Technology@lemmy.worldbyDeep@mander.xyz
17 hours

Commercial Children sexual abuse websites have doubled from 7,028 sites(2024) to 15,031 sites(2025), Generating profits for the gangs operating them

www.iwf.org.uk English

Data.

The charity warns organised criminals are taking advantage of “systemic failures” in online security infrastructure.

Commercial websites host a wide range of child sexual abuse imagery which is available for users to buy. The imagery for sale can involve victims of all ages, and can include some of the most severe and extreme forms of sexual abuse.

Some of these sites have been deliberately disguised to appear as non-criminal sites or to look inactive in an attempt to operate on the open web while avoiding detection. Many of these sites accept payment via cryptocurrencies, card payments or money transfer services.

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    Profiting From Abuse: Crackdown Urged on Commercial CSAM
    www.iwf.org.uk
    Commercial child sexual abuse sites have doubled as gangs profit online. IWF urges tougher laws on payments, platforms and encryption.
    • Tollana1234567@lemmy.todayEnglish
      7 hours

      there was some sites like that disguised as a reddit style pics/ adult porn, its only when they get to look at the users profiles it will eventually lead to CP discussion. one last decade was shutdown for its inability to pay the bills/ or some legal issue who the owner was, not because of the cp people were complaining about.

    • Optional@lemmy.worldEnglish
      13 hours

      Y’all know pedophiles run the world, right? Like, NO one is stopping them in any but the most limited ways.

    • nymnympseudonym@piefed.socialEnglish
      17 hours

      We can mobilize tens of thousands of ICE officers to get day laborers, but can’t afford a few hundred detectives to hunt down these eminently findable clearnet site operators.

      • FlowerFan@piefed.blahaj.zoneEnglish
        5 hours

        In all fairness, the ICE goons are probably hunting down a lot of these sites in their free time, if you catch my drift.

      • southsamurai@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        17 hours

        In “fairness”, all it takes to be an ice agent is two legs, a trigger finger and the ability to goose step with one hand raised. It takes a small amount of actual brain power to do real investigations

      • IratePirate@feddit.orgEnglish
        14 hours

        Well, who would have thunk that people would suffer and pedophiles would be enjoying safe havens if we put the Epstein class in charge of the country?

    • Buffalox@lemmy.worldEnglish
      17 hours

      If these sites are known, why are they allowed to operate? AFAIK there is no country where it is legal.

      • MurrayL@lemmy.worldEnglish
        16 hours

        In some cases they’re deliberately allowed to operate as a honey trap, allowing authorities to identify and arrest as many users as possible.

        If you simply shut the site down, the users go elsewhere and you have to find them again.

        • MonkderVierte@lemmy.zipEnglish
          2 hours

          to identify and arrest as many users as possible.

          You mean, to identify the gangs running them. Identifying the users helps nothing, same for just shutting it down.

          Just wanted to point out the erronous criminalizing the user mindset the media mafia pushes.

            • MonkderVierte@lemmy.zipEnglish
              2 hours

              Depends on jurisdiction. And better they watch it and not do it, no? Remember, pedophilia is a disorder.

        • Buffalox@lemmy.worldEnglish
          16 hours

          OK, personally I don’t think such honey traps should be legal, you can never say for sure, that a person falling for it, would use an illegal site if the honey trap didn’t exist.
          IMO it’s immoral, and luckily in my country they are in principle illegal, although the police here is trying to push the line on that.

          The honey trap could be the thing that “ignited” the interest for an individual!
          It can also be the trigger for other people to make similar sites, as in if they can do it, we can do it too.
          Honey traps break with the fundamentals of justice in many ways, and making them legal is a sign of a sick society IMO.

          • Zozano@aussie.zoneEnglish
            14 hours

            You don’t just accidentally stumble upon a honey pot/illegal website, you intentionally stumble into them by going to shady websites, and then clicking links to even shadier websites.

            Why would you click on the links to these shadier websites? Because the thumbnails approximate what you’re looking for; barely legal teens, only not barely.

            Pedophelic interest doesn’t “ignite”. It’s not like other kinks/fetishes which require exposure to discover.

            The real immorality of the issue should come from the fact that the honey pots are still using child sexual abuse material, which is almost certainly used without the adult victims consent.

            This does raise an interesting ethical dilemma; if an adult consents to law enforcement using CSAM made while they were a minor for the purposes of identifying individuals with the capacity to cause harm, or contribute financially to those causing harm - is that ethical?

            • Buffalox@lemmy.worldEnglish
              6 hours

              You don’t just accidentally stumble upon a honey pot/illegal website

              That is probably true, I have never seen such a site myself, and if I stumbled upon it, I would leave immediately.

              The real immorality of the issue should come from the fact that the honey pots are still using child sexual abuse material, which is almost certainly used without the adult victims consent.

              I don’t get how that can be legal. But USA is very extreme with their double standards in their laws.

            • Tollana1234567@lemmy.todayEnglish
              8 hours

              usually those kinks and fetishes are not found in the traditional PH-type websites so the user look for sites that are off the grid, like yo said shady sketchy and one of them leads to CP eventually.

      • crusa187@lemmy.mlEnglish
        16 hours

        Is it really illegal if it’s intentionally never prosecuted?

        • Buffalox@lemmy.worldEnglish
          16 hours

          Seems it’s not illegal if you are a billionaire.
          But at least in Europe it has consequences for people if they are in the Epstein files.
          But in USA it seems it’s just considered to be a group of friends with special interests! 🤢

    • fira@lemmy.todayEnglish
      17 hours

      I wonder if the pedo-king Donald Trump has a stake in these sites, meaning they’ll never be taken down

      • EvergreenGuru@lemmy.worldEnglish
        15 hours

        Nope, he had a guy for that. Plus he could get someone to find him a woman like Stormy Daniels.

        • MnemonicBump@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
          13 hours

          I’m sorry to tell you, but Epstein isn’t the going guy doing this for rich and powerful elites. Not by a long shot.

            • MnemonicBump@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
              2 hours

              Yes, that’s my point. Just because he’s dead does not mean that all of the his has stopped. This type of guy has existed for a long time, and there are a lot of them. If anything, this whole Epstein thing is the perfect distraction from the fact that this is all still actively happening.

    • Fishnoodle@lemmy.worldEnglish
      17 hours

      Who would have thought, Trump steals another election and now pedos are making more money than ever