Child Pornography crime

Child Pornography
Federal and state laws make it a crime to produce, possess, distribute, or sell pornographic materials that exploit or portray a minor. Increasingly, child pornography laws are being utilized to punish use of computer technology and the Internet to obtain, share, and distribute pornographic material involving children, including images and films.

Society and policy makers have long struggled with finding effective ways to protect the public from sex offenders. A sex offender is a person who has been convicted of certain sex offense crimes.

 

Examples of sex offenses include:

• Sexual conduct with a minor
• Sexual assault
• Sexual assault of spouse
• Molestation of a child
• Continuous sexual abuse of a child
• Infamous crimes against nature
• Lewd and lascivious acts
• Indecent exposure and public sexual indecency
• Taking a child for the purpose of prostitution
• Sexual exploitation of a minor
• Incest
• Kidnapping, aggravated assault, murder, unlawful imprisonment, and burglary (when the offense includes evidence of sexual motivation)
• Failure to register as a sex offender
• Violation of Sex Offender Registration statutes

 

Most offenses involving criminal sexual conduct fall within the jurisdiction of state law, but federal law also includes a number of sexual offenses. The offenses are found in Title 18 of the United States Code. Some of the federal offenses specifically apply to sexual offenses committed within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States or in a federal prison. Other crimes involve offenders who cross state or international borders to commit, or in the commission, of a sexual offense. For example, 18 U.S.C. section 2251 makes it illegal to knowingly print, publish, or cause to be made, "any notice or advertisement seeking or offering to receive, exchange, buy, produce, display, distribute, or reproduce any visual depiction involving the use of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct. This statute also applies when such person knows that such notice or advertisement will be, or has been, transported in interstate or foreign commerce by any means, including by computer."

 

Federal sexual offense include:

• Selling or buying of children (Section 2251A(a)(b)
• Certain activities relating to material involving the sexual exploitation of minors, including both distribution and receipt of visual depictions in books, magazines, periodicals, films, and videotapes (Section 2252)
• Certain activities relating to material constituting or containing child pornography (Section 2252A)
• Production of sexually explicit depictions of a minor for importation into the United States (Section 2260)
• Transporting an individual in interstate or foreign commerce with the intent that the individual engage in prostitution or other illegal sexual activity (Section 2421)
• Transportation of minors in interstate or foreign commerce, with intent to engage in criminal sexual activity (Section 2423(a))
• Interstate or foreign travel with intent to engage in a sexual act with a juvenile (Section 2423(b))
• Use of interstate facilities to transmit information about an individual under the age of 16, with "the intent to entice, encourage, offer, or solicit that minor to engage in any sexual activity that can be charged as a criminal offense." (Section 2425)

 

Technology-Cyber LawCyber law encompasses the legal issues that are related to the use of inter-networked information technology. Cyber law is a body of law that governs many areas of law and regulation including intellectual property, privacy, freedom of expression and jurisdiction. Cyber law is a difficult and broad range of law to understand. A person using the internet in the United States could be subject to the cyber laws not only in the United States but also in other countries. This all depends on what the person in the United States is doing on the internet in relation to other countries. This is known as jurisdiction and entails the following:
• The laws of the state/nation in which the user resides
• The laws of the state/nation that apply where the server hosting the transaction is located
• The laws of the state/nation which apply to the person or business with whom the transaction takes place.

Not all of the laws or regulations regarding cyber law carry over to another state within the country or even to another country. For instance, what might be illegal on the internet in one country might be legal in another country and vice versa. There are still arguments raging today throughout the country about whether or not the internet should be treated as a physical space or as the internet being a world unto its own. If the internet is treated as a physical space then it would be governed by the rules and laws where it is located. If it is treated as its own world then the internet would self-govern itself.

Intellectual Property
Intellectual property has become a growing concern with cyber law because of how easy it has become to copy certain media and distribute that media. The intellectual property that cyber law tries to protect for the most part is music. With the development of the internet it has become much easier to download, copy, and distribute music against copyright laws. Copyright infringement is the violation of another person’s copyright of a piece of intellectual property. It is much easier now to share music files with other people on the internet illegally. There are sites that have established a fee to legally purchase music over the internet now. The money collected goes towards the people who created the music as royalties.

Cyber Law Enforcement
Cyber law enforcement is the process of enforcing cyber law. There are illegal activities that can occur on the internet that are violations of cyber law. This can be child pornography, cyber stalking, online fraud, cyber scams, hacking, cyber harassment and virus attacks. Cyber law can help to protect internet users from having their identity stolen over the internet, from having their computer records hacked into and from cyber harassment. Cyber law can be enforced by courts and police officers across the country. If a person violates cyber law they can be subjected to fines and maybe even a jail term. Many police officers will pose as young teenagers or young children on the internet to help track and arrest child predators or pedophiles. Cyber law is also monitored and enforced by the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation.

 

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Sources: FindLaw.com and LawFirms.com