On Messenger???!!!!!
What the heck man!
I thought whatever you posted on FB or whatever message you sent in messenger was public knowledge and subpoenable.
The nerve of these animals.
Can we just corral them and expel them to like Christmas Island or something? as far far away from kids as we can.
Please Facebook, help us out here.
It’s a cancer on society that needs to eradicated. We need laws that put the child’s safety first above all.
5
Facebook needs to be held accountable for its culpability in this. This is a disgrace! If any form of media was spreading child pornography as Facebook and YouTube are they would be fined and then shut down. Why are tech companies still getting a free pass? Their profits are almost beyond comprehension yet they claim they can’t monitor it- it is a lie, they just don’t want to pay for it and they must be forced to now!
9
Men do this. Not technology. Men.
Y'all are blaming the messenger, excoriating the owners of the platforms (now that that has become sooooooo fashionable and everyone follows in lockstep), blaming cell phones, blaming, blaming, blaming. But no one even mentions the perpetrators. And they are consistently left out of the conversation about how sad and bad and tragic it all is. As if "it" is doing "itself."
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FB is a disgrace. It needs to be shut down. Let’s see what the impeached trump has to say about this report in his next tweet and then what the government does.
No reference to sexting in the story. I'm surprised.
1
Same sorry story. No principles; no integrity; no adherence to the law.
These problems have been around for quite a while. They've worsened over the last 3 years.
Anyone see a connection?
2
This points to ANOTHER huge problem with Facebook. It is a despicable company with leaders who lack integrity.
1
Another reason to remove yourself from Facebook.
2
So Apple is basically doing nothing. Buy an iPhone and store these abhorrent images and videos and you won’t be found.
4
Now is the time to regulate the internet. The time to end this digital wild west is now.
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It is important for tech companies to remove child pornography whenever they find it. But why aren't we talking about those uploading the repugnant material?
That topic isn't mentioned in this piece, when that is the radioactive problem here. The focus is all wrong.
There seems to be more care put into going after tech companies, and less care put into going after the genuine criminals on the topic at hand. So we have political theater: the appearance of doing something about a problem by going after convenient, easy, tangentially related targets, and less focus on the more difficult problem of catching the perpetrators.
The next time I read about child pornography online, it should be about how many uploaders of child pornography were arrested in the latest dragnet, and the details of their upcoming prosecution. We can hold hold tech company's feet to the fire all day long. There are still criminals out there exploiting children sexually.
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Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sanders do not care what content is on Facebook as they laugh all the way to the bank.
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What role do the cell phone companies like Verizon, Sprint , etc play in this? I would imagine that most of these photos/ videos are taken with mobile phones.
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@JCAZ They are taken by men, not phones.
8
There is something to be said about the degree of censorship and enforcement that is lacking in our systems and technologies.
UBER of late has come to realize that growth at any cost is not a viable strategy. Our eminent tech firms platforms completely ignored the predatory members that added to their stellar growth. Chasing the dollars takes precedent over protecting our children.
I would like to see and learn how China is able to control or suppress this on their Net. I don't recall any news like this coming out of the mid east either. Must be an American gateway that welcomes all comers no matter.
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@Nick just because you don't hear about it does not mean this is not happening in those cultures. Child abuse is global wide, not just a USA or Western behavior.
-----"Additionally, most child porn is produced overseas.most of the images found last year were traced to other countries — but one firmly rooted in the United States because of the central role Silicon Valley has played in facilitating the imagery’s spread and in reporting it to the authorities.
Source: the link posted at the bottom of the page.
3
Sexualization of children is awful. But we should be aware that more of our world is sexualized than just children.
The Super Bowl half time show for example.
But the biggest problem for sexual predators of children is that their emotional development is stunted. We ned to do a better job making sure our families and schools have enough energy and knowledge to help their kids mature. There is always some sort of pathology behind pedophilia.
Best prevention is helping families plan child-bearing. Only wanted children should be conceived. Modern science has given us wonders!! Contraception is a super-wonderful scientific achievement. Let's make family planning and contraception universally available and affordable. Give families their best chance of raising mentally healthy kids.
