The once-thriving business for Web sites that offer child pornography generated by Web cameras has suffered a significant setback.
Some of the most trafficked Web sites that directed potential customers to minors' online Webcams have shut down, a move that impedes the ability of the illegal businesses to attract new customers. As a result, minors who open new sites will be less able to market them easily, and those teenagers with sites already in existence will have difficulty expanding their membership lists.
Some of the marketing sites, known as portals, continue to provide links to adult Webcam pornography and other services. However, special pages for adolescent Webcam sites, which allowed customers to rank their favorites, have been removed.
The shutdown of the portals, all of which have been in operation for at least four years, came days after an article in The New York Times described how minors, often with the assistance of their online fans, had begun operating pay pornography sites featuring their own images sent onto the Internet by Webcams.
The Dec. 19 article described the emergence of pay Webcam sites as well as the infrastructure that supported the teenagers' businesses, including the portals needed to help customers locate the illegal sites.
Such sites, as well as other pornographic sites that feature images of minors who were lured into performing sexually in front of their Webcams for people they believe to be friends, have changed the nature of child pornography in ways that are only now beginning to be understood by professionals in the field.
With the Webcam sites, adult predators are, for the first time, able to play a role in the generation of live child pornography, at times with the minor following instructions delivered by instant message from the audience. Ultimately, it has helped transform the illicit trade, decreasing the probability of detection as adults use the Webcams to determine if they are really speaking to a child, as opposed to an undercover law enforcement agent.
While it is unclear whether the portal shutdowns are permanent or simply the result of sudden scrutiny, child safety experts who work closely with law enforcement attributed the development to the recent public attention the business has received.
"The fact that portals are going down is evidence that the heightened attention being paid to this problem is forcing offenders who exploit children with Webcams to hide their activity," said Michelle Collins, the director of the exploited child unit at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
Ms. Collins added: "The more obstacles you throw in front of the individuals who are trying to locate these sites, the less likely it is that they will find them," she said. "And that will decrease the amount of victimization these children are unwittingly exposing themselves to."
People involved in the case said the shutdown of the portals could disrupt the illicit business far more than what could be achieved by any single law enforcement action.
"From a law enforcement perspective, those portals are the kind of enabling structures that need to be strategically taken out to make the business more difficult," said Stephen Ryan, a partner at the law firm Manatt, Phelps & Phillips who represents Justin Berry, the teenager featured in the Times article who formerly operated a Webcam site but who is now a federal witness. "These are people who can't stand the sunshine of public attention, and it is one of the more positive outcomes of Justin going public."
In addition to the portal closings, a criminal investigation of illegal Webcam sites has progressed. Knute Berry, who was identified in the article as someone who the government believes helped Justin, his son, operate an illegal site for a share of the money, has approached American officials in Mexico through his lawyer with an offer to turn himself in, officials involved in the case said.
Mr. Berry, who could not be reached for comment yesterday, has declined in the past to comment on his son's allegations.
Not every portal to teenage Webcam sites has disappeared. While among the most popular, the portals that have taken down their links to adolescent sites are only those that in the past featured links to Justin's sites. As a result, each one is primarily a listing of boys' sites, or both boys' and girls' sites. However, other portals that link solely to girls' sites are still up and running.
The ones that have disappeared, however, were significant parts of the Webcam infrastructure.
"These portals were the main source of the people that signed up to these sites," Justin said yesterday. "That was where most of the advertising came from. So with the majority of them shut down, it will be much more difficult for anyone to set up and market one of these sites."
There have been other recent disruptions in the business, which involves not only sites run by adolescents but also adult-managed sites featuring images of children tricked or lured into performing sexually in front of their Webcams.
For example, Bigfunhouse, a pay site that provided access to Webcam pornography, closed in recent weeks after losing its relationship with Verotel, a credit card processor. Verotel severed its ties with Bigfunhouse after being contacted by The Times with questions about the illicit images.