Poll: After Mark Bridger's conviction for the murder of April Jones, should Google do more to stop child porn?
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.During the trial of Mark Bridger for the sexually motivated murder of 5-year-old April Jones, details emerged of Bridger's use of online child porn.
Search engines including Google and Bing are now coming under pressure from campaigning groups to do more to prevent access to these illegal and obscene images.
Acting chief executive of the NSPCC, Phillip Noyes commented: "For some time we have been concerned about the growing number of these obscene images which are becoming more easily available and can fuel the fantasies of offenders like Bridger...This case points to the ever-growing evidence that there is a worrying link between looking at this vile kind of material and committing other serious sexual assaults."
Suggested actions include:
- Introducing pop-up warnings which threaten prosecution when users attempt to access certain material
- Introducing the "safe search" option as default (the current default setting, "moderate" allows access to pornography)
But is this a realistic and reasonable expectation? Or a knee-jerk response to a particularly shocking and horrific crime?
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments