Brussels: “The estimated number of unreported cases of child pornography on the Internet has increased tremendously," says Sabine Verheyen, a member of the European Parliament.

by Oystein Samnoen

Kids and Media attended the hearing, where the EU announced increased efforts against online child abuse.

”The technological development and the global network of online criminals have created a number of new tasks and challenges for European governments,” according to Verheyen.

The hearing in the European Parliament was part of the work towards a forthcoming EU directive related to online abuse of children and young people.

EU Commissioner Cecilia Malmström said:
“According to the Internet Watch Foundation, 80% of child abuse images depict children under 10 years of age. Images are becoming increasingly explicit. EU wants to implement a series of measures to eradicate the existence of child abuse images.”

The Commissioner underlined the seriousness of child abuse being distributed in the form of images and video clips via the Internet:

“These abuses do not only occur during the act itself, but every time someone looks at the picture afterwards.”

More focus on prevention
Gordon Alexander, director of UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre, stressed the importance of equipping children and parents to be confident users of the Internet:

“It is necessary to provide children, young people and parents with basic skills. Children do not distinguish between the analog and the virtual world. The balance between equipping children as competent users and at the same time protecting young users is a dilemma.”

He also stressed that EU's new draft Directive on prevention and control should be more preventive in nature before the Directive is passed. This was supported by Stephanie zu Guttenberg, president of the organisation "Innocence In Danger":

“We must strengthen measures aimed at sexual offenders and predators to prevent child abuse happening.”

Important, but difficult, work
Kids and Media was represented by Director Oystein Samnoen at the hearing in the European Parliament in Brussels on 1 July 2010:

“I support Gordon Alexander's emphasis on prevention, which includes providing children and parents with good user knowledge. EU's escalation of the fight against online abuse is an important, but difficult, mission in the face of an increasingly complex landscape of sexual predators and providers of online abuse images.”

Innocence In Danger, an organisation committed to preventing child exploitation, referred to figures from an American organisation that is working to map the extent of online child abuse images. In 1998, they estimated the number of available images to about 100,000. In 2008, the estimated number rose to 23,000,000.

Samnoen believes it is difficult to determine how big the problem is:
“It is difficult to determine the exact scope of online abuse, but there are many indications that the phenomenon is increasing in scope and seriousness. This was also underlined by the Europol Director at the hearing.”

Positive to Kids and Media
Samnoen spoke with UNICEF director Gordon Alexander regarding Kids and Media’s efforts to equip children, young people and parents with the skills needed in a digital world. Alexander showed great interest:

“The work of Kids and Media sounds interesting. I want to get familiar with your websites and put you in contact with players in UNICEF who might be interested in knowing more about you.”

Photo:

Kids and Media's Director, Oystein Samnoen, at the European Parliament. (Photo: Kids and Media)