Google and Microsoft, the two largest search engines, have agreed to implement measures to make it harder to find child abuse images online but the Prime Minister has warned that if they do not implement them stringently, he will bring forward new legislation.
While welcoming the announcements, Mr Cameron said that searches carried out through Google or Microsoft’s Bing, which together account for some 95 per cent of search traffic, must be “unambiguously” aimed at making illegal images return no results.
Both firms have made changes to their software instructions that will prevent searches for child abuse imagery delivering any such material and will soon do so in more than 150 languages, so the impact will be truly global.
The changes will apply to the UK first however, before being rolled out across the other languages in the next six month and in addition, there will be warnings shown at the top of search results reminding people that child abuse is illegal.
Unusually for the rival firms, they are working closely together on this project and, along with other internet firms are meeting with the Prime Minister later today (November 18) for an Internet Safety Summit.
Both companies have also agreed to work with the UK’s National Crime Agency and the Internet Watch Foundation to try to tackle networks which host child abuse images and are using their technological expertise to help in the identification of abuse images.
Campaigners have hailed the measures as a great step forward but some critics claim that they will not make any significant difference to paedophiles searching for images of abuse, as they search on peer-to-peer sites rather than use the big search engines.