아동포르노그래피 처벌 목적에 따른 관련 규정 개선방안

Children are the future of our nation. When they grow up in a healthy way, we are able to see bright and healthy future of our nation. By extension, they are the future of the entire world. Therefore, we should remember that crimes against them will have negative and harmful impacts not only on our society, but also on the entire world. That is why many nations, international organizations and agencies are put their efforts in preventing children from becoming a victim of crimes targeting them. Despite those endeavors, we are not experiencing a decrease in the number of child porn-related crimes and those crimes remain a grave threat to our children. Therefore, countries around the world already have strong actions in place to punish those committing these crimes. However, it is necessary for us to think again about whether we have proper punishment system in place to serve the purpose for punishment of child porn. Appropriate levels of legal responsibilities should be imposed depending on different types of actions such as production, distribution, posting and possession of child porn. There is a need to look at the concept and scope of child porn closely and to check whether we have the appropriate punishment system for it. This paper examined the concept and scope of child pornography in Korea, international trend in child porn-related laws, related legal system in Korea and how to improve it. As a result, I came to realize that there is still a strong need to punish those responsible for child porn, but we need to establish a reasonable legal system related to child porn. To impose heavier punishment for the crime would be ineffective and improper. The primary purpose of our laws regarding child porn should be to prevent child sexual abuse and exploitation. To stop the production of child pornography through measures to control child porn consumers would be considered a secondary purpose. It could also be regarded an important, but secondary purpose of our laws to put responsibilities on ISPs to ban access to child porn contents online. What is the most important thing is to establish a reasonable and systematic legal system governing child porn. I believe that this paper offers meaningful suggestions, though there is room for improvement, on this issue. Consequently, it is needed to revise the concept and definition of child porn and to correct our legal system and punishment for child porn in a way that reflects realities of the current situations. In particular, it is important to impose a proper amount of punishment depending on the different types of actions rather than solely using excessive punishment.