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Articles like these always talk about how huge the child pornography business is, but the language always strikes me as similar to the scare stories from the 80

Articles like these always talk about how huge the child pornography business is, but the language always strikes me as similar to the scare stories from the 80s about satanist cults, etc. I guess I could be wrong, I don't know if there are reliable sources for that kind of information

DanBC 13y ago
The reliable sources are the hundreds of thousands of images of child sexual abuse on the hard drives of people arrested and prosecuted for these offences. Checksums of these images are made and distributed (to help find other copies; to help filter these images) and some people attempt to identify the victim in order to arrest and prosecute the offender and to offer help to the victim. Satanist cults were always wing-nuts and piss-poor media reporting. Unfortunately, there's some awful reporting about images of child sexual abuse, and the perpetrators of child abuse, and the victims of sexual abuse. (Demonising sexual abusers is not helpful.)
- wyager 13y ago
  The article claimed it was a "Multi-billion dollar industry". I don't think there's any compelling evidence that this is true.
  - DanBC 13y ago
    > I don't think there's any compelling evidence that this is true. Have you looked for evidence, or is that a feeling that you have? I'm not snarking, just wondering. I guess it depends how you count the money. There has been a decline in the use of credit cards to access images of child sexual abuse. Most images of child sexual abuse are free, or traded for other images. But commercial trading exists. The best site for modern information is Europol https://www.europol.europa.eu/sites/default/files/efc_strategic_assessment_-_public_version.pdf https://www.europol.europa.eu/sites/default/files/efc_strate... You have people hosting images, and people paying for access to those images, and people paying to have those images made. You have people travelling to rape children. You have adults selling children into the sex trade. I dunno, that feels like it could be a couple of billion dollars. Some offenders have millions of images in their collections.[1] In 2005 there were about a million images online.[2] About 50,000 images are added yearly.[3] Sometimes children are raped "on demand", with the video being streamed by the rapist to some one who has ordered and paid for that rape to happen on video, and who is directing the abuse.[4] Parents sell their children into the trade of images of child sexual abuse.[5] Wired have some pricing information. http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-10/16/child-abuse-images-entrepreneurs http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-10/16/child-abuse-i... > [previous para talks about decline in use of credit cards, and rise of free images of child sexual abuse] New material has also become a currency in itself, with value ascribed to the novelty of the images. So individual video clips might cost as little as $10 (£6.20) each, with subscriptions for $50 (£30) for three months. Although one video file of new material on demand can cost as much as $1,200 (£748). [1] http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/oct/05/sold-mum-dad-images-child-abuse http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/oct/05/sold-mum... [2][3] http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/home-affairs/what-we-do/policies/organized-crime-and-human-trafficking/global-alliance-against-child-abuse/index_en.htm http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/home-affairs/what-we-do/policies/org... [4] https://www.europol.europa.eu/content/new-cybercrime-report-examines-disturbing-trends-commercial-online-child-sex-abuse https://www.europol.europa.eu/content/new-cybercrime-report-... [5] http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/oct/05/sold-mum-dad-images-child-abuse http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/oct/05/sold-mum...
jimhefferon 13y ago
One way to judge that is to ask yourself if you know of any instances, personally. Personally, I don't know anyone in a satanic cult. But I can personally name people interested in child porn (e.g., they have been prosecuted for it). So the second seems credible to me whereas the first does not.
- speeder 13y ago
  I know 3 people in satanic cult, one of them even did criminal things. But I never met a pedophile.
anigbrowl 13y ago
If you read indictments and court judgments from sting operations on online child porn, the statistics are pretty depressing. It's been a while since I read any of that and have no desire to do so right now but the DoJ maintains a page about their investigations: http://www.justice.gov/criminal/ceos/subjectareas/childporn.html http://www.justice.gov/criminal/ceos/subjectareas/childporn....

DanBC 13y ago

The reliable sources are the hundreds of thousands of images of child sexual abuse on the hard drives of people arrested and prosecuted for these offences. Checksums of these images are made and distributed (to help find other copies; to help filter these images) and some people attempt to identify the victim in order to arrest and prosecute the offender and to offer help to the victim. Satanist cults were always wing-nuts and piss-poor media reporting. Unfortunately, there's some awful reporting about images of child sexual abuse, and the perpetrators of child abuse, and the victims of sexual abuse. (Demonising sexual abusers is not helpful.)

wyager 13y ago
The article claimed it was a "Multi-billion dollar industry". I don't think there's any compelling evidence that this is true.
- DanBC 13y ago
  > I don't think there's any compelling evidence that this is true. Have you looked for evidence, or is that a feeling that you have? I'm not snarking, just wondering. I guess it depends how you count the money. There has been a decline in the use of credit cards to access images of child sexual abuse. Most images of child sexual abuse are free, or traded for other images. But commercial trading exists. The best site for modern information is Europol https://www.europol.europa.eu/sites/default/files/efc_strategic_assessment_-_public_version.pdf https://www.europol.europa.eu/sites/default/files/efc_strate... You have people hosting images, and people paying for access to those images, and people paying to have those images made. You have people travelling to rape children. You have adults selling children into the sex trade. I dunno, that feels like it could be a couple of billion dollars. Some offenders have millions of images in their collections.[1] In 2005 there were about a million images online.[2] About 50,000 images are added yearly.[3] Sometimes children are raped "on demand", with the video being streamed by the rapist to some one who has ordered and paid for that rape to happen on video, and who is directing the abuse.[4] Parents sell their children into the trade of images of child sexual abuse.[5] Wired have some pricing information. http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-10/16/child-abuse-images-entrepreneurs http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-10/16/child-abuse-i... > [previous para talks about decline in use of credit cards, and rise of free images of child sexual abuse] New material has also become a currency in itself, with value ascribed to the novelty of the images. So individual video clips might cost as little as $10 (£6.20) each, with subscriptions for $50 (£30) for three months. Although one video file of new material on demand can cost as much as $1,200 (£748). [1] http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/oct/05/sold-mum-dad-images-child-abuse http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/oct/05/sold-mum... [2][3] http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/home-affairs/what-we-do/policies/organized-crime-and-human-trafficking/global-alliance-against-child-abuse/index_en.htm http://ec.europa.eu/dgs/home-affairs/what-we-do/policies/org... [4] https://www.europol.europa.eu/content/new-cybercrime-report-examines-disturbing-trends-commercial-online-child-sex-abuse https://www.europol.europa.eu/content/new-cybercrime-report-... [5] http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/oct/05/sold-mum-dad-images-child-abuse http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2013/oct/05/sold-mum...

jimhefferon 13y ago

One way to judge that is to ask yourself if you know of any instances, personally. Personally, I don't know anyone in a satanic cult. But I can personally name people interested in child porn (e.g., they have been prosecuted for it). So the second seems credible to me whereas the first does not.

speeder 13y ago
I know 3 people in satanic cult, one of them even did criminal things. But I never met a pedophile.

anigbrowl 13y ago

If you read indictments and court judgments from sting operations on online child porn, the statistics are pretty depressing. It's been a while since I read any of that and have no desire to do so right now but the DoJ maintains a page about their investigations: http://www.justice.gov/criminal/ceos/subjectareas/childporn.html http://www.justice.gov/criminal/ceos/subjectareas/childporn....