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Wow. That must've been a pretty disgusting story to investigate. I heard people at Facebook that have to moderate this kind of stuff develop PTSD-like problems.

by dep_b 8y ago

duxup 8y ago
I mean how many shares of seeing folks beaten or even executed before it gets to you. Me ... 1.
- toufiqbarhamov 8y ago
  I’m still haunted by some of the things I stumbled across many years ago when I was exploring FTPs just to see what I could find. That all ended the day a video labeled “AMV 1” turned out to be (at least the few seconds I saw) a very young boy tied up and being raped. I reported anonymously to the FBI, but even then it was clear they were overwhelmed and I never heard back. If I had to see that kind of thing as a job, I’d die.
  - brownkonas 8y ago
    My friend is on the other side of this fence, FBI agent, that's had to conduct surveillance of child pornographers after tips like this to collect sufficient evidence to prosecute. Luckily, he was eventually transferred into a white collar crime division. There are a lot of revolting, but vital jobs out there. Hats off to those with the psychological disposition to handle them, even if not sustainable in the long term.
  - l0c0b0x 8y ago
    When I was looking at which professional direction to take, I started looking at government jobs (mostly law enforcement) and spoke with some industry people. My take was: Get prepared to look at a LOT of ugly stuff. Also heard horror stories that just thinking about it, makes me want to puke and punch somebody at the same time.
    - ryanmarsh 8y ago
      I have several LE friends including a homicide investigator. The common refrain is “you loose faith in humanity”. Which consequently, is why mental health for LE is of the utmost importance. Frankly it’s a public safety issue.
AlexandrB 8y ago
Yup. I knew someone who did this at BlackBerry. Very emotionally taxing work. Thankless too.
LinuxBender 8y ago
They are hiring the wrong people. Hire pedos. Just don't let them leave the room with anything. Felons need jobs too. There are no kids in the moderator rooms. Looks like some folks prefer they work around children instead.
- Consultant32452 8y ago
  Funny, I was thinking sociopaths. Most sociopaths aren't criminals, but wouldn't be affected by the material.
- danso 8y ago
  Hiring people, who don’t find child porn objectionable, to make decisions on whether reported child porn is objectionable, will have some drawbacks.
  - LinuxBender 8y ago
    Easy enough to test them with moderator uploaded material that only they can see.
    - LinuxBender 8y ago
      The more I think about this, you can have a serialized A->B filter. Filter A is the large group of convicted pedos. They won't likely be as traumatized as the B group. The B group is the existing moderators and will get whatever the A group missed. The A group should minimize the PTSD impact on the B group.
- darkpuma 8y ago
  > Looks like some folks prefer they work around children instead. Holy mother of all false dichotomies...
  - LinuxBender 8y ago
    I nominate you as leader of the free world. How would you put the released convicts to work?
partiallypro 8y ago
Microsoft itself was sued for PTSD over their anti-child porn efforts. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jan/11/microsoft-employees-child-abuse-lawsuit-ptsd https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jan/11/microsoft...
neurobashing 8y ago
I had a gig that was adult-industry-adjacent and the constant exposure to plain-jane porn became exhausting; I cannot imagine what this work is like.
jayalpha 8y ago
"That must've been a pretty disgusting story to investigate." Please, this is limited to law enforcement. DO NOT TRY TO INVESTIGATE THIS yourself. Looking and finding CP could be considered a crime already in your jurisdiction.
- RIMR 8y ago
  At the same time, citizen investigations can be powerful things. Investigating corporations for flippantly allowing child abuse materials to be indexed and distributed on their platforms should never be illegal. The fact that Israeli investigators did this research, rather than Americans (Google is an American company) shows that our own low enforcement clearly isn't doing it's job here. I have a toolchain for finding child abuse content on Youtube, and I use it to report videos to Youtube for takedown. It's absolutely insane that I can be held criminally responsible for finding this content - but Youtube is immune from consequences hosting it. Some of the videos I have found had millions of views. Many that I have reported have not been taken down.
tsuresh 8y ago
Radiolab did an episode[0] last year where they talked to Facebook content moderators. [0]: https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/post-no-evil https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/post-no-evil

