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International Child Porn Initiative Leads To Several Arrests

The European police agency, Europol, said this week that police in twelve European Union countries, as well as in the United States, searched more than 150 houses and arrested several people suspected of being involved in some aspect of viewing or distributing child pornography. According to the Dutch National Police Agency, Europol coordinated the child porn raids and provided initial intelligence for 76 countries related to an Internet message board.

The message board had members whose activities included possession and distribution of child porn/abuse-related material. Europol says the network used sophisticated techniques to hide members` electronic identities and to post encrypted content for a short period of time on free web services.

Europol Director Max-Peter Ratzel said in a statement, "The arrests and house searches are an important action against those who either directly or indirectly are responsible for the sexual exploitation of children. The next step in the investigation will be to try to prove the link between the illegal content and the active abuse."