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Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by xenospn on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:16PM (#21273543)
It honestly breaks my heart to know that there is such massive demand for these videos, where thousands of people will pay millions. It means children will always be exploited since there’s tons of money to be made.
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by johnpowell on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:37PM (#21273846)
I used to work for Kodak doing "photofinishing" in college. We used to get all the rolls of film for overnight processing in Oregon, Idaho, and Washington. I was one of two people who worked in the digital room. My job was to spend all night scanning rolls of film and then it would get sent over to a computer where I would click on each photo so it was upright and then we would burn cds with the pictures.

This was back in 2000 and digital cameras were rare, expensive, and not the best quality. So we were how a lot of people got their film onto the Internet. I had a special number for the police on speed dial. A few times a week I would have to call because of kiddie porn. Clearly sexual stuff and not just kids in the bathtub. It always struck me as odd that people used our service since you actually had to pick up the cds. Where the police would be waiting for you.

We also had to process crime scene pictures for some smaller police stations. Lots of suicide pictures. I do not miss that job.

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by RandomBacon on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @03:41PM (#21274600)
I'm sorry to hear. Thank you for helping catch those people and helping save those kids.
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by samcday on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:30PM (#21273745)
Conundrums like this make my head spin when I try to consider my position on Internet freedoms.

On the one hand I believe the Internet should be a truly personalized, private interface for humans all over the world to be able to communicate freely and privately - safe from censorship, mass-surveillance, profiling, and so on.

On the other hand I also believe if the Internet was that way, then it would mean that these elements of society, the ones that seek to horrifically and tragically exploit the most vulnerable of us, would be able to do so relatively unimpeded.

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by shadowgovt on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:40PM (#21273869)
Conundrums like this used to make my head spin.

Then I realized that nothing about moving humans online made humans magically more virtuous than they are in meatspace, and the tools we've used to audit and intercept bad-behaving humans in the real world have merit online too.

There's a reason so much motion online in the past two decades has been in the direction of "de-wild-Westing" it.

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by MiroF on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @03:15PM (#21274259)
It does make direct coercive power online (ie. violence) difficult. I agree with you, but I do think that the internet reduces the harm inflicted by human vices
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by belorn on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @05:48PM (#21276248)
A helping thought is that those that commit assault of children don't generally consider the possibility of getting caught and will use their personal phone and tools rather than technology that are safe from censorship and mass-surveillance. Sexual assault is not part of rational thinking.

The major problem is when someone want to earn money by becoming a distributor that sits between producer and consumer, like the one in the article, and those people usually do consider the risk of getting caught. There is however a silver lining in that those are quite few and tend to become major target for law enforcement and sooner or later the opsec will have a flaw. It is questionable if Internet can ever become so safe that a person can be one of a handful few that earn millions for years without giving out any clues to whom they are.

So to me this resolve conundrum. Neither criminal is likely to operate unimpeded even when the Internet become safer from censorship and mass-surveillance.

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by toomuchtodo on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:17PM (#21273572)
While we cannot drive suffering down to zero, we can still make efforts to drive it down as close to zero as possible.
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by moomin on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:32PM (#21273765)
Indeed, it’s not like it’s invulnerable to economics. We need to make sure that the costs are too high. Like most crime, this is less about sentencing than it is about the probability of getting caught.
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by sysbin on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:25PM (#21273657)
It would be interesting to know if suffering has increased or decreased over the years and while the extra measures are being put in place. I agree with your opinion btw. I'm just skeptical if for all we know there is now more suffering than before because of the internet.
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by toomuchtodo on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:30PM (#21273727)
The world has been getting better objectively.

https://www.vox.com/2014/11/24/7272929/global-poverty-health...

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by minblaster on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:42PM (#21273890)
Unfortunately, some relative comparisons don't matter as much as the absolute. A world where the number of slaves is objectively increasing (as it has now) is worse I'd say. The total amount of suffering is more, even if there are billions more happy people oblivious to your plight.
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by pmarreck on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @03:12PM (#21274228)
I have struggled to understand how this proclivity can be evolutionarily possible and the only thing I can come up with is this unfortunate combination of elements:

1) the necessary sexual dimorphism that makes sexual reproduction possible, actually took an unfortunate shortcut: childlike features are retained in females (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoteny), which ostensibly requires "less" DNA encoding, while males actually "develop" into more "adult" forms (body hair, musculature, height, deeper voice, etc.)

2) the reproductive window of women is far smaller than men, causing men of all ages to be drawn mainly to this small subselection of all women

3) consequently, men who were more likely to choose women in this younger reproductive window might have been selected for;

4) some portion of these men (due to natural variation), in being drawn to the paedomorphic features of women, actually are "steered too low" in preferential age genetically and are thus born having to deal with this unfortunate proclivity.

Ethical question: If no children were harmed and 100% of the videos and images produced were synthetic, would simply consumption of the media still be a problem?

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by outworlder on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @04:13PM (#21274961)
> while males actually "develop" into more "adult" forms

No.

Neoteny in humans apply to both males and females and apply not only to physical appearance, but also behavior. You can compare with other primates – Chimps can be very friendly until they reach adulthood, when they become less social and more aggressive.

