ISPs Block Access to Child Porn

• By theWHIR.com , June 10, 2008

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By Justin Lee, theWHIR.com

June 10, 2008 -- (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) -- Internet service providers Verizon (verizon.com), Sprint (sprint.com) and Time Warner Cable (timewarner.com) have all agreed to block access to child pornography and remove such material from their servers, said New York's attorney general Tuesday.

As part of an agreement with New York attorney general Andrew Cuomo, the new initiative will see companies severe all access to newsgroups that spread child pornographic material on Usenet, as well as websites that host these kinds of images and videos.

Cuomo said the companies have also agreed to pay $1.1 million to help back efforts to remove the online child porn created and circulated by users through their services, which will affect customers nationwide.

Investigators said they discovered 88 newsgroups that distribute child pornography in their six to eight month undercover investigation of child porn newsgroups.

The team gathered more than 11,000 images using software that detects child pornography by analyzing patterns in the pixels of the images, said Cuomo's office.

Cuomo said that his office is still investigating other service providers. He has used similar tactics and the possibility of civil or criminal charges to extract concessions on Internet safety in the past.

The companies acted immediately when Cuomo's office approached them with the issue by shutting down the sites, said Cuomo, adding that it was imperative to work with ISPs instead of going after thousands of users alone.

"There's no doubt this is a tough issue," Cuomo said at a news conference. "People are very creative and there is a market for this filth... We have to work together."

As two of the five largest ISPs in the world, Verizon boasts 8.2 million subscribers while Time Warner Cable's Road Runner has 7.9 million. Sprint is one of the three largest wireless companies in the nation.

In March, an internal audit of the US Justice Department found discrepancies in the number of child pornography websites or Web hosts shut down in FBI investigations.

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