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This topic needs merged out. What is a picture of child exploitation? Perhaps, a picture of a baby naked? Or how about a kid doing somewhat lewd acts fully clo

This topic needs merged out. What is a picture of child exploitation? Perhaps, a picture of a baby naked? Or how about a kid doing somewhat lewd acts fully clothed? Or how about pictures by others of those child beauty pageants? Who actually describes lewd? Or is it in the eyes of the beholder of the picture for those gray areas? Next, "child porn" pictures are a possess-only crime, no mens rea required. So, how do we tell if a picture is a legal 18 yr old, instead an evil completely morally corrupt (but legal to fuck) 17 year old?

darkarmani 14y ago
Even better, sending CP to every single politician should automatically make them all felons. Possession is what is illegal, so I'm just waiting for an internet virus that spreads CP onto millions of computers.
- DanBC 14y ago
  To echo lotharbot, English law requires "knowledge" for a offence to have been committed.
- lotharbot 14y ago
  According to US courts, "possession" requires knowledge. via http://www.nycourts.gov/ctapps/Decisions/2012/May12/70opn12.pdf http://www.nycourts.gov/ctapps/Decisions/2012/May12/70opn12.... and quoted in more depth elsewhere in this thread.
  - darkarmani 14y ago
    Is that only in NY? I know in MA and NH, there were some huge sexting scandals. Girl's were texting naked pictures of themselves to their boyfriends. The girls were getting charged with distribution of child pornography, but they were going to charge the boyfriends for possession as well. Notice when the controversy is about our "normal" kids, all of a sudden everyone thought the law was too harsh. For everyone that thinks any criticism of CP possession laws is support for pedophiles, do you support every 17 year old girl becoming felons for sexting their boyfriends? Text messages are push, so how would you defend against this as a receiver?
    - lotharbot 14y ago
      The decision cites federal law: "to possess the images in the cache, the defendant must, at a minimum, know that the unlawful images are stored on a disk or other tangible material in his possession". Text and pic messages are push, but (at least on my phone) pictures aren't downloaded until you access the message, at which point it's marked as "read". So at least one valid defense is to have not accessed the message -- you can't knowingly possess it in that case. What if you've already accessed it? US CP laws explicitly allow an "affirmative defense" [0] if you possess only a small number of images and, upon discovering this possession, either immediately destroy them or immediately turn them over to law enforcement [1]. So if you receive a sext message from someone underage, quickly deleting it should shield you from prosecution (IANAL TINLA [2].) [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirmative_defense http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirmative_defense - in essence, affirming the facts of the case, but offering a justification/excuse that demonstrates one is not culpable. [1] http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2252A http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2252A section (d) [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IANAL http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IANAL
    - TheAmazingIdiot 14y ago
      To make "distribution of child pronography" even more weird... SCOTUS ruled* that children photographed not engaged in lewd acts does not commit a crime. In other words: Children nudists are legal to photograph. Kids in bathtub are legal to photograph. A 13 year old "seductively" sucking on a banana, fully clothed, is illegal. ? A guy fapping to pictures of legal children nudists makes those pictures illegal? So... What rules would be appropriate for the spirit of the law?
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
DanBC 14y ago
I've had to censor this post to avoid a filter. > What is a picture of child exploitation? I didn't use the word exploitation. I carefully used the word abuse. Obviously there are different levels of abuse. At the more severe[1] end are images where the child's face is clear; where the child is obviously younger than 18 (and probably younger than 12) and where a p----[3] or object is inserted in a va----, an--, or mouth. At the less severe end are images where there is only a single person, that person looks to be 18, that person looks to have been a willing model, and that person is partially clothed. You say no mens rea required, and that is a troubling aspect of UK law. (What does a sysadmin do if s/he finds an image of child sexual abuse on his/her computer, downloaded by a user? Who 'owns' that image, and who goes to jail for it?) But the courts are happy to use mens rea if it helps - a man with a conviction for child sexual abuse was visited by police, who found a tape he'd made from broadcast tv adverts. He admitted he used this as masturbatory material, and was prosecuted. And "knowledge" is required by English courts. I'd agree that the law is a bit broken when we're talking about adult looking 17 year olds (a 17 and 11 month old with lots of life experience etc could be sensible enough to make that decision) or young looking 21 year olds. (Someone who is 21 but appears to be under 18 is tricky area.) Or the popular example of "s--ting" - someone under 18 taking a photo and sending that to a friend also under 18. (Several laws potentially committed, especially if there's any persuasion going on.) I kind of hope that police, prosecutors, and courts are balanced enough to not bother investigation, prosecuting, or convicting someone who has a collection of nude photos of people who are 18 but who might be 17; especially if there's no other offending happening. But I realise I'm being optimistic. For reference: The Criminal Prosecution Service has some nice information (http://www.cps.gov.uk/legal/h_to_k/indecent_photographs_of_children/ http://www.cps.gov.uk/legal/h_to_k/indecent_photographs_of_c...) Since the results of an investigation, charge, prosecution, or[2] conviction are so serious for the suspect it'd be nice if there was a bit of clarity. [1] All child sexual abuse is severe. So, now we're in that domain we re-calibrate the word severe. [2] carefully chosen 'or'. [3] fill in the blanks; avoided spam filter.

darkarmani 14y ago

Even better, sending CP to every single politician should automatically make them all felons. Possession is what is illegal, so I'm just waiting for an internet virus that spreads CP onto millions of computers.

