www.csua.org/u/wcp -> news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/viewing-child-pornography-not-crime-according-york-court-165025919.html
"The purposeful viewing of child pornography on the internet is now legal in New York," Senior Judge Carmen Beauchamp Ciparick wrote in a majority decision for the court. The decision came after Marist College professor James D Kent was sentenced to prison in August 2009 after more than 100 images of child pornography were found on his computer's cache. Whenever someone views an image online, a copy of the image's data is saved in the computer's memory cache. The ruling attempts to distinguish between individuals who see an image of child pornography online versus those who actively download and store such images, MSNBC reports. And in this case, it was ruled that a computer's image cache is not the same as actively choosing to download and save an image. "Merely viewing Web images of child pornography does not, absent other proof, constitute either possession or procurement within the meaning of our Penal Law," Ciparick wrote in the decision.
The court said it must be up to the legislature, not the courts, to determine what the appropriate response should be to those viewing images of child pornography without actually storing them. Currently, New York's legislature has no laws deeming such action criminal.
Atlantic Wire notes, under current New York law, "it is illegal to create, possess, distribute, promote or facilitate child pornography." But that leaves out one critical distinction, as Judge Ciparick stated in the court's decision.
"To hold otherwise, would extend the reach of (state law) to conduct--viewing--that our Legislature has not deemed criminal." The case originated when Kent brought his computer in to be checked for viruses, complaining that it was running slowly. He has subsequently denied downloading the images himself.
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Skyler 7 hrs ago Agreed 100%, I don't even know WHY this is up for debate the very thing is just plain flat out WRONG and yet they still argue over it, and they have the gall to say it isn't illegal when it goes against all the moral codes of which we all live by?
Bongo o 12 hrs ago i wonder how many people know what pictures saved to your cache means. i just counted 21 pictures on this page (not counting peoples avatars), so everybody who clicked on this article to read it had at least 21 pics saved to their cache and probably dont even know it.
Ennis, Texas o 11 hrs ago I'm all for prosecuting those engaging in child porn, but I don't trust most prosecutors. There seems to be a willingness to engage in prosecutorial misconduct if the prosecutor decides the perv is guilty, then pushing the envelope in numerous areas seems to be the norm. There are a lot of ways for stuff to end up on your computer without you putting it there, but most prosecutors don't want to hear about those possibilities because they just unnecessairly cloud the issue. The proper solution is acknowledging the cloud and removing it with the appropriate technology instead of ignoring the technology.
Cleveland, Ohio o 2 hrs 47 mins ago A lot of you seem to be misunderstanding this as an all out right to be an online pedophile. Say you get a virus or type in daddy or are looking for young boys toys and you wind up on a site that promotes child porn, your are then disgusted (as almost any normal person should be) and leave the page it stores that on your computer even though you didn't do anything just visiting that page is enough. So your house gets raided or you take you comp in to get it worked on and next thing you know you're being booked for child porn charges, even though you are not a ped, never sincerely attempted to view child porn, just ended up at a site like that either through a virus or a bogus ad. It's to protect those who happen across the disgusting stuff and keep the jails open for this sicko's who actually get off on the twisted stuff.
mike o 6 hrs ago If someone decides to email you picture of an underage person in a sexual or undressed state, before this ruling you could be charged with possession of child porn just for opening the email (not knowing what it was), even if you immediately deleted it. I had a friend going through a nasty divorce and child custody battle. His soon to be ex (we believe) sent him several pictures using what appeared to be an email address that one of his children had, with the subject line "my soccer game". When he saw the pictures he deleted them immediately and then called me. I told him to bring me the computer, and replaced the hard drive. I reinstalled the OS and put his programs back on the computer. I them installed the hard drive in a different computer and ran a "wash" program on it, so that the data could not be recovered. Two days later he had federal agents at his door with a search warrant for child porn. The took his laptop, and after 6 weeks returned it seeing as they found nothing.
Austin, Texas o 9 hrs ago I would call that a rather misleading headline. having images in your cache is not the same as downloading and storing those (grotesque) images. Everyone who surfs the internet has stumbled onto content they didn't want to see before.
San Francisco, California o 1 hr 56 mins ago FYI to all you non-computer geeks. Some are very small and you may not even see it or click it to see a larger version of image. But, because you or him visited the page, the "image" is now stored on his cache. There is a huge difference between this and storing it by "download" on your drive.
Bob o 9 hrs ago Most internet users at some point click a link that keeps loading porn pages until you kill the connection, often by shutting off the computer. I don't think all users know if that has put inappropriate jpg's on their hard drive somewhere.
Sunnyvale, California o 11 hrs ago BTW, just because it hasn't happened to you yet doesn't mean it can't or won't. Any good hacker can hijack and run your computer, doing whatever they choose to do. They can also do it while you are online without you even realizing it.
titan34 o 9 hrs ago I am willing to bet that if we took 100 computers that have been extensively used to surf the net for a period of one year, you would find some interesting stuff in the memory caches in at least 90% of them (if not more). There is some stuff stored somewhere in the memory that could prove to be at least a bit embarrassing if not just plain criminal on your computer without your knowledge. Regardless of what the people think and how careful they are (or think they are), web-pages have redirects, pop-ups, ads, spyware, and malware embedded in their pages that web-page publisher might not know about (at least right away) never mind the person surfing the web and visiting the page.
ROBERT o 5 hrs ago At first, I was outraged at this decision. However, after reconsideration, I understand the logic behind it. All of us log onto the internet and we are barraged with sucker-bait from penile enlargement pills to porn. If some of those images were of juveniles and are of a pornographic nature, those images could be in the cache of any of our computers. What the judge was saying is that unless we took some action, such as doing a save or save-as, those images could have gotten on our hard drives cache without our knowledge or permission.
Knoxville, Tennessee o 2 hrs 50 mins ago I understand the difference. I've avoided particular videos and/or pictures because I deemed them iffy. Nevertheless, I have no desire to watch children in any sexual situation.
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