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Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) responds to Pete interview



Internet Watch Foundation responds to Pete interview

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/letters/story/0,6903,1115806,00.html


>>Listen to Pete

Sean O'Hagan's interview with Pete Townshend (Review, last week) may have
given the impression that the rock star was working with the Internet Watch
Foundation to combat child abuse images on the net and that, when he was
arrested on suspicion of accessing such images, we misled the media by
suggesting he had not been in contact with us.

In fact, when our spokesman was first contacted, he had no way of knowing
whether Mr Townshend had been in touch with the IWF. When we established that
he had, we were not in a position to explain this publicly, because the police
were considering legal action and it would have been inappropriate.

However, we can now confirm that he made on-line reports of potentially
illegal material to us on 24 August, 19 November and 6 December 2002. It
should be noted that all of these reports came after the public was made aware
in the spring of 2002 of Operation Ore, the police investigation of British
users - including Mr Townshend in 1999 - of the American Landslide pay per
view site. Readers should now be able to draw appropriate conclusions.


Roger Darlington
Internet Watch Foundation
Oakington, Cambs>>