PLDT, Smart tout conquers children’s sites with Canada’s C3P; 127K URL block record

MANILA, Philippines – PLDT Inc. and Smart Communications said they have blocked a record number of online addresses showing child sexual abuse and pornography, thanks to its partnership with the Canadian Center for Child Protection (C3P ).

PLDT said in a statement that a total of 127,000 uniform resource locators (URLs) have been blocked as it steps up its fight against sites displaying illegal content featuring minors.

“We want to leverage this alliance with C3P to further strengthen our child protection platform and increase our ability to permanently eliminate and prevent access to CSAM within our network,” said Angel Redoble, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer of PLDT.

Based in Winnipeg, Canada, C3P is a national charitable unit that advocates for child safety and works to prevent the proliferation of online child sexual abuse (CSAM) material.

C3P’s Arachnid project detects and processes CSAM whistleblowing line reports and serves as an intelligence resource for e-service providers to remove harmful and abusive sites from the web.

“Child sexual abuse material is a borderless epidemic that demands a collaborative and global response. By helping to reduce access to images and videos of sexually assaulted children in their country, PLDT and Smart are strengthening online efforts to reduce child victimization and protect children, ”said Lloyd Richardson, CIO of the C3P, in the same press release.

With this C3P partnership, PLDT and Smart have access to a personalized URL blocking list to step up their domain and content blocking from CSAM.

“When customers try to access any of these URLs listed, they will be directed to a page telling them that the content violates Republic Law 9775 or anti-child pornography law,” Redoble said.

PLDT and Smart are also working with UNICEF, International Justice Mission and Internet Watch Foundation on various industry initiatives and solutions that enable children’s rights and tackle child sexual abuse and exploitation online.

These align with PLDT and Smart’s pioneering Child Protection Policy which institutionalizes the implementation of child safety practices and solutions in their offline and online business operations.

JPV

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