Bhubaneswar: In a disturbing trend, a research involving online users from 100 cities across the country has found Bhubaneswar tops the cities in connection with the spike in demand for Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM) or child pornography on the net during the ongoing lockdown period.
The New Delhi-based Indian Child Protection Fund (ICPF) published the report ‘Demand for Child Sexual Abuse Material in India’ that included demand of child pornography materials registered across thousands of pornography websites and all public social media platforms as a 30-day rolling average.
The ICPF found during the research that though the demand for child pornography is prevalent across all 100 cities, places like Bhubaneswar and Chennai recorded a significant increase during the lockdown period.
As per the report, “The demand for generic child pornography content on pornographic platforms like Pornhub was the highest in Bhubaneswar and Chennai.”
Similarly, the state capital also finds a place among the cities where there is a good demand for specific content related child pornography.
“The demand for specific content, where the person was interested in specific actions, age groups and locations were the highest in Kolkata, Siliguri, Howrah, Chandigarh, Guwahati, Indore, Bhubaneswar and Chennai,” the report records.
As many as 18 per cent of individuals out of such online perverts who were found interested in specific themes in child pornography material ‘exhibited explicit intent for videos where children were choking, bleeding, tortured, in pain or screaming’.
Meanwhile, what seems most worrisome is the fact that the report finds an increase of as much as 200 per cent in the demand for such kind of violent online contents during the lockdown period.
According to the report, male users consist around 90 per cent out of such individuals while one per cent was women users who also searched for such child porn materials online during the period.
Most of the users of such materials have been using virtual private networks (VPNs) in order to conceal their identity from the government’s regulating authorities.
Notably, the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) has said in its 2018 annual crime report that Odisha tops the list of states where innocent children are engaged for pornography and circulation of other sexual materials.
As many as 333 cases under the Sections 14 and 15 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act have been registered in the state during 2018. The said sections 14 and 15 of POCSO Act deal with incidents where the accused used children for pornographic purposes or store child pornography materials.
Meanwhile, reports indicated a spurt in registration of complaints related to various child abuse and violence through the Childline number ‘1908’ during the lockdown period.
Benudhar Senapati, city-based noted child rights activist, told Orissa POST, “Child pornography is strictly prohibited worldwide and it is very shameful that Bhubaneswar tops the list for increased demand for child pornography during the lockdown period. I request Odisha Police to track the persons involved in sharing, watching and storing child pornography materials through advanced tracker systems. The accused should be booked under the stringent sections of POCSO Act.”