- Take-down report 2022: German Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) received 15,309 reports on child sexual abuse material
- 98.77 per cent of all reports on child sexual abuse material came from German hotlines
- Annual Report of the eco Complaints Office documents its successful 2022 work
The German federal government yesterday published its evaluation report on the take-down of child sexual abuse material on the Internet in the year 2022. According to the report, a total of 15,309 external reports on child sexual abuse material were statistically recorded at the German Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) in 2022, of which 7,868 cases (51.4 per cent) involved content hosted in Germany, while 7,441 (48.6 per cent) involved content hosted abroad. The average access time for national URLs in Germany was 1.54 days. Compared to the previous year, the sharp drop in access times (measurement starts from the receipt of the complaint by the German Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA)) is primarily due to the rapid, only minute-long response times of the most important providers.
98.77 per cent of all reports of child sexual abuse material came from German hotlines
This year’s take-down report also focuses on the extremely effective cooperation between the law enforcement agencies and the German hotlines: The forwarding of reported cases by the hotlines to the BKA was kept stable at an average of 0.82 days in 2022, despite the increased volume of complaints.
“The current take-down report once again documents the successful cooperation with the BKA, and once again illustrates the indispensable bridging function of German hotlines as the most important reporters. In this regard, the eco Complaints Office provides the public with a low-threshold and easily accessible opportunity to report content, which can be reported anonymously if desired,” says Alexandra Koch-Skiba, Attorney-at-Law and Head of the eco Complaints Office.
In 2022, the BKA received 98.77 per cent of all reports of child sexual abuse material from the German hotlines. Once again, there were no direct reports to the BKA from private individuals or the public.
“The importance of the German hotlines network has been growing for many years, and the number of reports is also rapidly expanding. Due to the high proportion of reports received by the BKA via the hotlines, sufficient personnel and material resources will continue to be required both on the part of law enforcement and at the hotlines, so that the prosecution and take-down of child sexual abuse material can be achieved effectively and efficiently, even if the number of cases continues to rise,” says Koch-Skiba.
The 2022 Annual Report of the eco Complaints Office also documents a new high in the number of legal violations found on the Internet
The independent 2022 Annual Report of the eco Complaints Office also documents the increased number of actionable complaints regarding depictions of sexual abuse or sexual exploitation of minors (CSAM) – this increased by around 28 per cent in 2022. Through close cooperation with its network partners, the eco Complaints Office was nevertheless able to achieve important successes in 2022: 100.0 per cent of websites hosted in Germany with content still referred to in legal terms as Child Pornography were taken down within an average of around 2.8 days. Worldwide, such content was removed in about a week and with an overall success rate of 98.5 per cent. This underlines just how important the work of the hotlines is.
CSAM Regulation: Important role of the hotlines network must be taken into account in regulation plans
Since its publication in May 2022, the EU Commission’s proposal for a “Regulation on laying down rules to prevent and combat child sexual abuse” (the CSAM Regulation) has sparked much discussion, not to mention severe criticism. The Association of the Internet Industry also expresses critique on the European plan to establish new public authorities or institutions for combatting child abuse; instead, established, functioning structures should be more closely embedded into the current plans, and existing cooperation and synergies should be promoted and expanded.
“Here we would have liked to see a strong political commitment to involve the hotlines that have already been established at national and international levels. The eco, FSM and jugendschutz.net hotlines in Germany, as well as the other hotlines of the international network INHOPE, are important points of contact for reporting depictions of abuse. This important bridging function should not be jeopardised under any circumstances!” says Head of the eco Complaints Office Koch-Skiba.
About the eco Complaints Office:
For more than 25 years, the eco Complaints Office’s work has been based on an approach involving voluntary self-regulation by providers and the commitment of Internet users. From the outset, eco has cooperated with law enforcement agencies in the fight against Child Pornography and other illegal Internet content. If preferred, anybody who might have reservations about directly contacting the police can anonymously submit a report to the eco Complaints Office.
The success statistics and further information on all areas of the eco Complaints Office’s work can be found in the current Annual Report 2022.
Further information on the eco Complaints Office at: eco-complaints-office
