Switched has a new home! Huffpost Tech.

Click here to visit the new home of Switched!

Hot on HuffPost Tech:

See More Stories
AOL Tech

Rising Online Child Abuse Complaints

by Tom Conlon on April 18, 2007 at 08:30 AM

Rising Online Child Abuse Complaints
According to its 2006 numbers, the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) is reporting a 34-percent increase in online child abuse complaints since 2005. Though some of the increase is due in part to greater awareness of the IWF itself, the report also points to newer methods being employed by illegal sites for avoiding detection or legal action. One such method involves cutting up pornographic images into several smaller, seemingly innocuous images, and hosting them on various servers all over the world, only to piece them back together on a Web page. Another method is to frequently relocate servers to foreign countries -- a tact that has helped one scofflaw site stay online despite 224 complaints since 2002.

The report also identifies the United States as the country of origin for a majority of the Web sites the IWF received complaints about: nearly 55 percent. Russia was number two with more than 28 percent.

From BBC News

Tags: abuse, child, illegal, kiddie, online, porn

Add your comments

Please keep your comments relevant to this blog entry. Email addresses are never displayed, but they are required to confirm your comments.

When you enter your name and email address, you'll be sent a link to confirm your comment, and a password. To leave another comment, just use that password.

To create a live link, simply type the URL (including http://) or email address and we will make it a live link for you. You can put up to 3 URLs in your comments. Line breaks and paragraphs are automatically converted — no need to use <p> or <br /> tags.

HuffPost AOL Social News Most Popular