The Maltese police have not yet been approached by the team which is investigating more than 2,300 people from 77 countries, including Malta, who are suspected of trying to download videos of young children being sexually abused and even raped.

According to foreign press reports, the Federal Bureau of Investigation is investigating around 600 suspects from the United States, the German authorities are investigating another 400 from Germany, France is looking into more than 100 French suspects and 23 suspects are Austrians.

Although no press reports said how many Maltese people tried to download these video, the country was mentioned as one of the countries wherein people are suspected to have tried to download the video.

Asked by The Malta Independent for his reaction to this story, Police Commissioner John Rizzo said that the local police have not as yet received any request for collaboration regarding this case.

The Police Commissioner added that the police had offered, through Interpol, to help the Austrian investigators if necessary.

An Austrian police expert on internet crime told journalists that the links to the videos were posted on a Russian pornographic website which is no longer online.

The videos were hosted on an Austrian web server and people had to pay by credit card in order to access them. Within 24 hours, more than 8,000 hits from 2,361 internet IP addresses in 77 countries were recorded. These people are now under investigation.