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Police Say 80 People in Global Child Porn Ring

Originally published by Reuters, April 21, 2001

MADRID (Reuters) — Spanish police believe around 80 people were involved in an international child pornography ring which sent more than 20,000 images of naked children around the world via the Internet, officials said on Saturday.

Police in Spain working with Interpol broke up the 21-country child pornography network on Friday, arresting 7 people in Spain and with one more detention due.

“This is perhaps one of the most important (investigations of its kind) because of its international implications and the fact that it appeared to operate among Spanish speakers,” the police’s technical advisor Marceliano Gutierrez told reporters.

Further arrests abroad are expected soon.

The organization, based in the Spanish town of Pamplona and run by a Spaniard, worked under a web distribution list called “nudeboys2,” comprised of pseudonyms.

Of 54 distribution points, 21 were in the United States.

Although all the data on the mailing lists was false, thanks to new tracking methods, police were able to obtain real details of the participants.

The images primarily came from economically-deprived areas in Asia, Latin America, Russia and the United States.

Recently police arrested more than 100 people in 12 countries for suspected involvement in an international child porn network, the biggest crackdown of its kind.

Britain’s Internet Crime Forum said last month it believed children were increasingly at risk of being befriended and abused by pedophiles using Internet chatrooms.