Financial firms help fight child porn

We now know a little more about how credit card companies and banks will help in the anti-child porn fight (find coverage of the announcement in my 3/17 issue). The Financial Coalition Against Child Pornography "will report child porn sites they discover on the Web to a central tip line, slated to expand next month to receive the information," USATODAY reports. That's the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children's CyberTipline that's expanding for this type of reporting (it has been accepting reports and talking with parents and other individuals since its inception). The coalition members - Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover, Bank of America, Chase, Citigroup, and PayPal – will also "block transactions for online child porn or, if law enforcement opens an investigation, help track sellers and buyers," USATODAY adds. All this is in addition to the reporting that Internet service providers such as AOL do. "Visa, MasterCard and American Express say they will identify sites accepting their cards to sell child porn but won't reveal customers unless subpoenaed."