Porn Links Young

Porn Links Young

Everything Apple Just Announced

iPhone 14 Pro, Pro Max

iPhone 14, 14 Plus

iPhone 14's New Emergency SOS Feature

Apple Watch Series 8

Apple Watch Ultra

AirPods Pro 2

Selling Your Old iPhone

Want CNET to notify you of price drops and the latest stories?

Tech
Tech Industry

Screen snapshot: This now-defunct site is reportedly where an FBI undercover agent posted hyperlinks purporting to be illegal videos. Clicking the links brought a raid from the Feds.
Spice up your small talk with the latest tech news, products and reviews. Delivered on weekdays.

© 2022 CNET, a Red Ventures company. All rights reserved.

US
France
Germany
Japan
Korea

Agency disseminates hyperlinks purporting to be illegal videos of minors having sex, and then raids the homes of anyone willing to click on them.

Declan McCullagh is the chief political correspondent for CNET. You can e-mail him or follow him on Twitter as declanm . Declan previously was a reporter for Time and the Washington bureau chief for Wired and wrote the Taking Liberties section and Other People's Money column for CBS News' Web site.

The FBI has recently adopted a novel investigative technique: posting hyperlinks that purport to be illegal videos of minors having sex, and then raiding the homes of anyone willing to click on them.

Undercover FBI agents used this hyperlink-enticement technique, which directed Internet users to a clandestine government server, to stage armed raids of homes in Pennsylvania, New York, and Nevada last year. The supposed video files actually were gibberish and contained no illegal images.

A CNET News.com review of legal documents shows that courts have approved of this technique, even though it raises questions about entrapment, the problems of identifying who's using an open wireless connection--and whether anyone who clicks on a FBI link that contains no child pornography should be automatically subject to a dawn raid by federal police.

Roderick Vosburgh, a doctoral student at Temple University who also taught history at La Salle University, was raided at home in February 2007 after he allegedly clicked on the FBI's hyperlink. Federal agents knocked on the door around 7 a.m., falsely claiming they wanted to talk to Vosburgh about his car. Once he opened the door, they threw him to the ground outside his house and handcuffed him.

News.com daily podcast
Reporter Declan McCullagh talks about the FBI's
hyperlinking tactic for getting child porn suspects.

Download mp3 (6.36MB)

Vosburgh was charged with violating federal law, which criminalizes "attempts" to download child pornography with up to 10 years in prison. Last November, a jury found Vosburgh guilty on that count, and a sentencing hearing is scheduled for April 22, at which point Vosburgh could face three to four years in prison.

The implications of the FBI's hyperlink-enticement technique are sweeping. Using the same logic and legal arguments, federal agents could send unsolicited e-mail messages to millions of Americans advertising illegal narcotics or child pornography--and raid people who click on the links embedded in the spam messages. The bureau could register the "unlawfulimages.com" domain name and prosecute intentional visitors. And so on.

"The evidence was insufficient for a reasonable jury to find that Mr. Vosburgh specifically intended to download child pornography, a necessary element of any 'attempt' offense," Vosburgh's attorney, Anna Durbin of Ardmore, Penn., wrote in a court filing that is attempting to overturn the jury verdict before her client is sentenced.

In a telephone conversation on Wednesday, Durbin added: "I thought it was scary that they could do this. This whole idea that the FBI can put a honeypot out there to attract people is kind of sad. It seems to me that they've brought a lot of cases without having to stoop to this."

Durbin did not want to be interviewed more extensively about the case because it is still pending; she's waiting for U.S. District Judge Timothy Savage to rule on her motion. Unless he agrees with her and overturns the jury verdict, Vosburgh--who has no prior criminal record--will be required to register as a sex offender for 15 years and will be effectively barred from continuing his work as a college instructor after his prison sentence ends.

