in dealing with illegal content originating in other jurisdictions, Hotline.ie maintains its membership of INHOPE (International Association of Internet Hotlines). Through INHOPE, details of illegal content discovered by a hotline in one country can be swiftly forwarded for action to another member country's hotline. In 2008 Luxembourg's hotline joined the INHOPE network as did the new organisation which took over hotline operations in Cyprus.

CONCLUSION

While illegal content makes up only a minute percentage of all Internet material, it is vital that users appreciate the necessity of reporting and where they can make reports. Ireland's continued clean record is outstanding; none of the reports received by the Hotline and assessed as child pornography were found to be hosted or distributed from this country.

conclusion contd.

However, there is no room for complacency. This is an international fight on the international network that is the Internet, and Ireland must play its part. It is extremely important that the public do not ignore content encountered that they suspect to be illegal but report it.

Public reporting plays an essential part in making the Internet a safer environment for all users, particularly children, not just here in Ireland but around the world.