More than 1,000 Danish teenagers charged with spreading Facebook sex videos
Some 200 girls and 800 boys are accused of sharing images of a couple, both 15, having sex, an offence that could see them jailed.
Monday 15 January 2018 21:57, UK
More than 1,000 teenagers are being charged with spreading sex videos in Denmark.
The case involves two videos and an explicit photo showing a boy and girl, both 15, having consensual sex, Danish Police said.
The material, from 2015, was spread on Facebook from that year until autumn 2017.
Some 800 boys and 200 girls were involved in distributing it, most of them aged between 15 and 20 and from all parts of Denmark.
Police said most of the young people shared the video a couple of times but some had shared it hundreds of times.
The videos and photos were allegedly spread on Facebook's messaging service, something that was reported to the social network.
Facebook told US authorities and the case reached Denmark through Europol, the European Union's law enforcement agency.
Denmark's age of consent is 15 but distributing sexual material involving people under the age of 18 is a criminal offence which has a maximum sentence of six years in jail.
If the young people in this case are found guilty they are likely to be fined or given a suspended sentence.
Either of those punishments would give them a criminal record lasting for up to a decade, police have said.
Investigator and police inspector Lau Thygesen from North Zealand Police described the case as "very big and complex".
"We have taken the case very seriously as it has major implications for those involved when such material is spread - and it must be stopped."