DanBC 14y ago
To echo lotharbot, English law requires "knowledge" for a offence to have been committed.
lotharbot 14y ago
According to US courts, "possession" requires knowledge. via http://www.nycourts.gov/ctapps/Decisions/2012/May12/70opn12.pdf http://www.nycourts.gov/ctapps/Decisions/2012/May12/70opn12.... and quoted in more depth elsewhere in this thread.
- darkarmani 14y ago
  Is that only in NY? I know in MA and NH, there were some huge sexting scandals. Girl's were texting naked pictures of themselves to their boyfriends. The girls were getting charged with distribution of child pornography, but they were going to charge the boyfriends for possession as well. Notice when the controversy is about our "normal" kids, all of a sudden everyone thought the law was too harsh. For everyone that thinks any criticism of CP possession laws is support for pedophiles, do you support every 17 year old girl becoming felons for sexting their boyfriends? Text messages are push, so how would you defend against this as a receiver?
  - lotharbot 14y ago
    The decision cites federal law: "to possess the images in the cache, the defendant must, at a minimum, know that the unlawful images are stored on a disk or other tangible material in his possession". Text and pic messages are push, but (at least on my phone) pictures aren't downloaded until you access the message, at which point it's marked as "read". So at least one valid defense is to have not accessed the message -- you can't knowingly possess it in that case. What if you've already accessed it? US CP laws explicitly allow an "affirmative defense" [0] if you possess only a small number of images and, upon discovering this possession, either immediately destroy them or immediately turn them over to law enforcement [1]. So if you receive a sext message from someone underage, quickly deleting it should shield you from prosecution (IANAL TINLA [2].) [0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirmative_defense http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirmative_defense - in essence, affirming the facts of the case, but offering a justification/excuse that demonstrates one is not culpable. [1] http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2252A http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2252A section (d) [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IANAL http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IANAL
  - TheAmazingIdiot 14y ago
    To make "distribution of child pronography" even more weird... SCOTUS ruled* that children photographed not engaged in lewd acts does not commit a crime. In other words: Children nudists are legal to photograph. Kids in bathtub are legal to photograph. A 13 year old "seductively" sucking on a banana, fully clothed, is illegal. ? A guy fapping to pictures of legal children nudists makes those pictures illegal? So... What rules would be appropriate for the spirit of the law?

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

DanBC 14y ago

I've had to censor this post to avoid a filter. > What is a picture of child exploitation? I didn't use the word exploitation. I carefully used the word abuse. Obviously there are different levels of abuse. At the more severe[1] end are images where the child's face is clear; where the child is obviously younger than 18 (and probably younger than 12) and where a p----[3] or object is inserted in a va----, an--, or mouth. At the less severe end are images where there is only a single person, that person looks to be 18, that person looks to have been a willing model, and that person is partially clothed. You say no mens rea required, and that is a troubling aspect of UK law. (What does a sysadmin do if s/he finds an image of child sexual abuse on his/her computer, downloaded by a user? Who 'owns' that image, and who goes to jail for it?) But the courts are happy to use mens rea if it helps - a man with a conviction for child sexual abuse was visited by police, who found a tape he'd made from broadcast tv adverts. He admitted he used this as masturbatory material, and was prosecuted. And "knowledge" is required by English courts. I'd agree that the law is a bit broken when we're talking about adult looking 17 year olds (a 17 and 11 month old with lots of life experience etc could be sensible enough to make that decision) or young looking 21 year olds. (Someone who is 21 but appears to be under 18 is tricky area.) Or the popular example of "s--ting" - someone under 18 taking a photo and sending that to a friend also under 18. (Several laws potentially committed, especially if there's any persuasion going on.) I kind of hope that police, prosecutors, and courts are balanced enough to not bother investigation, prosecuting, or convicting someone who has a collection of nude photos of people who are 18 but who might be 17; especially if there's no other offending happening. But I realise I'm being optimistic. For reference: The Criminal Prosecution Service has some nice information (http://www.cps.gov.uk/legal/h_to_k/indecent_photographs_of_children/ http://www.cps.gov.uk/legal/h_to_k/indecent_photographs_of_c...) Since the results of an investigation, charge, prosecution, or[2] conviction are so serious for the suspect it'd be nice if there was a bit of clarity. [1] All child sexual abuse is severe. So, now we're in that domain we re-calibrate the word severe. [2] carefully chosen 'or'. [3] fill in the blanks; avoided spam filter.