Portal sites to be held responsible for child porn

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Portal sites to be held responsible for child porn

Published: 14 Sep. 2012, 20:50

김기용 경찰청장이 10일 오전 서울 서대문구 미근동 경찰청에서 열린 39아동 음란물 근절 간담회39에서 모두발언을 하고 있다. 이날 김기용 경찰청장은 경찰의 아동음란물 근절 의지를 설명하고 민간기업의 자정을 촉구했다. 간담회에는 NHN 김상헌 대표, SK커뮤니케이션즈 이주식 대표, 다음커뮤니케이션 유창하 이사 등 인터넷 포털 대표들과 한국인터넷PC문화협회 김찬근 회장, 한국인터넷윤리학회 최종원 회장, 학부모정보감시단 이경화 대표 등이 참석했다. [YONHAP]

Every Web portal site must provide its own system to prevent child pornography, according to a revised law that will be implemented starting tomorrow.

The Ministry of Health and Welfare presented the revised law for protection of children and teenagers from sex crimes yesterday, saying that every Internet Web portal site such as Naver and Daum and peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing sites must provide a way to delete or block child pornography once it is detected on their servers.

The ministry said content that contains images of adults dressed up like children in pornography, wearing a school uniform for example, must also be controlled by Web site operators.

The ministry said that violators are subject to a maximum fine of 20 million won ($17,836), or up to three years in prison. The law also demands Web site operators produce a system where users can report other users’ posting activity to the system administrators.

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“The ministry is also considering providing a system that can monitor key words being used for child pornography on Web sites’ search engines,” Kang Wol-goo, a spokesman from the Gender Equality Ministry, told the JoongAng Ilbo.

The ministry said smartphone SMS messaging service operators such as Kakao Talk should also provide their own programs that can monitor its users’ behavior.

The ministry said it will provide technical guidelines for mobile application operators soon.

In accordance with the ministry’s movement, the Seoul Metropolitan Government, Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency and Korea Internet Self-governance Organization (KISO) signed the MOU to improve cooperation in managing sex crimes targeting women and minors.

Most of the country’s major Web portals, including Naver, Daum and Nate are members of the KISO.

Under the agreement, the three organizations will create a hotline system where they can monitor pornography and prostitution behavior simultaneously in real time.

The city government said monitoring agents, composed of volunteer citizens, will report to the KISO once they find any illegal sex crime activities such as messages offering prostitution and posting of obscene content, and then the KISO will notify Web portals to block netizens’ access to the posts.

By Park Yu-mi [[email protected]]