- Take-Down Report 2018: The German Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) received 5,951 reports on child sexual abuse material (CSAM) online
- 96% of all reports of CSAM online come from German complaints offices
- Annual Report of the eco Complaints Office documents successful work in 2018
The German federal government published an evaluation report on the deletion of online CSAM content for the year 2018 in September. In 2018, a total of 5,951 reports of child sexual abuse material were statistically recorded by the German Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA), 82 percent of which were hosted abroad. The take-down report also deals with the effective cooperation between the law enforcement agencies and the German complaints offices: The forwarding of reported cases by the complaints offices to the BKA could be kept stable in 2018 at an average of 16.8 hours (0.7 days), despite the increased number of complaints.
Most important source of reports: 96% of all references to online CSAM come from German complaints offices
The German federal government’s evaluation report clearly shows that the bridging function of the complaints offices has become indispensable: In 2018, the BKA received a full 96 percent of all references to CSAM URLs from the German complaint offices. Direct complaints from private individuals did not reach the BKA.
“For an effective and sustainable fight against depictions of sexual abuse of children and juveniles, consistent criminal prosecution to the fullest extent of the possible penalties is essential. For this reason, the eco Complaints Office has always cooperated with the BKA in the event of complaints and consistently reports such content. The current statistics once again illustrate the indispensable importance of complaints offices as the most important source of reports,” says Alexandra Koch Skiba, attorney-at-law and Head of the eco Complaints Office.
Annual report of the eco Complaints Office documents success: Notice & takedown also the right approach internationally
The independent annual report of the eco Complaints Office from last year successfully documents that the “notice & takedown” approach works. In 2018, the eco Complaints Office received a total of 8,671 complaints: Of these, 3,097 cases were actually justified complaints, with almost three-quarters concerning depictions of sexual abuse of children and juveniles. In total, 96.33% of all content flagged by the eco Complaints Office worldwide last year could be removed or otherwise legalized (e.g. through the implementation of age verification systems). This shows that the self-regulatory approach also works well internationally.
Using an approach based on the voluntary self-regulation of providers and the engagement of Internet users, the eco Complaints Office has been working primarily on a self-financed basis for over 20 years. From the outset, eco has cooperated with law enforcement agencies in the fight against child sexual abuse material and other illegal Internet content. If desired, a report can also be made anonymously to the eco Complaints Office and is therefore often used by people who have reservations about contacting the police directly.
These and other success statistics for all working areas of the eco Complaints Office can be found in the current Annual Report 2018.
Further information on the eco Complaints Office can be found at: https://international.eco.de/eco-complaints-office/.
