Should family and friends report to the authorities people who are looking at images of child pornography?

Legislation introduced in December 2007 in Manitoba would make it a crime for anyone in that province to fail to report someone they suspect of looking at images of child pornography and/or possessing same.

The question that comes to the fore is, “Is this a good law?”

Many will say that such a law will reduce child pornography because if more people are afraid to look at it, there will be a less need to produce it. I doubt that the solution to child pornography is that simplistic.

I think the proposed legislation has flaws in it that will make it meaningless. For example, are we to understand that family members and good friends of such child pornography viewers/owners will prefer to risk their relationships with these people? Further, how will the authorities really prove that family members and good friends of such people were aware that these people were looking at images of child pornography or possessed the same, especially if no one admits to the allegations of the authorities?

"Internet service providers do make a lot of money off of the sharing of child pornography online." said Benjamin Perrin, an assistant law professor at the University of British Columbia. "They definitely have an obligation to contribute more to eradicate child pornography than they do now."

"The industry itself has long had a voluntary reporting system in place that's worked very well." said Tom Copeland, chairman of the Canadian Association of Internet Providers, an industry group.

Major providers like Bell Canada and Rogers help fund Cybertip.ca, an agency that operates a national hotline and investigates reports of child pornography. The companies also run Project Cleanfeed Canada, a project that blocks child pornography websites from loading.

Perrin, a law professor who specializes in issues of child exploitation, said while the threat of criminal prosecution could spur new vigilance in Internet company employees, by saying, "It might not encourage average citizens to report pedophiles. Putting the threat of criminal prosecution on family members of pedophiles - who may be victims themselves - may not be the best way to encourage them to come forward." said Perrin.

The concern I have is that the government is acting not unlike the Stasi in East Germany – forcing family members and close friends to accuse their relatives and close friends of wrongdoings and report them to the authorities.

The cohesion that keeps families and close friends together should not be lessened just to keep the police happy. Such a law would in fact break up those relationships and I am not convinced that the public good would be served that way.