04 August,2011 11:46 AM IST | | ANI
The US has charged 72 people for their alleged involvement in an online child pornography network used to share photos and videos of sexual abuse.
Fifty-two of those charged have already been arrested as part of the investigation, called 'Operation Delego', which US launched 20 months ago, the BBC reports.
Senior US officials said some 600 users of a site known as 'Dreamboard' had been investigated.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said that the 20 others charged as part of the US probe remain at large, and are known only by their Internet pseudonyms, 'Demented dream'.
Napolitano described the amount of pornographic material seized as equivalent to 16,000 DVDs.
Authorities have arrested people in 13 other countries that include Canada, Denmark, Ecuador, France, Germany, Hungary, Kenya, the Netherlands, the Philippines, Qatar, Serbia, Sweden and Switzerland, the report said.
The US Department of Justice said the members of Dreamboard traded graphic images and videos of adults molesting children aged 12 and under, often violently.
The members of the site created a massive private library of images of child sexual abuse.
A justice department statement said that out of the 52 individuals arrested, 13 have pleaded guilty, including two bulletin-board administrators in Canada and France.
Dreamboard was created in 2008 and shut down in early 2011 when it became evident the US government had launched a probe.
The charges being handed to members of the website carry sentences ranging from 20 years to life imprisonment.
