This web page lists academic papers, government reports, and criminal cases involving child sexual exploitation on Tor, Freenet, or i2P.
Please make use of these references in your next academic publication or news article.
Bibtex file for these entries: csam.bib
- S. Aked. An investigation into darknets and the content available via anonymous peer-to-peer file sharing. 9th Australian Information Security Management Conference, Edith Cowan University, Perth Western Australia. December 2011
- Adrian Crenshaw. Darknets and hidden servers: Identifying the true IP/network identity of I2P service hosts. Not a empirical study, stating only ``There is a fair amount of child pornography out on I2P."
- C. Guitton. A review of the available content on Tor hidden services: The case against further development. Computers in Human Behavior, 29(6):2805–2815, 2013.
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A. Biryukov, I. Pustogarov, F. Thill, and R. Weinmann. Content and Popularity Analysis of Tor Hidden Services. In Proc. IEEE Intl. Conference on Distributed Computing Systems Workshops (10.1109/ICDCSW.2014.20), pages 188–193, 2014.
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M. Spitters, S. Verbruggen, and M. v. Staalduinen. Towards a Comprehensive Insight into the Thematic Organization of the Tor Hidden Services. In 2014 IEEE Joint Intelligence and Security Informatics Conference, pages 220–223, 2014.
- G. H. Owenson and N. J. Savage. The Tor Dark Net. Technical report, Centre for International Governance Innovation , September 30 2015.
- D. Moore and T. Rid. Cryptopolitik and the Darknet. Survival: Global Politics and Strategy. (10.1080/00396338.2016.1142085), 58(1):7–38, February 2016.
- G. Owen and N. Savage. Empirical analysis of Tor Hidden Services. IET Information Security, 10(3):113–118, May 2016.
- M. Bernaschi, A. Celestini, S. Guarino, and F. Lombardi. Exploring and Analyzing the Tor Hidden Services Graph. ACM Trans. Web, 11(4), July 2017. ISSN 1559-1131. doi: 10.1145/3008662.
- B. N. Levine, M. Liberatore, B. Lynn, and M. Wright. Statistical Detection of Downloaders in Freenet. In Proc. IEEE Intl. Wkshp. on Privacy Engineering, pages 25–32, May 2017.
- J. Dalins, C. Wilson, and M. Carman. Criminal motivation on the dark web: A categorisation model for law enforcement. Digital Investigation, 24:62–71, 2018.
- G. Owenson, S. Cortes, and A. Lewman. The darknet’s smaller than we thought: The life cycle of Tor Hidden Services. Digital Investigation (10.1016/j.diin.2018.09.005), 27:17–22, 2018.
- R. Portnoff. The Dark Net: De-Anonymization, Classification and Analysis. PhD thesis, Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences, University of California at Berkeley, March 2018.
- S. He, Y. He, and M. Li. Classification of Illegal Activities on the Dark Web. In Proc. International Conference on Information Science and Systems (10.1145/3322645.3322691), pages 73–78, March 2019.
- E. Bursztein, E. Clarke, M. DeLaune, D. M. Elifff, N. Hsu, L. Olson, J. Shehan, M. Thakur, K. Thomas, and T. Bright. Rethinking the Detection of Child Sexual Abuse Imagery on the Internet. In The World Wide Web Conference, pages 2601–2607, May 2019.
- B. R. da Cunha, P. MacCarron, J. F. Passold, L. W. dos Santos, K. A. Oliveira, and J. P. Gleeson. Assessing police topological efficiency in a major sting operation on the dark web. Scientific Reports (10.1038/s41598-019-56704-4), 10(1):73, January 2020.
- C. M. Steel, E. Newman, S. O’Rourke, and E. Quayle. An integrative review of historical technology and countermeasure usage trends in online child sexual exploitation material offenders. Forensic Science International: Digital Investigation, 33, June 2020.
- B. N. Levine, M. Liberatore, B. Lynn, and M. Wright. A Forensically Sound Method of Identifying Downloaders and Uploaders in Freenet. In Proc. ACM Computer and Communications Security, November 2020. doi: 10.1145/3372297.3417876.
- U.S. Dept. of Justice. The National Strategy for Child Exploitation Prevention and Interdiction: A Report to Congress, August 2010.
