A Rutherford man is among 44 others charged across Australia, amid a crackdown on the production of child abuse material.
350 charges have been laid so far, with Australian Federal Police making arrests in every state and removing 16 children from harm over the course of a year under Operation Molto.
The operation began after the Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation referred a report to police, showing thousands of offenders were using a cloud storage platform to share abhorrent child abuse material online.
The offenders range in age from 19 to 57 years old, and are employed in range of occupations, including construction, transport, law enforcement and hospitality.
Eight of them are from New South Wales.
“Arresting offenders and putting them before the court is only half the battle,’’ AFP Commissioner Reece Kershaw said.
“Identifying victims is a race against time and the ACCCE’s victim identification team is relentless in rescuing children from sexual abuse.
“Pixel by pixel, our investigators painstakingly look for clues and never give up and the tools they use give Australian police access to world leading expertise.”