8
This report poses some serious questions and doubts. Are there really 70 million distinct child pornography images? Were they 69 million copies of the same image? Are they affirming that human beings actually looked at 70 million images? Or are these actually just flagged by computer algorithms and no one actually knows what the alleged images show? Was there not one prosecution of the alleged 70 million images? Or are all these affirmations not substantiated, not proveable in court, or exaggerations? Cops, prosecutors, and self-appointed guardians of children have a bad track record of making up, and exaggerating. It has become a career. Just this week all sexual assault charges were dropped against a doctor and his girlfriend because the prosecutor had simply lied when he claimed there were "1000s of videos of sexual assault." It turns out there were zero. Is there really a massive epidemic of child pornography and assault, as asserted? I certainly want pedophiles prosecuted, but based on real evidence and facts, not wild accusations. The NYT should check into these allegations. If true, we'd better start building large concentration camps for hundreds of thousands sharing 70 million images. Hmm.
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@AR, as the article points out, there are duplicates of images shared across different web platforms. However, a case prosecuted this week in the US but of international origin, there were one million children newly abused because of one person facilitating it through the server he ran on dark net.
https://www.rte.ie/news/ireland/2020/0206/1113690-irishman-pleads-guilty-to-child-pornography-in-us/
So, unfortunately, yes, it's on a massive scale.
5
WRONG. The article refers to 1 million images. Not 1 million children having been abused. You provided a perfect example of the utterly unsubstantiated exaggerations or downright falsification by so-called children's advocates. Only the truth will protect children and the rest of us from actual pedophilia.
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@AR
The investigation revealed that the hosting service contained over 8.5 million images of child exploitation material and over 1.97 million of these images and/or videos involved victims that were not known by law enforcement.
4
I have been following the NY Times series of articles on these horrible, shameful crimes against the humanity of children. From a child welfare researcher perspective, I understand the magnitude of the problem and the secrecy that is inherent in child sexual abuse. It all begs the question of why do men want to rape children? What happened to them that drives them to hurt and frighten even very little babies and toddlers? And, yes, I know that there are women who commit these crimes, but the stats are clearly driven by men. Men are the problem here. It infuriates me so many are getting away with it this kind of rape. And I feel incredibly sad for the suffering of so many children.
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"So many are getting away with rape..." Really? Do you have actual statistics or cases to cite for your wild assertion? "Many" as in thousands? How do you know? Is it a vast conspiracy? Or corrupt...(fill in the blank)? The actual fact is that you just made up your horrific accusation to frighten, anger and incite. You claim to be a "child welfare advocate"? Only the truth can help, and those who make careers by fear-mongering are not out to help children.
2
@AR ginger mentions she is researcher not advocate
5
The idea that FB or any of these tech companies will adequately self-police is ludicrous.
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Maybe - just maybe - Facebook will recognize its responsibility to vet the content on their “platform” and accept that they are indeed the largest media publisher on Planet Earth. Whether its child pornography, blithely circulating weaponized political falsehoods, or exploiting user data and shredding privacy, Facebook is making the world a far worse place.
8
User accounts that possess or share such content should be immediately disabled. The sheer volume of incidences makes it look like some of the tech companies are well aware their platforms are being used in this way but are turning a blind eye.
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@Amanda
If turning a blind eye helps bring in profit, then turning a blind eye is considered "just the way business goes" as Trump once said about his handling payments to contractors he stiffed.
3
I’m convinced that the internet is the worst thing humans have invented. It seems like everyday there is more negative news about what this technology has wrought. This just makes me sick.
9
Facebook accounts belong not to “people” but to “users,” collections of data points connected to other collections of data points on a vast Social Network, to be targeted and monetized by computer programs.
The company allowed Donald Trump’s presidential campaign to collect personal data on millions of Americans. It failed to notice Russia’s attempts to influence the 2016 election; facilitated ethnic and religious violence in several countries; and allowed advertisers to target such noble categories of consumers as “Jew haters.” Not to mention that fake news, conspiracy theories, and blatant lies abound on the platform.
Facebook is evil.
18
I despise child abuse, sexual or otherwise; a close friend was the 5-year victim of a neighbor, leading to severe lifelong consequences.
Never-the-less I support end-to-end encryption, banning facial recognition, as well as location tracking by any means, now disclosed as in use by ICE and others.
There must be other ways to uncover abusers, ways that do not require the rest of us - the vast majority - to surrender our necessary rights, badly needed to fight those who would be dictators, or who seek to punish us for our views.
