World’s Largest Cryptocurrency-Fueled Darknet Child Pornography Website Hammered

U.S. and Korean authorities have just revealed their bust of one of the world's largest markets for pornography, a crime that is proliferating at a furious pace with the rise of cryptocurrency.

The website that operated the market, accepted Bitcoin and distributed more than one million sexually explicit videos involving children. These agencies analyzed the blockchain and were able to de-anonymize Bitcoin transactions, allowing for the identification of hundreds of predators around the world.

The operation resulted in the seizure of approximately eight terabytes of child sexual exploitation videos, which is one of the largest seizures of its kind.  The images, which are currently being analyzed by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), contained over 250,000 unique videos, and 45 percent of the videos currently analyzed contain new images that have not been previously known to exist.

Notably, the operation is responsible for the rescue of at least 23 minor victims residing in the United States, Spain and the United Kingdom, who were being actively abused by the users of the site.

According to a US Department of Justice news release, a nine-count indictment was unsealed along with a parallel civil forfeiture action against Jong-Woo Son, 23, a South Korean national, who was indicted by a federal grand jury in the District of Columbia for his operation of Welcome To Video, the largest child sexual exploitation market by volume of content.

And an additional 337 site users residing in Alabama, Arkansas, California, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington State and Washington, D.C. as well as the United Kingdom, South Korea, Germany, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, the Czech Republic, Canada, Ireland, Spain, Brazil and Australia have been arrested and charged.

Assistant Attorney General Brian A. Benczkowski of the Justice Department's Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Jessie K. Liu for the District of Columbia, Chief Don Fort of IRS Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI) and Acting Executive Associate Director Alysa Erichs of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE)'s Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), made the announcement.

“Darknet sites that profit from the sexual exploitation of children are among the vilest and reprehensible forms of criminal behaviour,” said Assistant Attorney General Brian A. Benczkowski of the Justice Department's Criminal Division.  “This Administration will not allow child predators to use lawless online spaces as a shield.  Today's announcement demonstrates that the Department of Justice remains firmly committed to working closely with our partners in South Korea and around the world to rescue child victims and bring to justice the perpetrators of these abhorrent crimes.”

“Children around the world are safer because of the actions taken by U.S. and foreign law enforcement to prosecute this case and recover funds for victims,” said U.S. Attorney Jessie K. Liu.  “We will continue to pursue such criminals on and off the darknet in the United States and abroad, to ensure they receive the punishment their terrible crimes deserve.”

“Through the sophisticated tracing of bitcoin transactions, IRS-CI special agents were able to determine the location of the Darknet server, identify the administrator of the website and ultimately track down the website server's physical location in South Korea,” said IRS-CI Chief Don Fort.  “This large-scale criminal enterprise that endangered the safety of children around the world is no more.  Regardless of the illicit scheme, and whether the proceeds are virtual or tangible, we will continue to work with our federal and international partners to track down these disgusting organizations and bring them to justice.”

You might also like

Comments are closed.

This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish. AcceptRead More