French authorities have arrested nearly 100 people in connection with a huge international child pornography ring following an investigation launched last year by the National Gendarmerie.
France's gendarmerie, the police in charge of fighting cybercrime, on Thursday recovered approximately 122 computers, 152 smartphones, and 375,000 photos and 156,000 It revealed that they had seized 330 other digital media devices containing books, videos and a total of 217 terabytes of data. Operation International Child Pornography.
So far, 95 people have been arrested in France in connection with the incident, including directors of youth organizations, sports instructors and even the deputy mayor. le figaro report. Most of the suspects have already admitted their guilt in the case, the paper said.
Thirty-six of those arrested were already known to police to have previously committed sex crimes against children or visited websites containing child pornography. All suspects were males between the ages of 18 and 74, with the exception of one minor who was 16 years old.
The investigation began in December after an examination of an individual's mobile phone revealed multiple discussion groups about child pornography on the encrypted messaging application Signal. It started.
Colonel Hervé Petri of the National Cyber Unit (UNC) said: “Hidden behind these forums are child criminals who can be predatory and potentially very dangerous.'' It's the entire galaxy.”
“The fight against child crime is an area in which the Military Police has made significant investment and dedication for decades. Thanks to the rise of social networks, this problem has exploded. Since then, it has taken on a really very worrying aspect. Before social networks, it took several years for these people to have access to these kinds of images. Especially now,” he explained.
Petry added: “Nowadays, thanks to social networks, images and videos can be exchanged so easily that there is a 'growing supply'.”
