If an image containing illegal content is sent to the browser of an unsuspecting user, does that constitute a breach of the law? If a CDN goes rogue and suddenly starts pushing out child porn then is every person whos browser cached that image now guilty? What if they didn't even know it got cached? A very grey area with these sorts of things.
(d)Affirmative Defense.—It shall be an affirmative defense to a charge of violating subsection (a)(5) that the defendant—
(1) possessed less than three images of child pornography; and
(2) promptly and in good faith, and without retaining or allowing any person, other than a law enforcement agency, to access any image or copy thereof—
(A) took reasonable steps to destroy each such image; or
(B) reported the matter to a law enforcement agency and afforded that agency access to each such image.
That may be the case in the US, but FWIW it is not necessarily true across jurisdictions. In the UK, for instance:
> A person who views an image on a device which is then automatically cached onto its memory would not be in possession of that image unless it can be proved that he / she knew of the cache [...but...] the person would also have "made" the image in question. Subject to there being evidence of the act which constituted the making and the necessary mental element, an offence contrary to section 1 of the PCA 1978 is preferable and in most cases would suffice. [...] The charge of 'making' [has been] widely interpreted to cover such activities as opening attachments to emails and downloading or simply viewing images on the internet.
Further note:
> So, for example, in a "pop-up" case, it would have be to be proved [for the act of making] that suspect knew that accessing a website would generate "pop-ups" and that those "pop-ups" would depict, or be likely to depict, indecent images of children
That is far shakier legal ground than I would like to be on, especially for readers of this thread who would presumably be aware of the cache and where it has been hinted that the images may contain at best questionable content.
There’s definitely no assured promise of correlation between transmission of content, possession of content, and true criminal act resulting in harm.
What’s actually transpiring is opportunistic enforcement, whenever there’s a broader perception of necessity to act against an apparently dispicable entity.
This motive alone guides organizations to hunt down and punish anything that would seem obvious to a lowest common denominator beureaucrat, when printed on paper.
The reason these sorts of policies are upheld is to provide the umbrage of an imprecise broadsword, when conducting more surgical operations relating to espionage and counter operations. That’s it.
Someone needs to quietly erase something, and they need to sweep it up with a broad mop, so that no one notices the little smear that needed to go away.
It’s not about morality. Only convenient morality. Deviants are pretty rare, and the population of apparent deviants needs to be magnified, so that certain criminals may be framed to keep their real crimes (betrayal, subterfuge) quiet.
