SecondLife developer Linden Lab has vowed to assist German authorities as they investigate allegations that an international pedophile ring operates inside the massively multi-user online "metaverse."
According to the BBC and the Deutsche Welle news service, German television news reporter Nick Schader, a member of SecondLife's virtual society, uncovered evidence that a group of users pays for sex with virtual children inside the game and uses the game as a gateway to real-world exchanges of both virtual and actual child-abuse images. In a Tuesday report, Schader said he was asked to pay for admission to in-world gatherings where real and simulated child-porn content was shown, and members of the group offered to connect him with real-world traders of the material.
"We'll try to find out the name of the person responsible," Senior Prosecutor Peter Vogt of the Division for the Prevention of Child Pornography told the TV news magazine Report Mainz. "This sort of criminal activity is punishable by a term of imprisonment of between three months and five years."
German law prohibits not only actual child abuse, but also "realistic" simulated child pornography.
Linden Lab Vice President Robin Harper told the BBC the company will help identify any users involved and will pass on details to prosecutors.
The current episode is not the first sexual controversy to surround SecondLife. Although so-called "emergent sex" between adults is a tolerated aspect of the milieu, in recent months objections have been raised to alleged "cyber-raping" of avatars within the game.
SecondLife's popularity is on the rise in Germany. According to a comScore report released May 4, the number of German members now exceeds the number of Americans in the virtual world.
In March, SecondLife's user base was calculated at 1.3 million people over the age of 15, according to comScore.
