The majority of the arrests were made on Wednesday during “Operation Cumberland” in one of the first globally-coordinated operations on AI-generated child sexual abuse material.
“Europol has supported authorities from 19 countries in a large-scale hit against child sexual exploitation that has led to 25 arrests,” a statement said.
“The suspects were part of a criminal group whose members were engaged in the distribution of images of minors fully generated by artificial intelligence,” the Hague-based law agency said.
After a “symbolic online payment, users from around the world were able to obtain a password to access the platform and watch children being abused,” Europol said.
The operation was led by Danish police and also involved EU law enforcement as well as peers from Australia, Britain, Canada and New Zealand.
It followed the arrest in November of the main suspect, a Dane who ran an online platform where he distributed the AI material he produced.
Due to its relatively new nature, the case was “exceptionally challenging”, Europol said, “especially due to lack of national legislation addressing these crimes”.
“Online child sexual exploitation remains one of the most threatening manifestations of cybercrime in the EU,” it said.
This “continues to be one of the top priorities for law enforcement agencies, which are dealing with an ever-growing volume of illegal content,” Europol said, adding that more arrests were expected.
Although EU member states are mulling common regulation to tackle “this new situation”, the use of AI to create images of sex with minors poses “significant challenges to authorities to identify real victims”.
“Even in cases when the content is fully artificial and there is no real victim depicted… AI generated child sex material still contributes to the objectification and sexualisation of children,” it said.
‘New investigative methods’
Europe’s biggest hotline dedicated to finding and removing AI-generated child sexual abuse material in October said it had removed more websites “in the past six months than the entire previous year.”
Many of the images and videos of children being “hurt and abused are so realistic that they can be very difficult to tell apart from imagery of real children”, said the UK-based Internet Watch Foundation (IWF).
“People can be under no illusion that AI generated child sexual abuse material causes horrific harm, not only to those who might see it but to those survivors who are repeatedly victimised every time images and videos of their abuse are mercilessly exploited,” said Derek Ray-Hill, interim chief executive of the IWF.
Europol said it aimed to mount an online campaign “within the coming days” to highlight the consequences of using AI for illegal purposes and targeting potential offenders “where they are most active: online.”
Europol chief Catherine De Bolle said AI-generated content made it progressively more challenging for investigators to identify offenders.
“Law enforcement will need to develop new investigative methods and tools to address these emerging challenges,” she said.