Germany announces bust of 'one of the world's biggest child pornography darknet platforms'

(Image credit: Maja Hitij/Getty Images)

published 3 May 2021

German prosecutors announced Monday that they have dismantled the child pornography platform "Boystown" and arrested three alleged site administrators and one extremely active German user. With more than 400,000 registered members, "Boystown" was "one of the world's biggest child pornography darknet platforms," prosecutors said.

Prosecutors in Frankfurt and Germany's Federal Criminal Police Office said the three German administrators were arrested in mid-April. Police then shut down the platform. The unidentified alleged site administrators — aged 40, 49, 58 — helped pedophiles spread child pornography while evading law enforcement, prosecutors say, and the site included "images of most severe sexual abuse of toddlers" among other vile pornography. The 58-year-old administrator was arrested in Paraguay and the 64-year-old super-user from Hamburg allegedly uploaded more than 3,500 posts to the site.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Explore More

Peter has worked as a news and culture writer and editor at The Week since the site's launch in 2008. He covers politics, world affairs, religion and cultural currents. His journalism career began as a copy editor at a financial newswire and has included editorial positions at The New York Times Magazine, Facts on File, and Oregon State University.