Child Abusers Run Rampant as Tech Companies Look the Other Way (nytimes.com) (jamesmarshlaw.com) – Nov 09 2019
Topics: Yahoo, Times, Google, Microsoft, sexual abuse, Dropbox, PhotoDNA detection tool, known illicit content
- The scope of the problem is only starting to be understood because the tech industry has been more diligent in recent years in identifying online child sexual abuse material, with a record 45 million photos and videos flagged last year.
- The largest social network in the world, Facebook, thoroughly scans its platforms, accounting for over 90 percent of the imagery flagged by tech companies last year, but the company is not using all available databases to detect the material.
- The two sisters are among the first generation of child sexual abuse victims whose anguish has been preserved on the internet, seemingly forever.
- Mr. Gonzalez told the authorities that he had used Microsoft’s search engine, Bing, to find some of the illegal photos and videos, according to court documents.
- The web addresses were sent to Microsoft’s PhotoDNA service , which is used by technology companies to identify known abuse imagery.
- Tech companies have known for years that videos of children being sexually abused are shared on their platforms, according to former employees at Microsoft, Twitter, Tumblr and other companies.
- A Florida man, Gregory Householder, told investigators that he had used online platforms for eight years and had regularly shared logins to Dropbox accounts with other offenders.
- Though platforms bar child sexual abuse imagery on the web, criminals are exploiting gaps.
Victims of sexual abuse and electronic child pornography deserve justice. We help them find it. For more information, including an explanation of what to expect in the legal process, a checklist for parents and victims, answers to frequently asked questions, and other information, please click here, call or text Hurley McKenna & Mertz, P.C. today at 312.553.4900.
