Online pornography cases fall
The number of suspected cases of online pornography in Switzerland has dropped by half in the last year.
The Swiss Cybercrime Coordination Unit said serious pornography cases dropped from 2,085 in 2007 to 1,047 in 2008. Officials said better filters could be behind the decrease.
But there was an increase in fake commercial offers and so-called “phishing” spam in the last year, according the service’s annual report published on Tuesday. Phishing is the illegal practice of trying to trick online users into revealing sensitive information, such as passwords and account numbers.
Of the 6,500 reported instances of cyber crime, 29 per cent were linked to pornography, the majority of which involved children. About 23 per cent of cases were spam related.
A total of 335 cases were passed onto the police to investigate in Switzerland or abroad. There were cases being examined in every Swiss canton apart from Appenzell Inner Rhodes and Obwalden.
The service said the number of suspected cases over the past six years – 44,500 – could be considered high in comparison to some other countries, and criminals appeared to be refining their techniques.
The service said prevention methods needed to be stepped up.
swissinfo.ch and agencies
In compliance with the JTI standards
More: SWI swissinfo.ch certified by the Journalism Trust Initiative
You can find an overview of ongoing debates with our journalists here. Please join us!
If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at english@swissinfo.ch.