How the hyperlink sting operation worked

The government's hyperlink sting operation worked like this: FBI Special Agent Wade Luders disseminated links to the supposedly illicit porn on an online discussion forum called Ranchi, which Luders believed was frequented by people who traded underage images. One server allegedly associated with the Ranchi forum was rangate.da.ru, which is now offline with a message attributing the closure to "non-ethical" activity.

In October 2006, Luders posted a number of links purporting to point to videos of child pornography, and then followed up with a second, supposedly correct link 40 minutes later. All the links pointed to, according to a bureau affidavit, a "covert FBI computer in San Jose, California, and the file located therein was encrypted and non-pornographic."

Some of the links, including the supposedly correct one, included the hostname uploader.sytes.net. Sytes.net is hosted by no-ip.com , which provides dynamic domain name service to customers for $15 a year.

When anyone visited the upload.sytes.net site, the FBI recorded the Internet Protocol address of the remote computer. There's no evidence the referring site was recorded as well, meaning the FBI couldn't tell if the visitor found the links through Ranchi or another source such as an e-mail message.

With the logs revealing those allegedly incriminating IP addresses in hand, the FBI sent administrative subpoenas to the relevant Internet service provider to learn the identity of the person whose name was on the account--and then obtained search warrants for dawn raids.

The search warrants authorized FBI agents to seize and remove any "computer-related" equipment, utility bills, telephone bills, any "addressed correspondence" sent through the U.S. mail, video gear, camera equipment, checkbooks, bank statements, and credit card statements.

While it might seem that merely clicking on a link wouldn't be enough to justify a search warrant, courts have ruled otherwise. On March 6, U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt in Nevada agreed with a magistrate judge that the hyperlink-sting operation constituted sufficient probable cause to justify giving the FBI its search warrant.

The defendant in that case, Travis Carter, suggested that any of the neighbors could be using his wireless network. (The public defender's office even sent out an investigator who confirmed that dozens of homes were within Wi-Fi range.)

But the magistrate judge ruled that even the possibilities of spoofing or other users of an open Wi-Fi connection "would not have negated a substantial basis for concluding that there was probable cause to believe that evidence of child pornography would be found on the premises to be searched." Translated, that means the search warrant was valid.

Entrapment: Not a defense

So far, at least, attorneys defending the hyperlink-sting cases do not appear to have raised unlawful entrapment as a defense.

"Claims of entrapment have been made in similar cases, but usually do not get very far," said Stephen Saltzburg , a professor at George Washington University's law school. "The individuals who chose to log into the FBI sites appear to have had no pressure put upon them by the government...It is doubtful that the individuals could claim the government made them do something they weren't predisposed to doing or that the government overreached."

The outcome may be different, Saltzburg said, if the FBI had tried to encourage people to click on the link by including misleading statements suggesting the videos were legal or approved.

In the case of Vosburgh, the college instructor who lived in Media, Penn., his attorney has been left to argue that "no reasonable jury could have found beyond a reasonable doubt that Mr. Vosburgh himself attempted to download child pornography."

Vosburgh faced four charges: clicking on an illegal hyperlink; knowingly destroying a hard drive and a thumb drive by physically damaging them when the FBI agents were outside his home; obstructing an FBI investigation by destroying the devices; and possessing a hard drive with two grainy thumbnail images of naked female minors (the youths weren't having sex, but their genitalia were visible).

The judge threw out the third count and the jury found him not guilty of the second. But Vosburgh was convicted of the first and last counts, which included clicking on the FBI's illicit hyperlink.

In a legal brief filed on March 6, his attorney argued that the two thumbnails were in a hidden "thumbs.db" file automatically created by the Windows operating system. The brief said that there was no evidence that Vosburgh ever viewed the full-size images--which were not found on his hard drive--and the thumbnails could have been created by receiving an e-mail message, copying files, or innocently visiting a Web page.

From the FBI's perspective, clicking on the illicit hyperlink and having a thumbs.db file with illicit images are both serious crimes. Federal prosecutors wrote: "The jury found that defendant knew exactly what he was trying to obtain when he downloaded the hyperlinks on Agent Luder's Ranchi post. At trial, defendant suggested unrealistic, unlikely explanations as to how his computer was linked to the post. The jury saw through the smokes (sic) and mirrors, as should the court."

