Five Eyes nations target tech titans on child sex abuse

Security ministers from the powerful Five Eyes alliance have demanded tech ­giants allow access to encrypted criminal content.

Minister for Home Affairs Peter Dutton. Picture: Kym Smith

Security ministers from the powerful Five Eyes intelligence alliance have demanded tech ­giants allow backdoor access to encrypted criminal content on the dark web, as Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton declared Australia was in a global “war” with sex offenders.

In an unprecedented move against the technology industry, the Five Country Ministerial — comprising the US, Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand — said urgent action was needed from the companies to combat live-streaming of child sex abuse.

The harshly worded statement gave executives from ­Google, Facebook, Twitter, ­Roblox, Snap and Microsoft, who were called to the ministerial meeting in London, until September to prove what action they had taken to combat what the five countries said were “abhorrent crimes”.

The statement also accused some companies of deliberately designing systems to prevent any access, even to the most serious criminal content.

Mr Dutton, who led discussions on the growing problem of child exploitation, has insisted that tech companies, which have resisted regulation and calls for backdoor encryption keys, begin co-operating under a moral ­obligation.

The demands are the strongest yet issued by the Five Eyes alliance, which is the world’s largest security and intelligence-sharing partnership.

Mr Dutton said from London that the Five Eyes partners had led the world against terrorism and were now taking the same approach to child exploitation and abuse.

“This is a bad day for pedophiles and a victory for authorities in their fight to protect innocent children,” he said.

“Our government is at war with child sex offenders, whether in our country or abroad, and there is now a stronger resolve than ever with our Five Eyes partners. Our Five Eyes partners have led the war on terror and now that war extends against child sexual predators.

“Today commonsense prevailed and the rights of victims won over the rights of child sexual offenders.”

A communique putting tech companies on notice was issued following the close of the Five Country Ministerial talks, which also covered terrorism, foreign interference, cyber and 5G communications networks.

“We are concerned where companies deliberately design their systems in a way that ­precludes any form of access to content, even in cases of the most serious crimes,” it said. “This approach puts citizens and society at risk by severely eroding a company’s ability to identify and respond to the most harmful illegal content, such as child sexual exploitation and abuse, terrorist and extremist material and foreign adversaries’ attempts to undermine democratic values and institutions, as well as law enforcement agencies’ ability to investigate serious crime.”

It said tech companies should include mechanisms in the design of their encrypted products and services whereby governments, “acting with appropriate legal authority, can obtain access to data in a readable and usable format”.

The communique cited a 20-fold rise in live-streaming of child sex abuse and online child exploitation, with more than 18 million referrals of offensive online material to authorities last year.

It said all participants at the meeting, including the tech company executives, “agreed that tackling this epidemic requires an immediate upscaling of the global response to ensure that all children across the globe are protected against online sexual exploitation and abuse, and that there is no safe space online for offenders to operate.

The tech companies have been told they have until September to respond on finalising a voluntary code to stop the “viewing and sharing of child sexual abuse material, the grooming of children online, and the live-streaming of child sexual abuse and the ability to report such offences to law enforcement”.

Mr Dutton told The Australian before the meeting that the Five Eyes partners would look at offensive cyber capabilities to disrupt and close down pedophile networks and live-streaming of child sex abuse.

The meeting also discussed 5G and the controversy over Britain’s consideration of allowing Chinese firm Huawei to participate in the rollout of its network.

The US, Australia and New Zealand have banned the company from involvement with 5G with the US threatening that if Britain went ahead it would pull back on its intelligence sharing through Five Eyes.

Newly elected British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has signalled that the UK may reverse its decision.