CBI raids 59 locations against circulation of child sex abuse material

On Saturday the Central Bureau of Investigation CBI conducted national wide searches at around 59 locations in 21 States and Union Territory in a connection with child sexual abused contents under operation Megh ChakraThe CBI has registered two cases under relevant provisions of IT Act based on information received from Crime Against Children CAC a unit of INTERPOL Singapore which had received the same from New Zealand police for sharing with the relevant countryIt was alleged that a number of Indian citizens were involved in the circulation downloading transmission of Child Sexual Abuse Material CSAM using cloudbased storageldquoThe said information received in INTERPOL from law enforcement authorities of New Zealand was analysed and developed by CBI and suspected persons were identified to locate and disrupt further distribution Todays crackdown was follow up of massive operation Operation Carbon carried out by CBI last year against Online Child Sexual Abuse Materialrdquo a statement of CBI official readsDuring searches electronic devices including mobiles and laptops belonging to more than 50 suspects have been recoveredAlso read NSE phone tapping case CBI gets custody of exMumbai police chief Sanjay PandeyPreliminary scrutiny of these electronic devices using cyber forensic tools has allegedly revealed the presence of a huge quantity of CSAM Child Sexual Abuse Material in a number of electronic devicesThe suspects are being questioned with regard to the CSAM found in their electronic devices so as to identify the child victims and the abusersAccording to CBI Operation Megh Chakra is one of the CBIled global operations in recent times for rapid response to online child sexual exploitation cases with international linkages and organised cyberenabled financial crimes with victims accused suspects conspirators located across international jurisdictions requiring a globally coordinated law enforcement responseOperation Megh Chakra seeks to collate information from various law enforcement agencies within India engage with relevant law enforcement agencies globally and coordinate closely through INTERPOL channels to combat online child sexual exploitationldquoCoordination meetings were organised with INTERPOL and foreign law enforcement agencies for sharing critical information to dismantle such cybercrime networksrdquo the CBI statement further readsCities where the raid was conducted by CBIThe raids conducted in FatehabadHaryana Dehradun Uttarakhand KachhGujarat GhaziabadUttar Pradesh MursidabadWest Bengal Mumbai Pune Nashik Thane Nanded Solapur Kolahpur amp Nagpur Maharashtra Ranchi Jharkhand Chittoor Andhra Pradesh KrishnaAndhra Pradesh Ram Nagar Karnataka KolarKarnataka Faridabad Haryana HathrasUttar Pradesh Bengaluru Kodagu Raipur Chhattisgarh New Delhi Chelakkara Kerala Dindigul Madurai Gurdaspur amp HosiarpurPunjab Chennai Dhanbad Rajkot Goa Hyderabad Ajmer Jaipur CuddaloreTamil Nadu Mallapuram Kerala Lunavada Gujarat GodhraGujarat Guwahati DhimajiAssam ItanagarArunachal Pradesh BardhmanWest Bengal MaharajganjUttar Pradesh SaranBihar BhagalpurBihar AgartalaTripura Mandi Himachal Pradesh