The secondary characteristics develop at puberty on both sexes, they are just different.

In fact, there is a reason why they develop past a certain age. The individuals we are discussing here are not going to be selected for this trait, as they would not be able to reproduce.

> Ethical question: If no children were harmed and 100% of the videos and images produced were synthetic, would simply consumption of the media still be a problem?

No. Because the reason people are prosecuted is that, at some point, someone has been harmed. There are some very disturbing (to my senses) cartoons out there. No-one is jailed for drawing or viewing cartoons in any democratic society.

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by SkyBelow on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @04:25PM (#21275131)
You might want to take a look at laws concerning those cartoons. They don't seem to have as strict an enforcement, but they aren't nearly as rational as you are claiming.
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by COGlory on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @05:26PM (#21275954)
I will preface this with the disclaimer that I am a structural biologist; not an evolutionary one.

It seems to me that this hypothesis is unlikely. Is there any evidence that: 1) Sexual preference is genetic? (It seems intuitive that women whose bodies exhibit extremely visual traits of reproduction would be selected for. However, I don't the connection between that and there being equivalent selective pressure on men to be attracted to that). i.e. where is the gene that makes men attracted to young women specifically, and how and why is that under selective pressure?

2) Is there any evidence that pedophilia isn't a mental disorder caused by something else? Hormone imbalance? Developmental deficiency?

However, your theory does explain why so many more men than women are pedophiles, although it seems entirely inadequate at explaining the few number of women pedophiles that do exist.

Either way, it's a curious and interesting point. Thank you for making it.

In my opinion it's far more

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by api on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @03:51PM (#21274723)
I have a different and not mutually exclusive speculation:

It's often assumed that only females have a "biological clock." Maybe that's not true. Maybe males start to crave offspring too, and some mistake these feelings for sexual attraction.

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by matz1 on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @03:53PM (#21274750)
>If no children were harmed and 100% of the videos and images produced were synthetic, would simply consumption of the media still be a problem?

Then its not a problem.

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by pmarreck on Friday October 18, 2019 @05:05PM (#21295073)
So why wouldn't some rational person who isn't afraid of judgy people corner the market on that and just make legal pedo cartoons or CG renderings?

Or is Japan already doing that? >..<

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by minton on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @04:37PM (#21275281)
> 4) some portion of these men (due to natural variation), in being drawn to the paedomorphic features of women, actually are "steered too low" in preferential age genetically and are thus born having to deal with this unfortunate proclivity.

You’re suggesting someone is born a pedophile?

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by Karunamon on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @05:07PM (#21275715)
In the same way someone is "born" any other orientation in that you can't choose what you're attracted to.
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by COGlory on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @05:29PM (#21275990)
Yes but no one is attracted to anyone when they're born. That happens later, and how and why exactly some people are attracted to some sexes, or traits, or fetishes is still up in the air. It's likely some combination of genetic and developmental, and what the exact contributions are to pedophilia are unknown.
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by pmarreck on Friday October 18, 2019 @05:04PM (#21295063)
Identical twins raised separately have a >75% concordance in orientation, as opposed to no concordance as would be expected if there was no genetic input.

So there is definitely a genetic input, and it is definitely large, although it's not the whole story.

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by pmarreck on Friday October 18, 2019 @05:02PM (#21295057)
> You’re suggesting someone is born a pedophile?

Partly. Orientation is something like 75% genetic based on identical-twins-raised-separately studies. Why would I assume any particular orientation would be any different, without supporting evidence? Because the prospect of a world where people are born with such a proclivity is emotionally upsetting for you?

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by jandrese on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:26PM (#21273681)
Massive demand in this case being 300 some users worldwide. The site had generated a million addresses, but it's clear that most of them were not being used.

You should feel better that on a per-capita basis this is an extremely rare occurrence. Like around the same chances as being struck by lightning. It's horrible, but not widespread.

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by zenography on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:38PM (#21273853)
Unless I am misreading the article, that was 300 users arrested, not 300 users total.
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by tptacek on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:34PM (#21273798)
There were a quarter million unique videos on the site, almost half of which were previously unknown to law enforcement.
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by zzzcpan on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:39PM (#21273866)
> It means children will always be exploited since there’s tons of money to be made.

You can thank anti social capitalist system for that. In some countries some people are so desperate to make some money that they are willing to make porn with their own children and sell it to strangers.

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by dang on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:58PM (#21274077)
"Eschew flamebait. Don't introduce flamewar topics unless you have something genuinely new to say. Avoid unrelated controversies and generic tangents."

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by zzzcpan on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @03:05PM (#21274149)
I'm pretty sure most people are unaware of the facts pointed out in the comment. They don't like it, but that's another story.
Re:US Law Enforcement Traces Bitcoin Transfers to Nab ‘Large... by xenospn on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @02:52PM (#21274001)
I was about to ignore your comment but then remembered a story one of my ex-gf's told me. She said her mom, who was addicted to meth, literals tried to sell her to her meth dealer because she didn't have any money.

She was 6.