Just reading through the article, a couple of things stand out to me.
So here goes....
"Making" indecent images can have a wide legal definition, and covers more than simply taking or filming the original picture or clip.
The Crown Prosecution Service says it can include:
- opening an email attachment containing an image
- downloading an image from a website to a screen
- storing an image on a computer
- accessing a pornographic website in which an image appears in an automatic "pop-up" window
- receiving an image via social media, even if unsolicited and even if part of a group
- or live-streaming images of children
You may not know this or not, but when you visit a website, any images you see are automatically store in your "cache", so downloaded to your computer.
So let's look at a theoretical example. You often look at BBC for your news.
Except one day, someone hacks the BBC and uploads a picture on a news article of an underage child (boy, girl, bestiality, basically something illegal)
In theory, that's illegal. You could be sent to prison for that.
If it's not the BBC, it's this forum. I mean, there's no filter on what images I can post. I wouldn't, but if I had such pictures, they could be posted here. Chippy would take them down, but not before many of you had viewed them (been disgusted and reported them, but they're now downloaded to your computer)
As for the second point, you're on some porn site, enjoying yourself and a pop-up comes up, with an image of an under 18 year old, you're now nicked. There's nothing you can do about it (other than have pop-up blockers or whatever).
These laws need looking at. You could end up on the sex offenders register with a criminal record for minding your own business.
I mentioned elsewhere that in the early days of the internet, it was like the Wild West. Genuinely, I have never seen any child porn, underage nakedness or whatever, but I've seen some stuff that can't be unseen. For instance, a site called "Dan's Gallery of the Grotesque" had pictures of people after car accidents, shot and so on. Another chatroom I used to frequent, we used to get the odd troll who would post up bestiality. My missus confirmed she has also seen stuff like this.
I'll confirm, what has been seen, cannot be unseen. But in theory, had the laws been in place today, I'd be nicked.
