Credit cards help to track down child porn offenders

January 17, 2007

The German police have recently arrested 322 suspects after going through credit card transactions from 22 million customers. They were in ten different states yet the website they signed up to was based within the Philippines.

The child porn site charges $79.99 for 20 days and the German police found the suspects by narrowing their search down to one receiver account. This is because due to German laws, they were not allowed to look at a broader scale of card transactions. It was not even the police who went through the records, it was the credit companies themselves and 14 different credit card companies voluntarily offered to do it.

Once the suspects were narrowed down, the police swooped in and arrested them, as well as taking various evidence, such as computers, videotapes and photographs. The operation itself was known as ‘Mikado’ and it was the biggest of its kind as the 14 credit card companies did join in with the investigation.

Going through the records certainly would have taken some time and with 322 suspects now caught, who is to say how many more are left? The good news is that they did in fact pay with their credit cards which left them vulnerable to be caught. Whilst some will praise the move others still question it and wonder just how reliable the method is. However, the truth cannot be hid in this circumstance as the statements clearly show that $79.99 was taken out for the site and even if the individuals decided not to use it afterwards, they still signed up.

It is likely that more of these researches will be done in order to catch more unwitting child porn offenders. However, it remains to be seen whether there will be another large scale operation like the ‘Mikado’ operation was.