A/HRC/28/56 C. Overview of the issues and trends relating to the mandate 25. While new technologies offer a myriad of opportunities for children, they can also facilitate harm against them, including the commission of criminal activities such as the sale and sexual exploitation of children. Moreover, information and communication technologies have also created new threats or forms of abuse, such as the solicitation of children and the live streaming of child abuse. 1. Child pornography 26. Child pornography can be considered as the exploitative behaviour committed or facilitated through new technologies which captures most attention. Article 2 (c) of the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography defines child pornography as “any representation, by whatever means, of a child engaged in real or simulated explicit sexual activities or any representation of the sexual parts of a child for primarily sexual purposes”. It is a wide definition which may include non-visual depictions, such as text and sound. Some regional instruments, such as the Council of Europe Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse (art. 20, para. 2) and the Draft African Union Convention on the Establishment of a Legal Framework Conducive to Cyber Security in Africa (art. III-1), apply only to visual depictions, usually photographs, but increasingly such instruments also refer to “virtual child pornography”. Likewise, few domestic countries define child pornography as including expressly non-visual depictions.12 27. Article 3, paragraph 1 (c), of the Optional Protocol requires States to criminalize producing, distributing, disseminating, importing, exporting, offering, selling or possessing child pornography. A previous mandate holder called for the criminalization of all steps in the child pornography process (E/CN.4/2005/78, para. 123), including simple possession, as done by the Council of Europe Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse (art. 20, para. 1). However, new technologies have transformed what is meant by possession, since the growth in Internet speeds means that it is no longer necessary to download images because they can be viewed online. Some regional instruments require the intentional accessing of child pornography,13 and that model has been followed by some countries.14 28. New technologies have revolutionized the way child pornography is created and traded. On the Internet, collections of child abuse material can contain millions of images. 15 In addition, there has been a shift in the way material is traded, moving away from the web to peer-to-peer networks, which facilitates evading filtering and other detection software, therefore reducing risk to those seeking and distributing child pornography. Online virtual currencies also allow measures taken by the financial industry to combat commercial online child sexual exploitation to be evaded, as they are often subject to less transparency. The Internet also allows for anonymous payment methods which render even more difficult to trace the purchaser of exploitative material. 29. The overwhelming majority of those seeking child pornography are male,16 and the vast majority of victims are female.17 The age of child victims is becoming ever younger 12 13 14 15 16 8 An exception is the Irish Child Trafficking and Pornography Act, 1998. Council of Europe Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse, art. 20, para. 1. See the Anti-Child Pornography Act of the Philippines. Max Taylor and Ethel Quayle, Child Pornography: An Internet Crime (2003, Routledge). Ibid.