The international sweep included arrests in 12 countries across Europe and the Americas. The agency said there were also dozens of other suspects.
Twenty people in Europe, the United States and South America have been arrested as part of an investigation into an international network that produced and distributed child sexual abuse material, Interpol said on Friday. The policing organization said the network was also thought to extend to Asia and the Pacific region.
The arrests, which took place in 12 countries, were the result of a cross-border inquiry in which investigators tracked the illegal material online to people who viewed or downloaded it, according to Interpol.
The sweep made public by Interpol on Friday included arrests in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Bulgaria, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras, Italy, Paraguay, Portugal, Spain and the United States. It also led investigators to 68 other suspects in 28 countries, including the Americas, Asia, Europe and Oceania, according to Interpol and the Spanish police.
The investigation began last year in Spain, where officers from the national police force’s specialized cyberpatrols came across suspicious instant messaging groups, the Spanish police said in a statement on Friday. The police said the online groups had been set up exclusively to distribute images of child sexual exploitation.
As the authorities in Spain became aware that the network behind the online messaging forums was international, they began to work with the Interpol, where investigators broadened the operation to South America, Interpol said.
In the arrests announced on Friday, the police in Spain said they had detained seven people in five provinces, and seized cellphones, computers and storage devices. Investigators found that in some cases, those suspected of viewing or downloading the illegal images worked with children.
In Seville in southern Spain, the police arrested a schoolteacher whom they accused of being in possession of exploitative images and belonging to several chat groups through which the illegal material was distributed.
In Barcelona Province, the police arrested a health worker who treated children; the police said that he was suspected of paying minors in Eastern Europe for sexually explicit images.
The police said that one man who was arrested in the town of El Masnou in Barcelona Province had downloaded a messaging app to watch the illegal material and later deleted the app to hide his activities from his family.
In Latin America, officers arrested a teacher in Panama and 12 other people in countries across the region, Interpol said.
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