Child pornography is a problem that is being faced by all the nations all over the world. Child pornography is playing a major role in regard to violence against children. With the advancing technology the problem of child pornography is intensifying and now many people are able to download child pornography material.
Various nations have put in place laws that are employed in dealing with this problem. However, these countries are facing several challenges in prosecuting those people who engage in child pornography. More so, there exist no uniform international laws that can be used by the nations all over the world to curb this problem on an equal level. There is need for each and every nation to put in place harsh laws to deal with this problem.
Downloading child pornography is a grave offense that has grave consequences. A person found guilty of committing this offense can end up serving sentence in prison that go even up twenty years. Several people all over the world have been reported to go to prison to serve long sentences for downloading child pornography.
Introduction
Child pornography has been a global problem. The international community has identified that the children are facing a danger that is being posed by those people who are producing, showing, distributing, and making use of child pornography. There is a danger that children can easily derive negative effects stemming from exploitation of pornography. According to Healy (2004), UNCRC has made the identification of child pornography as an action of violence against children and there is need for all countries to intervene in the exploitation of the children that is being carried by using the pornographic materials.
Even if several efforts have been carried out by various countries to curb this problem, the issue of child pornography still stands to be a major issue. There are several challenges that are encountered in the course of carrying studies on the international child pornography. Among these challenges is the absence of a similar definition of what child pornography is all about. More so, another challenge that is being encountered is that there is no data that concerns child pornography production as well as data on the distribution of it in various countries, and especially in countries found in Africa and those in Latin America. Another challenge is that the child pornography patterns in the world keep on changing.
More so, another major challenge is the quickly growing global access to the less costly technology that is increasing. This has carried out the transformation of child pornography in to a highly developed cottage industry. Courts as well as officials responsible of enforcing the law are encountering major hardships in carrying out their duties for the reason that there is the possibility of setting up pornography that can be generated by the computer and also the possibility of carrying out alterations of the images using the computer.
Child Pornography Defined
According to the National Center for missing and Exploited Children (2010), basing on the federal law, the definition for child pornography is, any visual depiction, including any photograph, video, picture, or computer, or computer generated image or picture, whether made or produced by electronic, mechanical, or any other means, of sexually explicit conduct” in which:
- The production of the visual depiction involves the use of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct; or
- The visual depiction is a digital image, computer image, computer-generated image that is, or is distinguishable from, that of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct; or
- The visual depiction has been created, adapted or modified to appear that an identifiable minor is engaging in sexually explicit conduct (18 U.S.C. §2256).
The explicit sexual conduct here refers to either actual sexual behavior or the sexual behavior that is stimulated. A minor in this case is a person who has not attained the age of 18 years. Child pornography is a very serious offense and one found committing any offense in regard to this faces very serious charges. According to the Encyclopedia of children and childhood in history and society (2010), child pornography is an issue about which there have been keen concerns by the countries in the world and especially the European countries and the North American people.
Problems in Child Pornography
There are various problems associated with child pornography. Child pornography is currently a major problem that makes a big contribution towards violence against children who are below the age of 18 years.
The ever increasing access to the internet has brought in new concerns in regard to child pornography. Images of the minors participating in sexual activities can now be distributed at a higher rate than even in the past. Since the children have access to the internet, the danger of getting them exposed to child pornography is intensifying.
The offense of molesting the minors can, on a strong note, be associated with child pornography. However, there is not yet a conclusive proof of the relationship between the cause and effect. There is a high likelihood that the use of child pornography and violence that is carried out against children are effects of the causes of that are far much complicated (Encyclopedia of children and childhood in history and society, 2010).
Various measures are being taken by various nations all over the world by putting in place laws to deal with this problem. However, such measures have not turned out to be very much effective due to several problems. The main problem is that there exists no uniform international law that can be used to deal with this problem by all the nations. Not all the nations have taken the initiative to deal with this problem seriously (Healy, 2004).
However, even those nations that have put measures in place to deal with the issue of child pornography encounter some problems in the process of prosecuting those people who break this law. According to Herald (2005), it is quite hard to tell the number of children that are experiencing exploitation on the computer screens without those people who are engaging in this exploitation facing the law. This is due to the ever advancing technology globally and the growing number of cyber criminals. Carrying out the prosecution of those people who are suspected of engaging in these offenses, in most cases, calls for working together with the law enforcement agencies the world over. In order to have assurance about one having child pornography, those people who are carrying out the prosecution must give evidence which is beyond reasonable doubt that the pornographic material contain children that are found in a particular place in the world.
While there is a realization in the advancement in technology all over the world, the criminals involved in child pornography are now in a position to make unclear the difference between a real child and an image of a child that is just created, this brings in so much difficulty in the enforcement of the law.
Legislation on the Online Child Pornography
The online pornography is associated with special issues in regard to law. This is due to the global nature of the internet. There exist no uniform laws that are used in dealing with online pornography and each and every country has its own laws that it uses to deal with this issue. This implies that even if one person produces pornographic material and distributes it, another person who might receive this material might not be deemed to break the law because there might be no such laws to incriminate the person in the country (Healy, 2004).
Festa (2000) reports that having legislation to offer protection to children from internet sexual child offenders put in place in the courts, the child protection move that is directed by the U.N is pulling the interest of the leading technology firms in the United States of America and the interest of the law enforcement agencies as well as the interests of the institutions of learning.
According Festa (2000), there was a survey carried out by two researchers from the University of Florida together with a lawyer who is a specialist in the online safety issues of the children. This survey involved 10, 800 female children who were aged between 12 years and 18 years. There was a suspicion among these researchers that there was some carelessness among the girls and the women who were young in engaging in the online activities. The researchers came up with a confirmation of this suspicion they had.
