I bet just doing so would get me 10-20

@Smashville: Another thing to keep in mind is that you don't have context for who the person in the photo is. A lot of the kids who are being exploited are, like Cant_stop_the_rock said, in other countries, but are also orphans or have been placed in the prostitution trade. So it's not so much, "why don't these kids tell someone" - it's that there's no one to tell. Many of these children don't have parents. They've either been abandoned or taken. There's no one they can tell.

@DefineStatutory: Again, I find absolutely no reason to think everyone is a dirtbag. Then again, if an Apple employee digs through my computer looking for something juicy, all he/she is going to find is a ton of wedding photos and photos of my rabbit.

@DefineStatutory: What. It was clearly obvious that the entire problem had to do with the images.

But what Pecan said most of these pictures are taken outside of the US where there is no laws about child porn or the police and government are lax.

@Gilbert: Perhaps if you actually clicked on the article link, you wouldn't stick your foot in your mouth?

@pecan 3.14159265: Well. Here's the thing...and maybe it's just me when I was a kid.

I would have told my parents if some creepshow tried this.

But we rarely hear about them catching the people taking these pictures (granted, as Cant stop the rock pointed out, most of them are foreign). It doesn't require internet policing...it just shocks me that there are that many kids who don't tell someone.

Sorta a screwed up legal system. If you do report on somebody you're interfering,and often the first suspect if they can't find the person you claim did the act; if you don't you're hindering.

@DefineStatutory: If you were an attractive single female, you wouldn't have a tough time.

@Deleriumb32: Even further, the technician has a duty to report illegal activity.

(I don't see why malware programmers should care that you're looking at something related to what it's going to do to your computer though. Seems if you're going to be writing malicious code you'd go all out and put it on a site that has nothing to do with it.)

(imagine the Dude and/or Scooby-Doo's Shaggy saying that)

@DefineStatutory: Why is it that we assume everyone is a dirtbag?

I doubt that the existence of the photos will be the only evidence they use against this guy. If the guy downloaded the pictures himself they will no doubt find other evidence such as his source(s) of the child porn, perhaps traffic logs from his ISP.

Macs - it's not an acronym. And yes, it's possible to write malicious software for Mac OS. I can't remember the last time I heard (or if I ever heard) of a case of malicious software spreading on Mac OS X without the user granting permission for it to be installed. Of course the user wouldn't knowingly grant permission to install malicious software, but malware has been found in pirated Mac software before. You can't protect the user their own stupidity.

@GuinevereRucker:

The USC is only relevant in federal prosecutions, which this isn't. Moreover, I'm glad the prosecutions your grand jury was involved in were clear-cut, but inasmuch as there /are/ acquittals in child porn cases, perhaps the categorical "you're wrong" statement is, well, wrong.

@Joeb5:

If you're responding to GuinevereRucker, a grand jury doesn't deliver a verdict of guilty/not guilty.

@Smashville:

The same reason I can't track down the person who posts as "Smashville". The Innanet does a pretty good job keeping people anonymous most days.

@emona:

We don't know that the "genius" doesn't do exactly that with every other computer. In this case, he foujd something illegal, and reported it. He probably does the same thing geek squad does the rest of the time.

The law is written in such a way that in order to convict someone of possessing child pornography, you have to show that the image was real and not computer generated. The database that is held by the NCMEC contains images known by law enforcement to be real children, not computer-generated images.

@pecan 3.14159265:

That sort of depends on what the technician did, specifically. If he was just perusing the hard drive, not trying to actually solve an issue, hoping to score some free porn, the guy may have a point.

And no, I'm not defending a child porn guy. I'm just saying that we're making a hero out of a tech who probably copies everyone's home made shots of themselves onto his own computer to Fap to later. In this case, it was a positive. In a lot of cases, these cretins snooping around isn't.

@Smashville: First, it's hard to track exactly where things come from. Second, even though the FBI is a nationwide organization, they can't just step in and arrest someone unless they have confirmation that this guy on the internet is the same guy they think is living in Spokane on West Street in Apartment 100. It takes a lot of time and a lot of people, and they can't just step over local police.

Also, countless hours have to be spent tracing the origins of a photo. It's like an onion, and it's like a viral video, only there's no YouTube link and you're receiving it through e-mail or on a disc. Every group of people sending it is a layer to the onion. And because it just spreads through this network of sleazebags without any signature or originating link (not like YouTube, which has identifying markers like user accounts), it's hard for the authorities to get on the front line as the photo is being uploaded.

Even if they monitor every single network of sleazebags and do catch someone uploading a photo, there's no proof that person took the photo, merely that he or she has the photo.

@Devidence:

So is overreacting. It wasn't meant to condone the act, it was a joke. Feel free to head over to www.senseofhumor.com and download one.

Sidebar question...why do they never seem to track down the sick fucks that actually take the pictures?

Seriously though, good on Apple. I feel really sorry for the tech who had to discover that, though. Poor guy.

Sadly, I had a close encounter with one of these people, and I don't know why I never called the cops.

I was working on the road setting up car shows and he borrowed my laptop (he was my roomie). I came back from dinner one night and he was in the shower. The computer was on and downloading for Kazaa.... he was downloading child porn. If I had a chance to go back, he'd be doing hard time right now....

@Skankingmike: It's pretty clear that the guy signed over any rights he had to privacy when he sent in his computer to be looked at specifically for an issue regarding images being overwritten. It's not like he sent his computer in for a monitor problem and the employee started looking into his hard drive and found the photos.

Last year a computer popped up on my radar showing a virus, when I pulled the computer up remotely the first thing I saw was porn... wow, someone is surfing porn on a classroom podium computer.

As I took a couple of screen shots for proof I realized it was child porn. It at least looked like child porn going by the pictures. I am not an expert on child porn so I could only go by what I was seeing.

I immediatly notified campus police and we went to the classroom and found the guy there, sitting in the dark. He was arrested and charged with many things, including having some dope on him.

I later had to return to the computer and show the history our campus chief of the police. Since the computer was under DeepFreeze once it was turned off it would erase all tracks of what happened...

Having to view each page with the officer (who is female!) and print them was not fun at all...

The guy was convicted of a felony... and I also learned that he was fired from Boomers (mini-golf/arcade joint) because he felt up little girls as he "assisted" them.

@pecan 3.14159265: Especially if it's a 10-13 year old naked girl. There are uh, signs. But agreed, it's a creepy job. I guess you have to keep reminding yourself it's for the better good.

Graphic descriptions of the porn was given for every charge, and I promise it wasn't "naked hineys on a playground".

Under the law, child pornography is clearly defined and includes things like "lascivious exhibition of the genitals" among other things. Check out the USC for it sometime.

@pmcpa4:

Under what theory of liability?

@GitEmSteveDave_SameGreatTaste!: It's not that hard to tell how old a kid is. Do you have children? Nieces, nephews? Young cousins? Most people can tell how old a child may be and in this context, it's pretty much a given that one should call the police. Even if the person in the photos was 16, it doesn't change that the person looks 10 to 13, which is an indication that that age range is precisely what this guy wanted to see.

[www.hillcrestdesigngroup.com]

@Gilbert:

What do you mean "who volunteered"? That's a picture of Raymond Miller, accused pedophile-no quotes needed.
The photo credit link goes right to the news article.

In the meantime, I'm sure his next pursuit includes some manner of magnum opus of a hip-hopera.

Is midget porn illegal?

be sure to remove all traces of child porn before hauling your computer in to your local Apple Store's Genius Bar.

Both "suggestive" and "explicit" modifies "poses." Since when is a "pose" equated with porn without at least some nudity?!

Stupid criminals, there should be an app for that.