HYDERABAD: Regardless of a reported complaint lodged by social activist Sunitha Krishnan, the state police have been taking action to curtail the availability of Child Sex Abuse Material (CSAM) on messaging applications.
Krishnan, in her complaint to DGP Anjani Kumar, raised the very serious issue of the free availability of CSAM on messaging platforms like Telegram, and the ease with which paedophiles utilize payment gateways like PhonePe and PayTm to access child pornographic material.
The social activist, who is also the co-founder of Prajwala, reportedly lodged the complaint on Children’s Day. Krishnan, in her complaint, said that the applications were not taking the responsibility of filtering the content that is being exchanged on their channels and said that this begs the need for action against them.
Women’s Safety Wing ADGP Shikha Goel admitted to TNIE that CSAM is in circulation. She said that while her department has not yet received any complaint, action was being taken against such material nonetheless.“CSAM is monitored by a cyber lab set up for keeping an eye on paedophiles. This case will be taken up too if a complaint is received,” Goel said.
In her complaint, Krishnan explained that she created a fake identity that hardly needed any authorized documents and used it to contact various group members. She said that came across numerous groups where people were seen exchanging explicit material. Krishnan said that the applications did not allow her to take screenshots on her phone.
The activist said that the CSAM she accessed contained scenes of oral sex and intercourse with children, solo streaming of children between three and 12 years of age as well as adult pornography.
Meanwhile, it is reported that Telegram has removed nearly 26,000 such groups and channels.