The study established that most of the young females turn to online activities as a way of achieving sexual outlet. About 60 percent of those surveyed admitted for having taken part in one way or the other in some sort of sexual activity in the course of being on the internet.
On top of this, the survey established that among those girls interviewed there were those who took steps to meet the people they had come across online in person. In the current times, the internet poses a great danger to the young people who might be naïve in regard to the intentions of those people they come across while online. Following this, tough laws need to be put in place in regard to this issue especially on the issue of child pornography.
Legislation on Child Pornography in Various Countries
According to Healy (2004), the United Nations Children’s Rights Commission gives a global legal standard that has to be abided by in order to offer protection to children and most particularly in regard to the danger of the children being exploited. The countries are required to take appropriate measures in order to protect children from taking part in illegal sexual activities. Measures taken in regard to this issue vary from one country to the other.
Taking the case in Asia and the Pacific Rim, in Japan, there is forbidding of exposure of the adult sex organs, ongoing sexual activity as well as the pubic hair that might be in a printed form. However, those people in Japan who engage in the business of pornography have devised a means to escape the hand of the law by portraying those body parts that are not forbidden by the law (Healy, 2004).
There has also been the adoption of child pornography laws by other nations in the continent of Asia. For instance, in the year 1995, there was passing of a law in Taiwan that forbade the creation of the photographs, videos, or any other material that portrayed a behavior that is not decent or sexual activity in which those people who have not yet attained the age of 18 years are involved (Healy, 2004).
In the year 1993, there was the passing of a law in Philippines and this law forbids the use of children or compulsion of the minors (under 18 years of age) to participate in the exhibitions that are deemed to be obscene, be it live exhibitions or video exhibitions. More so, this law forbids the selling of such material as its distribution.
In Sri Lanka, a law was passed in 1995 which offers protection to the minors. In Australia, legislations have been set up in which merely being in possession of child pornography is a criminal offense (Healy, 2004).
Taking the case in Europe, legislation put forth to deal with the issue of child pornography vary from one country to the other within the continent. For instance, in England and Wales, according to the law put in place, it is illegal to be in possession of, give out, or exhibit even just a single photograph of a minor that is deemed to be indecent. According to this law, a minor is a person who has not attained the age of 16 years. According to the law, the indecency is determined by the court (Healy, 2004).
The law put in place in the Netherlands makes it to be a criminal offense to produce, carry, and export pornographic material in which the minors are involved (under 16 years of age). In Norway, the law on child pornography relates in a direct manner to the introduction and being in ownership of child pornography material and not to its production (Healy, 2004).
Taking the case in North America, the United States of America is a country that is taken to be one where there is a high level of the consumption of child pornography. However, at the same time this is a country in which there are very strict laws that are used to deal with child pornography. These laws in the current times forbid the manufacturing, receiving, transporting, being in possession of, and carrying out the advertisement of whatever visual depiction that involves the employment of a minor (under the age of 18), in sexually clear behavior (Healy, 2004).
In Canada, there exists a quite all-inclusive law in regard to child pornography. Under this law, it is a criminal offense to carry out the importation of, manufacturing, engaging in printing and publishing whatever child pornography. Child pornography, under this law, encompasses representing of the minors (Under the age of 18 years), who are taking part in or the minors who are exhibited as taking part in sexual activity. More so, according to the law in this country, merely owning child pornography is forbidden (Healy, 2004).
Consequences of Downloading Child Pornography
Serious consequences do exist that stem from downloading child pornography. According to Mintz (2008), accessing the forbidden world internet can easily land one in prison in which he can serve a very long sentence. He puts it that by one downloading child pornography or sharing this material with other people, this person can find out that they are not safe and protected by the privacy of their own computers. Such person may easily get surprised when he or she finds himself facing the law for the offenses he or she has committed in regard to child pornography.
Akdeniz (2003) reported that more than 100 people who were suspects of downloading child pornography were arrested within a period of four weeks in the course of the last part of the month of December 2002 and the first half of the month of January 2003. The target of carrying out the operation is to make the identification of those who are capable of bringing about a danger to the safety of the minors and to target them in an active way so as to offer protection to these minors.
Downloading child pornography is a grave offense with grave consequences. People who might have had a clean record and having not engaged in any criminal offenses often find themselves in prison for downloading child pornography. Such cases have been reported by various news reporters about the consequences those people who engage in downloading child pornography face. One of the most recent examples that occurred last month this year example is given by Swift (2010), in which he reports that a college student got five years in prison for downloading child pornography. This man by the name Patrick Alan Giunta who is twenty years old was sentenced to two five-year terms that had to follow each other concurrently for being in possession of a visual depiction of a child participating in sexually explicit behavior and getting a visual depiction of a child participating in a sexually explicit behavior. This student was as well sentenced to a lifetime supervised discharge (Swift, 2010). The student, while he was nineteen years of age had downloaded illicit child porn images, 32 videos in total showing child porn within a period of three and a half months. Several such cases have been reported around the world where people face even up to twenty years in prison.
References
Akdeniz, Y., 2003. 110 held in police crackdown on internet child porn. Web.
Encyclopedia of children and childhood in history and society, 2010. Child pornography. Web.
Festa, P., 2000. U.N. group to combat online child porn. Web.
Healy A. Margaret., 2004. Child pornography: an international perspective. United States Embassy Stockholm. Web.
Herald, B., 2005. Child porn: prosecution problems. Computer Crime Research Center. Web.
Mintz, H., 2008. US Feds push child-porn cases; penalty can be years in prison. Web.
National Center for missing and Exploited Children, 2010. What is child pornography? Web.
Swift, A., 2010. Naples man gets 5 years for downloading child porn. Web.