- U.S. Dept. of Justice. The National Strategy for Child Exploitation Prevention and Interdiction: A Report to Congress, April 2016.
- European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation. Internet Organised Crime Threat Assessment Technical Report (10.2813/858843), Europol, 2018.
- Brian Levine, Report to Congress: Increasing the Efficacy of Investigations of Online Child Sexual Exploitation. May 2022. On behalf of the National Institute of Justice.
- U.S. Department of Justice. National Strategy for Child Exploitation Prevention and Interdiction 2023
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Tor Hidden Services (two): Operation Round Table [more info] (2014). The website shared webcam-captured videos of mostly juvenile boys falsely enticed by the operators of the site to produce sexually explicit material.
- Johnson (operator)
- Devor, Foster, Gaw, Gonzalez-Castillo, Jabbar, Jamieson, Korpal, Saine, Schwab, Zdon, Naim,Thong, Eales.
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Tor Hidden Service: PedoBook, PedoBoard, and TB2 (2015)
- Cottom (operator)
- Defoggi, Flanary, Cameron, Austin, MacMillan, Peer, Welch, Huyck, Tidwell, Pierce, Spencer, Diberardino, Moore, Reibert, Smith, Pitman, Sebes.
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Tor Hidden Service: Playpen (2017)
- More than 150,000 users who actively traded in CSAM.
- 548 international arrests, with 296 sexually abused children identified or rescued; 25 producers of child pornography prosecuted; 51 hands-on abusers prosecuted
- Chase, Fluckiger, Browning
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Tor Hidden Service: The Giftbox Exchange (2019)
- Over 72,000 registered users and 56,000 posts.
- Falte (sexual abuse of a toddler-aged minor), Faulkner (sexual abuse of a toddler-aged minor), Leslie (sexual abuse and production of child pornography involving multiple children, including an infant and a toddler), Bedusek (child exploitation enterprise); .
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Tor Hidden Service: Welcome to Video (2019)
- "Rescue of at least 23 minor victims residing in the United States, Spain and the United Kingdom, who were being actively abused by the users of the site."
- Son (convicted in South Korea) and an "additional 337 site users residing in Alabama, Arkansas, California, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, Virginia, Washington State and Washington, D.C. as well as the United Kingdom, South Korea, Germany, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, the Czech Republic, Canada, Ireland, Spain, Brazil and Australia have been arrested and charged."
- Additional defendants charged and convicted in the District of Columbia include Stengel, Wunderlich, Wagner, Miller, DeJournett, LaPrath, and Ezeagbor.
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Tor Hidden Service: Elysium 89,000 members. "The suspected ringleader, a 39-year-old man, was arrested in the state of Hesse. The forum was also used to make appointments to abuse children. Police seized the website's server. They found that toddlers were among the children sexually abused, reports say."
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Tor Hidden Service: Unnamed
- "30,000 members, who were required to share illicit child pornography images in order to gain and keep membership, including numerous child pornography producers who were actively abusing children, according to the government’s memorandum."
