‘Take It Down’ enables teens to take down explicit images and videos of themselves from the internet, according to AP News’ article.
AP News reports that the new online tool ‘Take It Down’ is operated by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), and funded in part by Meta Platforms, the owner of Facebook and Instagram.
“Take It Down is made specifically for people who have an image that they have reason to believe is already out on the Web somewhere, or that it could be,” says Gavin Portnoy, a spokesman for the NCMEC. “You’re a teen and you’re dating someone and you share the image. Or somebody extorted you and they said, ‘if you don’t give me an image, or another image of you, I’m going to do X, Y, Z.”
Take it down anonymously
NCMEC reports an increase in online exploitation of children, with the non-profit’s CyberTipline receiving 29.3 million reports in 2021, up 35% from 2020. What is important for teens, NCMEC spokesman Portnoy says, is to remain anonymous, which would make them more comfortable, rather than to involve law enforcement.
Considering that many teens send explicit images of themselves under duress, or without understanding consequences, the new tool offers the victims of such exploitation some relief by letting them anonymously create what is essentially a digital fingerprint of the image, without uploading any actual images. This finger print, which is a unique set of numbers called a “hash”, goes into a database and the tech companies that have agreed to participate in the project remove the images from their services. The site also works for artificial intelligence-generated images and “deepfakes,” says Antigone Davis, Meta’s global head of safety.
Meta’s Facebook and Instagram, Yubo, OnlyFans and Pornhub are among the participating platforms but if the image is on another site or if it is sent in an encrypted platform such as WhatsApp, it will not be taken down. AP News reports that Twitter and TikTok so far have not committed to the project. NCMEC spokesman Portnoy says that goal is to have more companies sign up.
(Source: AP News)