And, as for the two thumbnail images, prosecutors argued (note that under federal child pornography law, the definition of "sexually explicit conduct" does not require that sex acts take place):

Prosecutors also highlighted the fact that Vosburgh visited the " loli-chan " site, which has in the past featured a teenage Webcam girl holding up provocative signs (but without any nudity).

Civil libertarians warn that anyone who clicks on a hyperlink advertising something illegal--perhaps found while Web browsing or received through e-mail--could face the same fate.

When asked what would stop the FBI from expanding its hyperlink sting operation, Harvey Silverglate , a longtime criminal defense lawyer in Cambridge, Mass. and author of a forthcoming book on the Justice Department, replied: "Because the courts have been so narrow in their definition of 'entrapment,' and so expansive in their definition of 'probable cause,' there is nothing to stop the Feds from acting as you posit."

*First Published: Aug 29, 2014, 8:00 am CDT

Posted on Aug 29, 2014 Updated on May 30, 2021, 4:45 pm CDT

Being a pedophile on the Deep Web isn’t as easy today.

When FBI agents burst into the home of Timothy DeFoggi early one morning last year, he was sitting at his laptop downloading child pornography videos over the Tor anonymity network.

DeFoggi, until then the acting cybersecurity chief at the federal Department of Health and Human Services, was recently found guilty of three child-porn crimes, including solicitation and distribution. His guilty verdict is the latest in a long string of successful investigations, busts, and convictions that have come as American law enforcement wages a war on child pornography on the Deep Web.

Today, the pedophile websites and communities of the anonymous Internet are closing ranks and making it more difficult for new members to enter than ever before.

The Love Zone, likely the biggest child pornography site on the Deep Web today, has over 50,000 members. At one time, registering for the Love Zone was as easy as making a Twitter account. For much of the four years since its founding in 2010, the site grew into one of the largest trading posts of illegal pornography simply because of its openness.

Prospective new members now have to actually commit a crime to gain access.

After you’ve claimed a nickname on TLZ, new members are required to post 50 to 200 megabytes of hardcore preteen pornography in order to gain access. An application “must contain clearly preteen hardcore material,” the site rules state. “No softcore, no jailbait. If at least one of the participants is 12 years old or less, flat-chested, hairless, and engaging in sexual activity, it most likely qualifies.”

Members also have to describe the content of the porn in detail.

That’s the equivalent of a street gang requiring a new member to rob a deli or stab a passerby, a tried-and-true method criminals use to separate the wheat from the chaff. Make the newbie commit a crime in front of everyone, or else he’s out.

Serious U.S. vigilance against child pornography in cyberspace began over a decade ago—long after the pedophiles had arrived online in large numbers—but the federal crosshairs shifted decisively to illegal abuse material on Tor’s anonymity network in 2013.

Over the past year, several of the biggest child pornography websites of all time have been targeted and shut down. Offenders were identified and arrested. Pedophile communities were saturated with fear, uncertainty, and doubt.

That hasn’t stopped many pedophiles from looking for illegal porn on the Deep Web, but it has put them in a new mindset.

In early Aug. 2013, federal agents seized and shut down Freedom Hosting, a Deep Web hosting operation they correctly identified as the “largest facilitator of child porn on the planet.”

Freedom Hosting was home to websites like Lolita City, which was then likely the largest child pornography site on the Web, with millions of photos and videos provided to over 15,000 members. It was free and open to access with no registration required.

Lolita City’s openness was the product of a pedophile community that had grown relatively comfortable behind the powerful veil of Tor’s anonymity.

Now, several popular forums across the Deep Web that were once open require illegal initiation rites or have simply closed up registration to new members.

This sort of defensive posture has been seen in the Deep Web’s recent past.

