FBI Controlled 23 Child Pornography Websites As Lures For Predators? Documents Reveal Disturbing Sting Set-Up?


There are documents that reportedly show that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) not only knew about the existence of 23 websites designed specifically for child pornography purposes but also were given authorization to control said websites in its effort to lure, track, and capture child predators. And it is those same alleged documents that provide a glimpse into a disturbing method used by the FBI, a government agency funded by citizen tax dollars, whereby a certain level of complicity in the criminal act is involved.

The Daily Mail reported this week that certain documents obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) have provided information that highlights the fact that the FBI may have been instrumental in the running of illicit child pornography websites. But as Ars Technica has pointed out, there is no proof that the agency operated any of the websites, nor does it appear that the FBI, when it seized control of the websites, allowed them to continue to operate. The documents, though, do indicate that the FBI were authorized to control 23 separate child pornography websites.

As the Daily Mail pointed out, it has been public knowledge that the FBI has operated child pornographic websites before. As USA Today reported in January, the FBI took control of and, for two weeks, operated Playpen, described by the agency as “the largest remaining known child pornography hidden service in the world.” The website existed in the province of the internet known as the “dark web,” an area of the internet accessible only through a certain network software, called Tor, that bounces the original online user’s traffic from computer to computer so as to make said traffic almost untraceable. To aid against that problem, the FBI infected the controlled website with malware designed to help them track down users.

Although the Playpen operation only lasted for two weeks, the website, according to USA Today, was an open internet conduit for “more than 215,000 registered users and included links to more than 23,000 sexually explicit images and videos of children, including more than 9,000 files that users could download directly from the FBI.”

The FBI, which has traditionally simply shut down uncovered child pornography sites under the Department of Justice mandate that even the act of simply viewing pornographic images of children does harm to the child and must not be tolerated, justified the operation — and two others prior to controlling and monitoring Playpen — by noting that doing so was the only way in which the agency could identify the users accessing the illegal website(s).

Websites on the so-called “dark web” allow access to illicit activities like child pornography. [Image by adike/Shutterstock]

“We had a window of opportunity to get into one of the darkest places on Earth, and not a lot of other options except to not do it,” said Ron Hosko, a former senior FBI official involved in planning one of the agency’s first child pornography website takeover. “There was no other way we could identify as many players.”

And as security researcher Sarah Jamie Lewis told Ars Technica, it was a “pretty reasonable assumption” that at some point the FBI could have been operating about half of the known child pornography sites on the dark web.

Part of the FBI investigation into child pornography allows the agency the ability to track internet users through their usage of illegal websites. [Image by John Williams RUS/Shutterstock]

When asked by Ars Technica if it were true that the FBI was running at least half of the illegal child porn sites, agency spokesperson Chris Allen replied (via email): “I would refer you to public documents on the Playpen investigation, in which we seized and operated a darkweb child pornography site for a period of less than two weeks. That was an extraordinary investigation, and to my knowledge may be the only time that has occurred. So to suggest this is a common thing is patently not true.”

The Playpen investigation netted only 137 criminal charges, all of which have met serious legal challenges. This, out of an admitted 100,000 users that accessed the site while the FBI controlled it. This, even though documents indicate that the site had more than 215,000 registered users. According to USA Today, the FBI has tracked just over 1,300 of all those users to “true” addresses.

[Featured Image by NicoElNino/Shutterstock]

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