Australian police have arrested 19 men for allegedly sharing child pornography online and rescued 13 children from further harm after receiving tips from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), authorities said on Tuesday.
The investigation began in Australia last year after two FBI agents were killed in Florida in 2021 who were investigating child abuse in the United States, police said.
The FBI then informed Australian police that members of a peer-to-peer network in the country allegedly shared child pornography material on the dark web, AFP Commander Helen Schneider told a news conference.
“The longer people like this evade detection, the longer the cycle of abuse continues. It was a sophisticated network,” Schneider said.
The men, aged 32 to 81, distributed images and videos of child pornography, chatted on messaging platforms and allegedly used encryption to avoid detection.
Most Australian offenders worked in jobs that required a high degree of knowledge of Internet networks. Some are accused of producing their own child pornography material, police said.
Two Australian offenders were sentenced to prison terms while the others stood trial. The related FBI investigation led to the arrest of 79 people.