Before the fall of Freedom Hosting, the most prominent threat to the pedophiles of the Deep Web was perceived to be cyberattacks from hacktivist vigilantes from groups like Anonymous . In 2011, Anonymous attacked and brought down multiple Deep Web child porn sites including Lolita City—for a few days, anyway.

Shortly thereafter, the sites came back online and grew to 10 times their previous size.

To defend their websites from distributed denial of service attacks, sites like the Onion Pedo Video Archive (OPVA, the website that DeFoggi was caught using) threw an obstacle in the way: a front page CAPTCHA containing child pornography that required a human being to view and interact with the illegal content before being able to access or attack the site.

OPVA no longer exists. It was never relaunched when Freedom Hosting was shut down. But many other child pornography sites popped back up.

While these obstacles can help to keep out vigilantes, trolls, and journalists—viewing and sharing that material is a crime for almost anyone—there are important exceptions the pedophiles are acutely aware of.

Police involved in an investigation can do what they deem necessary, for instance, and informants will likely be given a legal pass if they are cooperating with police.

The defensive posturing from the Deep Web’s child pornography realm is telling. They’re not stopping or shutting down shop by any means. But the last year, which has included arrests and raids of Deep Web pedophiles across the world, has left that community more on edge than ever before.
Patrick Howell O'Neill is a notable cybersecurity reporter whose work has focused on the dark net, national security, and law enforcement. A former senior writer at the Daily Dot, O'Neill joined CyberScoop in October 2016.

I am a cybersecurity journalist at CyberScoop. I cover the security industry, national security and law enforcement.
Black woman says man repeatedly tried to break into her room at 1am in D.C. hotel, suspects trafficking ring (updated)
‘Why is this still happening man’: Student film aftermath of school shooting in viral TikToks
‘We have to be careful’: Woman shares ‘scary experience’ with Bolt taxi driver amid recent U.K. murders (updated)
Coroner confirms Gabby Petito’s remains found in Wyoming, death ruled a homicide

Shortcuts to other sites to search off DuckDuckGo Learn More
ABUSEME - Excellent Collection Of Aggressive Pornography 58 min. 58 min Abuse Me - 2.1M Views - 1080p. Real punishment 2 min. 2 min Sexysdotus - 45.7k Views - 1080p. Best Of Maddy O'Reilly Hardcore Pornstar Compilation 10 min. 10 min Best3V1L - 226.2k Views - 1080p. Dreamnude Strip, Body Tour, & Massive Mirror Cumshot!
Watch Free Pornography porn videos for free, here on Pornhub.com. Discover the growing collection of high quality Most Relevant XXX movies and clips. No other sex tube is more popular and features more Free Pornography scenes than Pornhub! Browse through our impressive selection of porn videos in HD quality on any device you own.
Similar searches big boobs step daughter brazzers hard fuck office cuckold real after party pornography videos pornography husband lets wife f*** best friend granny cum shots boyfriend fingering granny cum hairy blonde wife pays debt free pornographic videos cock exam sex play it feels so big in me parents caught fucking uncensored ...
Spread DuckDuckGo. Help your friends and family join the Duck Side!
Dark Lantern Entertainment. My Secret Life, The Sexual Memoirs of an English Gentleman - 'The Sins Of Our Grannies'. 1k 11min - 720p. Pornographie française. 67.3k 100% 5min - 480p. Pornographie française. 1.4M 100% 5min - 480p. First-class erotic pornography video. 282.4k 96% 6min - 360p.
Pornhub is the world's leading free porn site. Choose from millions of hardcore videos that stream quickly and in high quality, including amazing VR Porn. The largest adult site on the Internet just keeps getting better. We have more pornstars and real amateurs than anyone else. It's fast, it's free, it's Pornhub!
Tons of free Adult Free Pornography porn videos and XXX movies are waiting for you on Redtube. Find th
Vintage Anal Film
Swinger Tranny
Voyeur Teeny

Porn Links Young

Report Page