Over 1000 Danes accused of child pornography

About 1,000 adults and adolescents in Denmark may face prosecution for redistributing child pornography after sex videos featuring 15-year-olds were shared on Facebook.

The move developed after the California-based social media giant alerted the US authorities that the videos, along with a sexually explicit photo, were being spread online.

While one video is 50 seconds long, the other is 9 seconds long.

The police explained that the consensual sex at the age of 15 is legal in Denmark, but anyone resorting to forwarding the video, violates the law against distributing child pornography, reported the New York Times.

According to the report, the police notified 1,004 people on Monday that they faced preliminary charges, which the police can issue on their own. However, it is upto the prosecutors whether to proceed with the charges and take the cases to trial.

"It may sound very dramatic that we're charging with child pornography," a police superintendent Flemming Kjaerside said.

"Many had no intention to distribute child pornography, but objectively speaking, that's what they've done," Kjaerside added.

The offenders, who range in age from 15 to their early 20s, shared the videos once or twice mostly but some of them did so hundreds of times.

-ANI