Internet Porn / Child porn

[Rod Serling]

Just curious and fascinated really about the whys, wherefores, rules and regs on these touchy subjects. Presumablky, as it's so very and heavily so, evident on the WWW, pornography of an adult and consenting nature is not illegal. I don't profess to surf these sites, but have been sent spam with stuff on, as it just doesn't interest me. As for child porrnography, this is highly illegal, and rightly so, but what concerns me is the possiblity, I or anyone else, for that matter, could be sent spam, and innocently open it up, only to have a thumbrpoint on their hard drive, and be open to prosecution. Incidentally, when you read the stories about people being done for lookin at images of childen, how do the police catch up with them, is a credit card thing like pete townshend or do they have inetlligence fromsearch engines, isp, internet providers or broadband companies? Don't want to fall foul of this stuff, so the more information to avoid it, the better.

[andy-hughes]

If you innocently open a spam e-mail with dodgy material on, then you have nothing to worry about - think of it as driving at 32 m.p.h. in a 30-zone. The police will be looking at you if you did 85 twice a day for a week - that's not an innocent mistake, that's flouting the law.

The police involved in tracking do have information from ISP's and appropriate monitoring agencies, but they are interested in the serial observers, and the sharers, rather than the one-time curious, and certainly not the inadvertent viewers such as yourself.

Sadly, child porn is on the increase, and police resources are so limited that they have to concentrate on the serious sharers and distributors - as in Operation Ore.

Remember, there is a world of difference between clicking inadvertently on a site, and the straight off again, or opening a spam without knowing the contents - as against deciding to take up a subscription offer which involves giving credit card details, that is a conscious decision to perpetuate the abuse of children, and deserves anything the law can provide to punish and prevent it.

Hope this sets your mind at rest.