Wow. That must've been a pretty disgusting story to investigate. I heard people at Facebook that have to moderate this kind of stuff develop PTSD-like problems.

by dep_b 8y ago

Wow. That must've been a pretty disgusting story to investigate. I heard people at Facebook that have to moderate this kind of stuff develop PTSD-like problems.

duxup 8y ago

I mean how many shares of seeing folks beaten or even executed before it gets to you. Me ... 1.

toufiqbarhamov 8y ago
I’m still haunted by some of the things I stumbled across many years ago when I was exploring FTPs just to see what I could find. That all ended the day a video labeled “AMV 1” turned out to be (at least the few seconds I saw) a very young boy tied up and being raped. I reported anonymously to the FBI, but even then it was clear they were overwhelmed and I never heard back. If I had to see that kind of thing as a job, I’d die.
- brownkonas 8y ago
  My friend is on the other side of this fence, FBI agent, that's had to conduct surveillance of child pornographers after tips like this to collect sufficient evidence to prosecute. Luckily, he was eventually transferred into a white collar crime division. There are a lot of revolting, but vital jobs out there. Hats off to those with the psychological disposition to handle them, even if not sustainable in the long term.
- l0c0b0x 8y ago
  When I was looking at which professional direction to take, I started looking at government jobs (mostly law enforcement) and spoke with some industry people. My take was: Get prepared to look at a LOT of ugly stuff. Also heard horror stories that just thinking about it, makes me want to puke and punch somebody at the same time.
  - ryanmarsh 8y ago
    I have several LE friends including a homicide investigator. The common refrain is “you loose faith in humanity”. Which consequently, is why mental health for LE is of the utmost importance. Frankly it’s a public safety issue.

AlexandrB 8y ago

Yup. I knew someone who did this at BlackBerry. Very emotionally taxing work. Thankless too.

LinuxBender 8y ago

They are hiring the wrong people. Hire pedos. Just don't let them leave the room with anything. Felons need jobs too. There are no kids in the moderator rooms. Looks like some folks prefer they work around children instead.

Consultant32452 8y ago
Funny, I was thinking sociopaths. Most sociopaths aren't criminals, but wouldn't be affected by the material.
danso 8y ago
Hiring people, who don’t find child porn objectionable, to make decisions on whether reported child porn is objectionable, will have some drawbacks.
- LinuxBender 8y ago
  Easy enough to test them with moderator uploaded material that only they can see.
  - LinuxBender 8y ago
    The more I think about this, you can have a serialized A->B filter. Filter A is the large group of convicted pedos. They won't likely be as traumatized as the B group. The B group is the existing moderators and will get whatever the A group missed. The A group should minimize the PTSD impact on the B group.
darkpuma 8y ago
> Looks like some folks prefer they work around children instead. Holy mother of all false dichotomies...
- LinuxBender 8y ago
  I nominate you as leader of the free world. How would you put the released convicts to work?

partiallypro 8y ago

Microsoft itself was sued for PTSD over their anti-child porn efforts. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jan/11/microsoft-employees-child-abuse-lawsuit-ptsd https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jan/11/microsoft...

neurobashing 8y ago

I had a gig that was adult-industry-adjacent and the constant exposure to plain-jane porn became exhausting; I cannot imagine what this work is like.

jayalpha 8y ago

"That must've been a pretty disgusting story to investigate." Please, this is limited to law enforcement. DO NOT TRY TO INVESTIGATE THIS yourself. Looking and finding CP could be considered a crime already in your jurisdiction.

RIMR 8y ago
At the same time, citizen investigations can be powerful things. Investigating corporations for flippantly allowing child abuse materials to be indexed and distributed on their platforms should never be illegal. The fact that Israeli investigators did this research, rather than Americans (Google is an American company) shows that our own low enforcement clearly isn't doing it's job here. I have a toolchain for finding child abuse content on Youtube, and I use it to report videos to Youtube for takedown. It's absolutely insane that I can be held criminally responsible for finding this content - but Youtube is immune from consequences hosting it. Some of the videos I have found had millions of views. Many that I have reported have not been taken down.

tsuresh 8y ago

Radiolab did an episode[0] last year where they talked to Facebook content moderators. [0]: https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/post-no-evil https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/post-no-evil