Four arrested for circulating child pornographic content

Thiruvananthapuram: The state police have arrested four persons from across the state for circulating child pornographic content ,as part of their drive against paedophilia and child pornography called Operation P Hunt.
Two men were arrested from Thiruvananthapuram district and two from Kollam district. The arrests were effected by the Counter Child Sexual Exploitation (CCSE) unit of the Kerala Police, acting as per the guidelines of Interpol – Crimes against Children Unit and the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children.
ADGP (south zone) Manoj Abraham, who is the nodal officer of CCSE, said raids were carried out at various centres in 12 districts on Sunday.
A technical team of CCSE had been monitoring social media and messenger platforms such as WhatsApp and Telegram, which the offenders used to share and circulate child pornographic content.
The Interpol too kept them updated about IP addresses that logged on to blacklisted websites and WhatsApp and Telegram groups, he said.
As many as eight persons were rounded up and based on the examination of their devices, 5 were registered and 4 among them were arrested.
One of them could not be arrested as he is currently abroad.
The raid teams also seized mobile phones, laptops and computers with shocking videos and pictures of children, the ADGP said.
In April this year, the police had carried out the first round of Operation P Hunt in which 21 persons were arrested.
‘’The number of arrests in the second round is expected to increase in the coming days as raids are still continuing at various locations’’, Abraham said.
Cyber experts with State Police Cybedome and State Hitech Crime Enquiry Cell were also part of the special drive. The raids were led by IG (crimes) S Sreejith, who is also the head of the CCSE unit.