Voluntary Principles to Counter Online Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse: overview (accessible version)
Updated 24 March 2022
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1. Prevent child sexual abuse material
1. Companies seek to prevent known child sexual abuse material from being made available to users or accessible on their platforms and services, take appropriate action under their terms of service, and report to appropriate authorities.
2. Companies seek to identify and combat the dissemination of new child sexual abuse material via their platforms and services, take appropriate action under their terms of service, and report to appropriate authorities.
2. Target online grooming and preparatory behaviour
3. Companies seek to identify and combat preparatory child sexual exploitation and abuse activity (such as online grooming for child sexual abuse), take appropriate action under their terms of service, and report to appropriate authorities.
4. Companies seek to identify and combat advertising, recruiting, soliciting, or procuring a child for sexual exploitation or abuse, or organising to do so, take appropriate action under their terms of service, and report to appropriate authorities.
3. Target livestreaming
5. Companies seek to identify and combat the use of livestreaming services for the purpose of child sexual exploitation and abuse, take appropriate action under their terms of service, and report to appropriate authorities.
4. Search
6. Companies seek to prevent search results from surfacing child sexual exploitation and abuse, and seek to prevent automatic suggestions for such activity and material.
5. A specialised approach for children
7. Companies seek to adopt enhanced safety measures with the aim of protecting children, in particular from peers or adults seeking to engage in harmful sexual activity with children; such measures may include considering whether users are children.
6. Victim/survivor consideration
8. Companies seek to take appropriate action, including providing reporting options, on material that may not be illegal on its face, but with appropriate context and confirmation may be connected to child sexual exploitation and abuse.
7. Collaborate & respond to evolving threat
9. Companies seek to take an informed global approach to combating online child sexual exploitation and abuse and to take into account the evolving threat landscape as part of their design and development processes.
10. Companies support opportunities to share relevant expertise, helpful practices, data and tools where appropriate and feasible.
11. Companies seek to regularly publish or share meaningful data and insights on their efforts to combat child sexual exploitation and abuse.