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Thank you, this is the kind of response I was hoping to see here. a lot of the reactions to this series of articles have been knee jerk reactions that are either unsustainable or put civil liberties at jeopardy.
3
The numbers here are truly alarming. Sharing these images and videos is illegal, right? So why is there no mention of efforts to identify and prosecute the perpetrators?
Is the only response to play whack-a-mole? When will people who post child pornography online start going to jail?
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@Mark
Nothing gets done with men running the courts and the country.
Look at all the men for years protecting this blatantly guilty sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.
Look at all the men who would have been destroyed by Epstein's many secrets had he not, conveniently for them, died inexplicably.
It always has been and always will be "the old boy network".
5
It would be interesting to see if they track by the posted age, with so many young kids with photo camera texting and sharing nude picture of themselves, if their any age breakdown
@Joe
Let's start with gender, first.
How many women vs men are sexually abusing children.
1
Messenger should be taken down. The scale of this pain being caused is incalculable and outweighs any benefits of this technology. This technology permits abuse on an unbelievable scale.
14
As systems to catch these offenders improve, more will be caught.
My question: How do the recently enacted no-cash-bail policies in New York State affect the people who view, store and/or store these photos and videos?
In my smaller town, over 70% of people released under no-cash-bail didn’t show up for their court appearances in January, per the police department.
I imagine these folks would have a 100% no-show rate.
1
@Huh
No cash bail is going to be proven to be one of the biggest mistakes ever made. And those who pushed for it will simply justify and support it.
This is a global phenomenon, but the problem needs to be addressed locally, somehow. The people that do these things are our fathers, brothers, sons, daughters, mothers. Very hidden, very personal.
Statistically, Americans at least are probably more prudish than perverse, but somehow, we need to be more aware of it, that it is part of us. Perhaps marijuana use with it's great effect on libido, must also be contributing to an increase of isolating and self-destructive sexual behaviors, perhaps just a few steps removed from criminality.
1
@Alexia It's not a phenomenon. Child exploitation has been going on since the dawn of human kind. We're only just start to talk about it. And it has nothing to do with marijuana.
9
Just discovered? Ha. They're just now being disclosed, before the companies begin to be prosecuted. They all knew what has been going on.
19
The lawlessness of this criminal administration seems to be validating so many other lawless and obscene activities like this. Trump, NOT the example that I would wish for ANY child, has said it’s ok to commit the worst of crimes, whether you get caught or not. He has generated massive new employment opportunities for armies of crooked lawyers - possibly good for his fake jobs report. Ambulance chasers and Giulianis can now get jobs for much higher pay than working as politicians - their previous default position.
It’s only going to get worse as Barr fails to do his job and our DOJ becomes the criminal arm of Trump - not to mention State, CBP and DOD. What a wonderful, secure time to be alive. Thanks Republicans!
13
These tech companies, run primarily by young men, actively prioritize profit over the well-being and safety of children. Nowhere in this article does it mention that though Twitter bans individuals from their platform for the crime of 'misgendering,' they have changed their policies to allow pedophiles to use their platform freely under the heading of being a 'minor attracted person,' with the only caveat being that they do not 'glorify or promote' child abuse. They have actively chosen to allow pedophiles to congregate on their platform, make connections, and normalize these crimes. It sounds insane, but it's true.
10
Perhaps the most important question, one that is not posed nor answered by this article, is what happens once a "report" is sent by one of these companies to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children? Does the report include information which identifies the sender and/or receiver and/or host of the illegal content? Does law enforcement have unfettered access to that identifying information? If a Facebook is not providing such identifying information, then what makes it any different than a web-based company that knowingly abets criminal behavior by its users, e.g. Silk Road?
6
I would like to know how law enforcement responds after receiving these reports. What % lead to arrests? The report volume is so staggeringly large that I would expect this to lead to hundreds of thousands of arrests each year.
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@Bill according to the Sep article linked towards the bottom of this article, -----" most of the images found last year were traced to other countries — but one firmly rooted in the United States because of the central role Silicon Valley has played in facilitating the imagery’s spread and in reporting it to the authorities.
That means an international law enforcement effort is needed because a lion's share of child porn is produced outside the US.
9