Computer grad held for watching, storing child porn

The accused, S Harish of Kallikuppam near Ambattur, who graduated in BSc Computer Science in 2016, does not work anywhere, said police.

Based on a tip-off from the National Crime Records Bureau that child pornography is being downloaded on a phone, the Crime against Women and Children wing of city police verified the phone number with the list prepared by the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children and confirmed that Harish has been a consumer of child pornography. Ambattur all-women police registered a case against him and detained Harish on Tuesday.

Investigation revealed that Harish used to watch child pornography at internet cafe before he started downloading them on his phone for the last two years. Police said he has stored about 500 IP addresses of different porn sites providing child pornography content. “He thinks it is harmless as he only watches videos and did not harm anyone,” said a senior official after interrogating him. He was booked under Sections 67 (B) of Information Technology Act (collecting, browsing and downloading material in any electronic form depicting children in obscene or indecent or sexually explicit manner) and 14 (1) of Pocso Act and remanded in judicial custody on Wednesday.

Police said Harish’s father Santhanam is into real estate business, while his mother is a teacher at a tutorial.