14 DAY TRIAL // The Sunnyvale company is now struggling to block the pedophile search queries conducted on its Yahoo search technology, aiming to help the authorities from the entire world control this illegal phenomenon. According to the United Press International, Yahoo partnered with the British authorities to stop the pedophile queries on the technology and identify the searchers. Although this action is prohibited by the laws, it seems that the phenomenon is increased every day as more and more users are attracted to pay for child pornography.
"Everybody using our service, regardless of whether they are law enforcement agencies, has to abide by our terms of service and if they don't we will close them down," Yahoo! said according to the same source. "Up to about six months ago we didn't get any help covertly but now they are falling over themselves probably because they realize there are more benefits from cooperating than failing to cooperate with law enforcement," Detective Inspector Brian Ward added as The United Press International reported.
This matter is quite important for both users and company because it is related to the security of the searchers. As you might know, the adult material and especially the prohibited one tends to become easier to access as the number of the websites is continuously growing up. Take for example a recent study that revealed that more than 200 pornography websites are built every day. Because Yahoo is indexing a considerable number of pages, its role is quite important as it can provide very relevant information about the websites and the searchers. However, this issue brings another topic in discussion: the anonymity of the users. Some of the users affected by the investigation can accuse the giant portal for infringing their privacy because Yahoo might provide sensitive details about them such as IP, search queries and visited websites.