Security News > 2020 > March > Report calls for web pre-screening to end UK’s child abuse ‘explosion’
A UK inquiry into child sexual abuse facilitated by the internet has recommended that the government require apps to pre-screen images before publishing them, in order to tackle "An explosion" in images of child sex abuse.
The imagery isn't only "Depraved"; it's also easy to get to, the inquiry said, referring to research from the National Crime Agency that found that you can find child exploitation images within three clicks when using mainstream search engines.
The NCA has previously proposed that internet companies scan images against its hash database prior to being uploaded.
Apple, Facebook, Google, Dropbox and Microsoft, among others, automatically scan images uploaded to their servers.
The client device can then perform the scan, and report only images that get flagged as CSAI. This approach removes the need for servers to see most of your data, at the cost of enlisting every client device into a distributed surveillance network.