IGF 2020 WS #91 Technology and innovation on behalf of the abused children.

Description:

The scale of CSAM (Child Sexual Abuse Materials) around the world is still tremendous despite joint efforts of the Police forces, internet hotlines and industry. 155,240 Child Sexual Abuse Materials related reports were exchanged between INHOPE members in 2018. This is an increase of almost 80% on 2017. 89% of reports are related to children 3-13 years old and 2% of the victims are less than 3 years old. The Internet is unfortunately constantly developing the ways of sharing, accessing and producing child sexual abuse imagery. Access to the Internet gives perpetrators new opportunities for abusing children – child grooming and self-generated content are trends increasing in last years. Behind every image there is a real child being abused, possibly in this very moment. There is a need of swift action, from deleting the content to victim and predator identification. This is a global problem requiring global and innovative solutions, taking into consideration different law regulations and crucial role of time of investigations concerning new materials. The issue is undoubtfully very important but research opportunity in this field is very limited, mainly because of organisational problems with human participation, due to the harmful nature of the content for the observer and possible secondary victimisation for abused minors. Eradication of CSAM from the Internet requires emerging technologies facilitating the process of gathering data from the internet and automated verification of the content. The industry has already presented some useful solutions but the constant development is essential, as well as working collaboration with other parties – internet hotlines, police and state representatives. Security solutions should be made available not only for huge platforms but also for small companies and developing countries because it is the only effective way to protect all the Network. The workshop is aimed to present an overview of current status of selected research projects concerning the use of the newest technologies like artificial intelligence in the field of fighting CSAM on the Internet and building cooperation among different stakeholders. The workshop also provides an opportunity to discuss limitations, chances and necessary policy development in the aspect of academia, industry and NGO shared responsibility for eradication of CSAM from the Internet.