- Delalio, Gmoser, Davis, Martin, Hoff
- Garland Man Sentenced to Serve a Total of 30 Years in Federal Prison on Child Pornography and Firearm Charges (Leal)
- United Kingdom Man Sentenced for His Role in Child Exploitation (Riley)
- Former Pearland Physician Sentenced on Child Pornography Charges (Hughes)
- FBI and the U.S. Attorney's Office Continue to Fight Against Child Pornography Five recent cases net the recovery of hundreds of thousands of child pornography images, some found in the possession of previously convicted sex offenders (Reed)
- Kentucky Man Sentenced to Prison For Engaging in a Child Exploitation Enterprise (Browning)
- Former DEA Agent Sent to Prison on Child Pornography Charges (Burke)
- McLean County Man Sentenced to Five Years in Prison for Receiving Child Pornography (Croker)
- McLean County Man Sentenced to 5 1/2 Years in Prison for Receiving Child Pornography (Broy)
- Richmond Man Sentenced To 108 Months In Prison For Possession Of Child Pornography (Hammond)
- Anna Man Pleads Guilty to Creating Pornography From Rape of Infant, Child & 10 Teens (Jones)
- Burleson man sentenced on child pornography charges (Pawlak)
- Oroville Man Sentenced To 14 Years In Prison For Receiving Child Pornography From The Dark Web (Sparks)
- Pikeville Man Sentenced To 87 Months For Receiving Child Pornography (Anderson)
- Morrisville Man Sentenced to 90 Months For Child Pornography Offenses (Caraher)
- Dyer Man Sentenced To 150 Months in Prison For Accessing Child Pornography (Struensee)
- Virginia Man Sentenced to Five Years in Prison for Receiving Child Pornography on Tor Network Forum (Bosyk)
- Anchorage Man Sentenced for Child Pornography Crimes (Cogley)
- Asheville, N.C. Man Sentenced To Nine Years For Possessing And Receiving Child Pornography From The Dark Web (Hall)
- Colorado Man Sentenced For Production Of Child Pornography (Perez)
- Council Bluffs Man Sentenced for Receipt of Child Pornography (Croghan)
- Crossett Man Sentenced To 6 Years In Federal Prison For Receiving And Possession Of Child Pornography (Ashcraft)
- Reisterstown Man Sentenced to 25 Years in Federal Prison for Traveling to the Philippines to Have Sex With a Minor, Which he Videotaped and Transported Back to the United States (Hall)
- Houston Man Hammered for Producing Child Pornography (Ferguson)
- Anchorage Man Sentenced to Federal Prison for Distribution of Child Pornography (Collier)
- Former Employee of D.C. School Admits to Transporting Child Pornography Across State Lines and Accessing it Over the Dark Web (Wilson)
- Air Force Colonel Pleads Guilty to Receiving Child Pornography (Visconi)
- Texas Man Pleads Guilty to Child Exploitation Violations (Barter)
- Richland County Boy Scout official sentenced to 30 years of prison for sexually exploiting children as well as receiving and distributing child pornography (Close)
- Dark Web Child Pornography Facilitator Sentenced to 27 Years in Prison for Conspiracy to Advertise Child Pornography (Marques)
- Argentine Citizen Sentenced To 35 Years In Prison For Child Sexual Exploitation And Distribution Of Child Pornography Over The Dark Web (Viola)
- Little Sioux Man Sentenced to 200 months in Prison for Child Pornography (Wickett)
- Former Baltimore Police Officer Sentenced to More Than Six Years in Prison for Federal Charge of Possession of Child Pornography (Wissmann)
- Navy Mechanic Admits Sexually Assaulting 7 Young Girls, Producing Child Pornography (Tilton)
- US v. Wehrle
- Four Men Sentenced to Prison for Engaging in a Child Exploitation Enterprise on the Tor Network (Falte, Faulkner, Bedusek,Leslie)
- Middlesboro Man Sentenced to 300 Months for Child Pornography Offenses (England)
- Jefferson County Man Sentenced to 6 ? Years in Prison for Possession of Child Pornography (Brasher)
- Omaha Man Gets 120 Months' Imprisonment for Possessing Child Pornography (King)
- District Heights Man Sentenced to 45 Years in Federal Prison for the Sexual Abuse of a Two-Year-Old and Seven-Year-Old Child in Order to Produce Child Pornography (Gilbert)
- Colorado Springs Man Sentenced to 20 Years in Federal Prison for Producing Child Pornography (Lopez)
- Man Sentenced to 45 Years in Federal Prison for Sexual Abuse of Two- and Seven-Year-Old Children to Produce Child Pornography (Gilbert)
- South Bay Man Sentenced to Life in Prison for Creating Child Sexual Abuse Material of Young Children and Engaging in a Child Exploitation Enterprise (Harrell, Martinez, Lawniczak)
- Alden Man Going To Prison On Child Pornography Charge (Kidder)
- Fresno Man Sentenced to Life in Prison for Engaging in a Child Exploitation Enterprise and Creating Child Sexual Abuse Material (Brinson, Jr.)
- Fresno Man Sentenced to over 11 Years in Prison for Receipt and Distribution of Child Pornography (Jones)
- Former Morris Resident Sentenced to 5 Years in Federal Prison for Child Exploitation Offense (Curley)
- Lincoln Man Sentenced to 21 1/2 Years in Prison for Production of Child Pornography (Tibbels)