Parlement steunt verwijdering van sites met kinderporno (en)
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - MEPs dealing with justice and home affairs on Monday (14 February) backed an EU draft law regarding the prevention of child porn and abuse on the Internet, but watered down some of the provisions allowing member states to block users from seeing such websites.
The amendments voted on in Strasbourg put the emphasis on deleting such websites "at source" and only in two exceptional cases - when the hosting server is in a country unwilling to co-operate or when procedures take too long - allowing member states to block Internet access.
The original proposal put forward last year by the EU commission would have made blocking of websites hosting child porn or child abuse material mandatory for member states, prompting outrage especially among German MEPs who are strongly in favour of Internet freedom.
When defending her proposal, EU home affairs commissioner Cecilia Malmstrom i repeatedly stressed that deleting the content is cumbersome and lengthy and only prolongs the exposure of the under-age victim. Studies quoted by the commission suggest that between 10 percent and 20 percent of all minors in Europe may be sexually assaulted during their childhood.
But MEPs in the civil liberties and justice committee, which had its first vote on the bill, agreed that Internet blockades "must be set by transparent procedures and ensure that the restriction is limited to what is necessary and proportionate, and that users are informed of the reason for the restriction." Content providers and users must also be informed of the possibility to appeal, and to whom to appeal, under a judicial redress procedure, they added.
Campaigners against child abuse see this as a skewed vision of Internet freedom, giving the offender more rights than the victim.
"MEPs seem more concerned with the rights of child pornographers than they do with the rights of children who have been sexually abused to make their foul, illegal images," John Carr from the Children's Charities Coalition on Internet Safety told The Observer.
The final compromise will have to be agreed before the summer among all member states and the EU legislature. Member states will then have two years to transpose it into national legislation.
Tougher sanctions
On other provisions, MEPs agreed with the EU commission, such as the introduction of new rules and tougher penalties for sexual abuse of children.
Offenders would face penalties ranging from one to over ten years in prison, depending on the crime. In order to prevent repeated crimes, MEPs want convicted offenders to be "temporarily or permanently" prevented from getting a job involving children.
When recruiting, employers will be entitled to obtain information on any convictions for sex crimes. After recruitment, if serious suspicion arises, employers may still request such information, even if it has to be obtained from criminal records held in other EU countries.
"Sex tourists" travelling abroad to abuse children will also face prosecution, as well as family or friends abusing the child.
New forms of abuse and exploitation will also be criminalized, such as "grooming" - getting friends with children over the Internet with the intention of sexually abusing them - and making children pose sexually in front of webcams. MEPs have also added a rule that offenders who use different means to target a great number of children so as to multiply their chances of committing the crime would face harsher penalties.
MEPs further strengthened proposed rules on assisting, supporting and protecting victims, to ensure that they have easy access to legal remedies and do not suffer from participating in criminal investigations and trials.
On this latter point, a fresh proposal to be tabled on Tuesday by EU commissioner Viviane Reding i, in charge of justice and fundamental rights, is set to make judicial procedures more "child-friendly." For instance, children should not be confronted with the person accused of molesting them in court if they are a witness.