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Yog-Yogguth writes:

The full story in English [www.vg.no] from the newspaper (no scripts required unless you want to use the global interactive map).

A partial global outline consisting of some of the networks trading in child abuse files is the focus of the first article in a series from Norwegian newspaper Verdens Gang [wikipedia.org] (Wikipedia link). The newspaper has gained access to information about 36 million downloads across the globe and singled out nearly half a milliion (430177) files alleged to be at least partially confirmed to show sexual abuse of children. These files in turn have been downloaded by close to a hundred thousand (94989) IP addresses.

In each case they claim to have “indications” (their choice of word) of the user name and email of the downloader as well as IP address and file information.

During the last ten months they say they've specifically looked at Norwegian destinations, mapping and identifying 78 Norwegian individuals they feel fairly confident has downloaded files with images or videos of child abuse. However in addition they have far more information available for the downloads of the same files across rest of the world: 18107 in Germany, 13630 in the US, 11118 in Russia, 3743 in the UK, 3393 in France, 3336 in Japan, and so on.

They also say they have contacted and confronted some of the specific Norwegians, at least some of which have privately admitted and commented upon their actions.

Another claim being made is that most of the downloaders are likely to have paid to access the material. No details are given as to why this is deemed likely such as who they have suposedly paid, whether they're including paying the download service as paying for the files, or whether those are ordinary download services that offer free downloads.

Original Submission