Child porn is
rampant in what is known as the dark web or darknet. The part of Internet that
cannot be reached by using a search engine like Google. It is that part which
is accessed using a special browser (TOR) which is freely downloadable, and
works to ensure the anonymity of the user online. It achieves this by use of
encryption and bouncing encrypted communication across a network of nodes before
it reaches the intended site. The information that the intended site possess is
the IP address of the last node which makes the original destination anonymous.
The downside of the TOR network is its slow speed.
Coupling an anonymous
network with an anonymous currency like BITCOIN allows illegal activity such as
the buying and selling of drugs, child porn, and counterfeits to flourish
without the fear of tracking either information or financial flows.
Cybercriminals, terrorists, drug peddlers and pedophiles among others, use the darknet
to further their business as the darknet protects both them and their customer’s
identities.
Criminal users
on the darknet are savvy and sophisticated in covering their tracks and erasing
the digital fingerprints they leave online. They conduct their business on
secret password protected websites limited to trusted users (excluding undercover
police), utilize sophisticated hard disk encryption (including some with
multiple passwords, each opening up a different volume), distributed storage across
multiple computers to ensure that each computer will not have a complete image
and move sites frequently. These tactics
coupled with the volume of sites on the darknet makes it a formidable task for
law enforcement to identify criminal rings and catch them.
Making the darknet
safe requires detectives to impersonate criminals or their customers to
infiltrate criminal rings. It is a tedious task with limitations in
jurisdiction and prosecution. In the next few years this old fashioned method will
be supplemented with technology to map and analyze darknet sites, contents and
activity to profile criminal behavior.
For Governments
wanting to crack down on child porn, like as in India, the only option is to
set-up a team of specialized investigators to explore darknet activity
originating from within the country and to partner with their counterparts from
like thinking countries to nab criminals within their jurisdiction.
No comments:
Post a Comment