Teenagers the biggest viewers of child pornography

TEENAGERS are the biggest viewers of child pornography, with a new study warning of stronger evidence that offenders who download the material may be more likely to commit sex crimes against children.

The investigation, conducted in New Zealand, follows a recent Irish study which found that one third of child sex abusers are in their teens.

In the US, 36% of men convicted of downloading child pornography have subsequently been convicted of sexually abusing children, warns Rachel O’Connell, Cork-born director of the Cyberspace Research Unit at the University of Central Lancashire.

“Just as paedophiles groom children for abuse, the process of using internet images to fuel sexual arousal around children is a grooming process in itself,” said Ms O’Connell.

“The websites celebrate paedophilia, describe it as a normal aspect of sexuality and assert that the children in the pictures enjoy and even instigate the abuse.

“The children pictured are being abused again every time a paedophile uses an image,” she said.

The number of images of child sex abuse has grown hugely in recent years. What once seemed a rare perversion is now commonplace and has become an international phenomenon.

The internet not only allows people the world over to access child porn sites but also to form friendships with other like-minded individuals and swap information with them on how to access those sites.

The sites have been growing at such an alarming rate that Combating Paedophile Information Network Europe, the University College Cork-based research and investigative project, transferred its data base of images to Interpol’s office in France.

In a statement, project leader Prof Max Taylor said: “Since 1997 the number of abuse images available on the internet has increased dramatically, making it increasingly difficult to maintain the database on a research budget.

“We feel that Interpol is the logical home for such a resource and that they are best placed to build on what COPINE has achieved. Through Interpol it will continue to be available to police forces around the world.”

What COPINE has achieved has been considerable, helping to track child porn users, identify victims and put paedophiles behind bars. The astonishing investigative ability of Professor Taylor and his team first came to light five years ago when they helped British police jail a child abuser.

Darren Rowlings from Berkshire, England, was tracked down by police after COPINE discovered internet pictures of him raping his four-year-old daughter.

Rowlings, a 25-year-old computer systems expert, was jailed for 12 years after pleading guilty to a series of sex offences.

COPINE is constantly on the look-out for new images, abuse that is happening currently, which gives them a greater chance of catching the abuser and saving the children.

Between one and two new child victims appear on the internet every two months, says Professor Taylor.

“We do come across a lot of stuff that is 40 years old, when it was legal to make and possess child pornography.

“A lot of the images we find are from America, Europe, Scandinavia and Holland. The newer material tends to be domestic and from all over the world, including Ireland. But a good majority of what we discover is from very poor countries where it’s easy to buy a child or bribe a parent, such as in Central America, Thailand, the Far East and the Philippines.”