According to the IWF's 2004 Annual Report, of the 17,255 reports received in 2004, the number of reports relating to potentially illegal content where action was taken by the IWF increased to 20% of all reports, compared to 17% of in 2003.
This, said the group, is a clear indication that the prevalence of child abuse images on-line remains a serious problem.
In fact, according to the IWF, 50% of the sites containing potentially illegal content were Pay-Per-View sites, an indication of the high level of commercialisation of abusive images of children on the internet.
Despite this however, the number of reports processed by the internet hotline staff in 2004 actually dropped for the first time in IWF history – nearly a 12% reduction on the previous year.
This, said the IWF, was due to greater awareness on the part of the public, who were more likely to delete e-mail messages from unfamiliar sources, and the impact of anti-spam measures taken by the industry.
Other factors included the development of new e-mail software, which does not display images as a default, so consumers are not so exposed to potentially illegal images, and the high profile media reporting of police activities in combating on-line child porn.
The IWF found that UK servers host less than 1% of all the potentially illegal material referred to the foundation in 2004, compared to 18% in 1996. This, said the IWF, is due to the effective partnerships between the IWF, the UK internet industry and the police.
In fact the group found that there has been a geographical shift in the locations of where web sites containing illegal content are apparently hosted. Russian servers hosted 31% of the sites, up from 23% in 2003, while US servers saw a reduction in hosted material – 40%, compared to 55% in 2003.
In general terms, 82% of all reports received in 2004 (as described by the reporters) related to child abuse images. Fifteen percent were criminally obscene, 1.5% criminally racist and 1.5% related to other types of content.
The group also highlighted its new status as a "relevant authority" in terms of the Sexual Offences Act 2003, which provides IT professionals with a conditional defence to enable them to copy and store for a limited time, any on-line content found on their company networks, which they consider to be potentially illegal, so that it can be assessed by the IWF or law enforcement agencies.