Child pornography on the Internet: the state of the problem and global trends in combating it

The article offers for consideration the issue of the spread of child pornography on the Internet. The authors analyzed the state of this phenomenon in the modern world. The large-scale nature of such crimes in terms of quantity and their universality in terms of territoriality are stated. At the same time, it was established that criminology currently does not have special scientific methods for tracking cybercrime in general and child pornography on the Internet in particular. It has been noted that science is lagging behind the rapid development of information and telecommunications technology and that there is a lack of development of this particular type of criminological scientific development. Using the comparative method of scientific research, the authors showed the state of national legislations in terms of criminalization of such act as distribution of child pornography through the Internet. The authors revealed that national legislations face various tasks to counteract the distribution of child pornography on the Internet — from criminalization of the phenomenon to the improvement of technical means to counteract it. The assumption is made that this divergence in tasks is connected with the socio-economic and technological level of development of this or that state. Using the method of system analysis allowed us to identify the main trends in counteraction to the phenomenon in question. One of them is the abandonment of the concept of «child pornography» in normative documents in favor of the term «sexual abuse of children. Violence is a constructive feature of child pornography. The authors justify this rejection. The methods used in various countries to counteract the spread of child pornography on the Internet are described. The authors propose their conditional classification into normative, organizational, and technical methods. It was noted that non-governmental international organizations play an important role in combating child pornography on the Internet. The article identifies current prospects for international cooperation in combating sexual exploitation of children, the main of which is the increased cooperation between states, including under the auspices of international organizations.