East Midlands MEP hosts event against online child abuse

East Midlands MEP Emma McClarkin has highlighted the importance of the fight against child sexual abuse online. Miss McClarkin recently hosted an event in the European Parliament to help launch the Internet Watch Foundation’s (IWF) Annual Report.

The IWF was established in 1996 by the internet industry to provide a UK internet Hotline for the public and IT professionals to report online criminal content in a secure and confidential way.

They work in partnership with the online industry, law enforcement, government, and international partners to minimise the availability of this content, specifically:

• child sexual abuse images hosted anywhere in the world
• criminally obscene adult content hosted in the UK
• non-photographic child sexual abuse images hosted in the UK.

Introducing the event, Miss McClarkin said:

“In 2014, over 99% of the child abuse content encountered by the IWF was hosted outside the UK. Whilst this demonstrates the UK’s diligence in fighting these heinous crimes, it still means that international cooperation is absolutely essential to combat this horrendous content on the internet.

“We can help by raising awareness, by supporting international cooperation, strengthening and enhancing procedures and standards where necessary and supporting organisations globally who work to reduce the availability of online child sexual abuse material. This is why organisations such as the IWF are so crucial and we must allow them to do carry on the fight by supporting their work.”