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Re:Our investigation into the suspicious pressure on Archive... by txrx0000 on Saturday November 15, 2025 @09:36AM (#45937743)
They have plausible deniability, but the fact of the matter is: this also erases evidence of past crimes from public records. If bad things already happened then we should keep the evidence that they happened.

The root problem of CSAM is child trafficking and abuse in physical space. But for whatever reason enforcement efforts seem to be more focused on censoring and deleting the images rather than on curbing the actual act of child trafficking and rape. It's almost as if viewing (or this case, merely archiving) CSAM is considered a worse crime than the physical act of trafficking and sexually abusing children, which is apparently okay nowadays if you're rich or powerful enough.

Re:Our investigation into the suspicious pressure on Archive... by roncesvalles on Saturday November 15, 2025 @12:14PM (#45938902)
>But for whatever reason enforcement efforts seem to be more focused on censoring and deleting the images rather than on curbing the actual act of child trafficking and rape.

Paradoxically it would seem that turning a blind eye to forums that disseminate CSAM would actually help surface and prosecute physical crimes easier. There is a counter-argument that CSA happens because of some financial or other incentive for the abuser to share the material online, but that argument has always seemed fickle to me. What's happening behind closed doors will probably keep happening, whether there's a camera involved or not.

Re:Our investigation into the suspicious pressure on Archive... by lostlogin on Saturday November 15, 2025 @12:11PM (#45938879)
> The root problem of CSAM is child trafficking and abuse in physical space. But for whatever reason enforcement efforts seem to be more focused on censoring and deleting the images rather than on curbing the actual act of child trafficking and rape.

Things get a bit uncomfortable for various high profile figures, political leaders and royalty if prosecutions start happening.

Re:Our investigation into the suspicious pressure on Archive... by supriyo-biswas on Saturday November 15, 2025 @11:13AM (#45938408)
A middle ground solution is for the admins to block the page with a message like "this page is unavailable due to reports of illegal content. if you work for a law enforcement agency and are considering using this as evidence, please contact us" for the preservation aspect.

The meta conspiracy theory in all of this would be that this is an actual CSAM producer trying to take down evidence that could be used against them.

Re:Our investigation into the suspicious pressure on Archive... by vintermann on Saturday November 15, 2025 @12:34PM (#45939053)
It's very likely that it's someone trying to take down evidence, and since they have CSAM to upload, they would be in deep legal trouble themselves if they were identified.

It is however not at all clear the evidence they want scrubbed from the internet is CSAM-related. It's just the go-to tool for giving a site trouble for some attackers.

Re:Our investigation into the suspicious pressure on Archive... by NoahZuniga on Saturday November 15, 2025 @04:58PM (#45940918)
archive.today already takes down all reported CSAM? They explicitly don't want to archive it.
Re:Our investigation into the suspicious pressure on Archive... by mpalmer on Saturday November 15, 2025 @10:44AM (#45938130)
Great point. I guess one is just a better anti-privacy boogeyman.
Re:Our investigation into the suspicious pressure on Archive... by asmor on Saturday November 15, 2025 @01:51PM (#45939643)
It's also a great (VC-funded) business opportunity to become the technology provider of such action. There are a few of these non-profit fronts with "technology partners" behind them that are lobbying for legislation like the UK Online Safety Act or Chat Control. Thorn is the most well-known one, but one particularly interesting one is SafeToNet, who after not getting a government contract for CSAM scanning (and purging their marketing for it from the web - you can still find it under the name SafeToWatch) have pivoted to just selling a slightly altered version of their app preloaded on a $200 smartphone to concerned parents - with a 2.5x price premium.

https://harmblock.com/

https://www.gsmarena.com/hmd_fuse_debuts_with_harmblock_ai_t...

Re:Our investigation into the suspicious pressure on Archive... by Lammy on Saturday November 15, 2025 @02:53PM (#45940094)
The people who make their living Caring A Lot would be out of a job without a constant fresh supply of things to be very concerned about.
Re:Our investigation into the suspicious pressure on Archive... by squigz on Sunday November 16, 2025 @03:27AM (#45943590)
I'm quite certain there's lots of effort world-wide to stop child trafficking and rape. So I ask: Does it only seem that there's more focus on censorship? Or is there actually?