The Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre’s (CEOP) website has been found to be insecure, placing children under ‘potential risk’, it has been reported.
In an investigation, the BBC said a page on CEOP’s site, set up to report alleged offenders, was found to be unencrypted by a member of the public, meaning that personal details could have been put at risk.
But CEOP spokesman Peter Davies told the BBC there was only a “hypothetical risk” and that there was no evidence any details had been compromised.
“The security was not as good as it should have been but it’s been fixed now,” he said.
“To have accessed it you would have had to have really gone hunting for it and would have had to have had very high levels of expertise.”
The Information Commissioner’s Office is now to investigate the issue.
CEOP has been responsible for protecting children online and was recently praised for leading an international team to shut down the world’s largest internet paedophile ring.
Government plans to merge the organisation into the future National Crime Agency have proved controversial, with opposition from parliamentarians, campaigners, and former chief executive Jim Gamble who resigned on the basis that the government’s decision was not in “the best interests of children”.
