Fiber internet provider Converge ICT Solutions Inc. has blocked around 350,000 web addresses or uniform resource locators (URLs) as of end-January 2023, more than double the list the previous year as it combats illicit content, including those that contain imagery of online sexual abuse and exploitation of children (OSAEC).
“In the face of a marked increase in the number of URLs containing OSAEC, we go beyond to protect customers and children by leveraging on cutting edge cyberdefense tools," stressed Converge Chief Network Transformation Officer Paulo Martin Santos.
According to network data, Converge increased the sites it has blocked in 2022 by 150 percent from about 100,000 web addresses restricted from its broadband network in 2021.
Converge has nearly two million subscribers using its end-to-end fiber network.
The company denied 2.1 billion requests to these web addresses during the same period - more than a tenfold increase from the 144 million requests denied during the previous year.
“The rising number of requests to these sites are alarming to us," says Converge CEO Dennis Anthony Uy.
"Enforcement agencies can count on our ready assistance to crack down on this on an operational level. As an internet service provider, we will continue to do our work in combating OSAEC and ensure our network is not taken advantage of by cyber criminals,” he explained.
The 350,000 URLs blocked are aggregated addresses related to different types of cyber crime including OSAEC, illegal online gambling, phishing/banking , terrorism, and voyeurism.
Converge has partnered with UK-based child abuse watchdog Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) to step up the fight against the spread of images and videos of child sex abuse.
Key to this partnership is the license to use IWF’s URL list of criminal webpages as a master list to block URLs.
The network team of Converge also has a coordination mechanism with enforcement agencies such as the National Bureau of Investigation and the Philippine National Police Cybercrime division for the reporting of all types of illegal content online, including OSAEC.