Things We Need to Worry About: India Tops NCMEC list for Uploads of Suspected Child Sexual Abuse Material
An Exponential Rise in Numbers
The National Centre for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) in the USA released some figures for the reports of online child sexual abuse material (CSAM) that they received in 2019. The highest number of uploads of suspected CSAM was from India as per geographical indicators related to the content. The figure reported is a sobering 1,987,430 pieces of content and should serve as yet another wake up call. We also have to acknowledge that given the current state of affairs, the numbers can only be expected to increase in 2020.
The Early Warnings
In 2008, the IT Act was amended to make provisions to bring CSAM firmly under the ambit of the law. Since then, experts have time and again brought the issue to the notice of policy makers as well as the mainstream. From 2015 to 2017, there were a series of multi-stakeholder meetings where governments, platforms, ISPs, civil society, academicians were present. The message given in each of these meetings was straightforward – if we don’t strengthen the policy and put in the infrastructure to prevent & protect children in the online space, there will be a progressive exponential increase in the number of CSAM cases reported each year. Until one year when the numbers start taking on alarming proportions. That day has clearly come to be.
Policy
CSAM falls under the ambit of the IT Act as well as the POCSO Act. Amendments to these acts have further strengthened them to help ensure that any interaction with such material can be deemed criminal. The law is strong, sweeping and verging on draconian. However as with most laws, the implementation needs further strengthening. And also the fact that these policies apply more to individuals than to companies. Maybe the mandatory reporting clause should focus more on platforms than on individuals as it does in some countries. This is something that has proven to result in more reporting.
Implementation of Policy
Recently, there has been a spate of arrests where CSAM uploaders in various states were caught in focused operations by State Police. Most of these arrests were on the basis of reports generated by NCMEC. This is a positive step in the implementation of the law but it is piecemeal. Some states are doing more than others. CSAM is a borderless crime defined neither by state borders or even by national ones. One must also account for the fact that one cannot wait for notices from NCMEC to act. There needs to be a quicker, more responsive national mechanism.
The Aarambh Hotline
Hotlines are key infrastructure for a National Response to CSAM. (NCMEC also hosts a hotline). The first hotline was started by the Aarambh India Initiative in 2016 in collaboration with the UK based IWF. It continues to function but is limited in scope and does not have the capacity to accept and process something like the 16.8 million suspected reports that companies sent across to NCMEC in 2019. The hotline gave us some data, some working knowledge on the issue and it helped thousands of victims of CSAM take down criminal content. It continues to do so. But the situation today would need us to expand operations to tackle a bigger issue but currently we are limited by the law and there is an already existing government hotline to reckon with.
The Government Hotline
The Government Hotline was launched in 2018. At the time, experts internationally and across the nation had generously given their opinions and feedback towards its launch. It started as a very viable and useful tool but overtime some its key features have changed and not for the better. Currently, it is extremely difficult to fill & submit the online form. People have written in to us asking our assistance in helping their report get across. The button for uploading content is very confusing regarding format and size of the file required. And the form asks for you to enter jurisdiction which is difficult to determine in online content. There is also a line where one can volunteer information about ‘why you delayed reporting’. Why this matter should in an anonymous form is something to speculate. It is probably one of the most difficult, complicated and opaque hotline forms in the world. There is a need for it to be much more user friendly and more clear in how the reports are to be processed. If it follows global best practices, the hotline further needs to developed into a clearing house and center where the issue is analysed and studied and more responses are devised and implemented. But it could start with getting the form right and encouraging more reporting. The hotline also seems to operate in isolation from global networks working on this issue.
A Dynamic URL specific Blocking System
Internet blocking as it is practiced in India overblocks content and the blocking is far from successful. There is no need to block an entire website just to block out few pieces of content. Also, if you have a blocked a website, it is only the beginning – there are mirror sites, spoof sites, hidden sites etc to deal with. The global best practice is a dynamic, constantly updated, automated URL specific blocking system that is transparent about what was blocked, why it was blocked and also offers a chance for citizens to contest the block if they have objections. Verified blocking lists are available but there is a lack of directive and compliance at the government and corporate levels that ensures that they are uniformly adopted.
International Alliances
The Alliance with NCMEC has yielded immediate results for India. This should be a signal for India to sign up to other existing global alliances which will give us access to more tools, information and international co-operation all of which are much needed to engage in this global borderless effort.
Understanding the Increase in Numbers
The India Internet Report 2019 by the IAMAI indicates a surge of new users from India onto the online space from 2018 to 2019. It is but natural that with increasing users and creation of more and better internet infrastructure in the country, all online issues will see a tantamount increase, from CSAM to phishing to online hate speech. The report also mentions that this surge was caused by a huge influx of rural users, school going children as well as women. So clearly there are currently, a greater number of vulnerable users than even before – children, women, users from lower socio economic zones.
Awareness
Police crackdowns & efforts at prosecution are well and good but it bears asking as to how many citizens are aware of the issue and of the law. Even earlier this year, in a training program, we have had professionals who were part of the criminal justice system tell us that- “it may be okay to watch CSAM if you are not actively harming the child.” That this is an issue with grave consequences still remains to effectively communicated to the country at large. And this is a failure on part of both the system as well as civil society.
Self-Generated Imagery
While content is criminal and needs to taken down, the fact remains that not everyone who produces and sends child sexual abuse imagery is necessarily a criminal. Some of them are children themselves who may be indulging in sexting and maybe just taking a nude photo of themselves. This is something which almost everyone with a smart phone indulges in – adults & children. And as it is pervasive behavior, chances are that it produces large amount of consensual content that is nonetheless CSAM. Atleast 1/3rd of IWF’s reports for 2018 are self generated. These are the situations for which hotlines are essential and we will be seeing a lot of these in the coming years.
And finally to end on some comments on self generated imagery by internet theorist Rob Horning that hints at the larger issues that need to be tackled:
“By stigmatizing and criminalizing teen sexuality, sexting becomes intertwined with broader matters of power and control. The atmosphere of moral panic doesn’t discourage teens from sexting; it frames sexting as an opportunity for rebellion, a chance for kids to feel free. Parental panic conveys the sense that teenagers’ sexuality is their most precious, most valuable property. This, as much as the process of staging and taking nude selfies, reifies sexuality, making it into something to be deployed and conserved rather than explored or developed or enjoyed for its own sake.”
