Operation Ore

Following changes in US law (CDA then COPA) requiring access to adult content to be restricted to adults, payment intermediaries on the Internet emerged as use of a credit card was deemed as proof of age. Landslide was one such payment gateway offering AVS, AVS gold and AVS platinum where users paid a fee to access a range of sites for a choice of duration and KEYZ offering a single site paid access for a duration and fee set by the webmaster.

Landslide had provided payment services to some 6,561 websites when on the 9th of August 1999 they received a letter from Superior Credit notifying them that their merchant account had been withdrawn due to excessive chargebacks and the company placed on the 'match' indicating this shut down was likely to be permanent. The company continued without being able to charge anyone until the 8th of September 1999 when Dallas PD, USPIS, FBI and UCSC descended at 10:15 am in a raiding party of some 57 officials which was to culminate in the trial of Landslide and owners Thomas and Janice Reedy.

Dallas Detective Steven Nelson provided evidence in relation to 12 websites featuring underage imagery and testified that this was essentially the nature of the keyz service. Landslide owner Thomas Reedy was sentenced to 1,335 years in December 2,000.

The list of subscribers to all the websites was distributed internationally via Interpol and the Metropolitan Police Service, the National Criminal Intelligence Service and the National Crime Squad planned for the UK side of operations in relation to an alleged 7,272 UK credit card identities, NCIS, NCS and other agencies subsequently being merged into a new secret police force on the 1st of April 2006.

A substantial proportion of the credit card transactions were fraud of one kind or another, but the Landslide data detailed which credit cards had been charged to which website under their KeyZ system, or the referring site in the case of AVS.

The people that actually went to sites that used Landslide were likely to be adult surfers accessing adult sites, these sites, or the site as the police often described it, did not mean anything sinister, just a range of adult sites. It was no doubt intended to mislead, as the notion of 'the site' does not apply.

A list of the majority of sites using Landslide's payments system in April 1999 can be accessed below. According to the prosecution in the trial of Thomas Reedy, these were adult sites.

Site descriptions are as they appeared on the live site at the time. Site descriptions cannot be relied upon in relation to content, but for the most part, if you picked up illicit material anywhere at any time, anywhere on the Internet, charges followed. One of the sites in the AVS, with a nondescript place name, had popups attached which was likely to have contaminated computers with illicit material. The fact that people were charged for popups was intended to remain a police secret, but the fact is popups derive from remote automation.

The Landslide web pages that provided access to these websites, is reconstructed via the link below (All hyperlinks have been neutralised to prevent access to live material or potential LEA entrapment sites). A 'very special' version of this page has been used in police briefings to the press, in order to incriminate the guilty and innocent alike.

The Landslide data actually exonerated most of the subscribers, but this did not deter the UK police, they just had to mention 'child pornography' and the opportunities for power and money increased almost with every raid. They busted most of the traceable people on the list and any UK webmaster that had used the Landslide system, no matter that the sites visited or hosted were legal. The police sought to incriminate everyone they arrested, destroying businesses, families and many people are not even alive today to complain, heaven knows what has happened to their children and others they left behind.

Operation Ore had rolled out in May 2002 with some 50 arrests. In September 2002 the arrest count had nearly reached 100 and police were claiming they had sufficient evidence to arrest 2,000 from the full Landslide credit card list. As it happens, this is rather strange in light of the facts. These were allegedly keyz subscribers and it was only a minority of these sites that provided illegal material. We do not like to release too much detailed information, as people could one day say this was all a terrible mistake, it was not. Even the list of incriminating keyz websites is fraudulent, an issue that is known to the police.

Knowing full well that adult surfing was not dangerous or unlawful, the story that was told was not the true one, far from it. The police would never had got away with it had the truth been released, and if they were held to account, the most senior police in the land would face court on more serious charges than they were prosecuting. To get away with it all, they had to show convictions and massive pressure was applied to the accused, the judicial system and the government.

Misinformation was fed to the public in abundance via every possible channel contaminating the entire jury pool. The police alleged these people were dangerous, a standard ploy to incriminate the accused. They divided the list up into groups according to whether whether they had access to children or positions of responsibility and then went out to convict as many people as possible. Along the way, and part of the plan, destroying the lives of the accused, their families and their friends, long before and after trial.

It represented an upstaged version of previous miscarriages of justice. Some Irishmen were accused of being terrorists and the court was surrounded by armed police, so of course these people were dangerous weren't they? Those still alive were released years later and received an apology from the prime minister and the prime minister is aware of problems in relation to Operation Ore. In a recent recent trial in the UK it was alleged a man was a terrorist and in charge of a ricin factory, a ricin factory that didn't produce any ricin. The police had suggested an escape plan had been hatched so the court was packed with armed police, so he was dangerous wasn't he? Curiously, a similar thing happened in the trial of Thomas Reedy where it was leaked that an escape to Mexico was planned.

People were normally arrested in a manner designed for maximum impact and casualty. It was totally inhumane and illegal, but the expression 'protecting children was a priority for the police' was used in an attempt to justify injustice of the most depraved kind. Large swarms of officers converging at work or at home at the worst time, and when questioned by the press, the words were well rehearsed, 'these are just specialist search teams'. They weren't of course, they were knock over squads, often followed up with visits accompanied by social services to have the man thrown out of the house or generally intimidate.

It had many similarities to an FBI operation called Candyman in the States; also launched with great fanfare. Lies were told by the FBI and Attorney General John Ashcroft to congress, the courts and the press, but these were soon exposed. The shock military tactics produced quite a number of confessions, even on the doorstep, but the fact they were busting innocent adult surfers did not stay buried for long. The American judges halted these trials, as such blatant lies were being told, it gave the FBI the right to enter any house in America. The judges, to their credit, said no.

In the UK, the sentencing increased throughout the trials as the campaign grew, and innocent or guilty, the general advice was to plead guilty for the leniency of the court. In the Ore trials, if anyone had the nerve to plead not guilty, a few of the worst images that could be found were often shown around the courts. It was a trick that no-one to our knowledge ever contested in court, but it would not be difficult to take images from most adult surfers of the day and disgust a jury. Just like the guns surrounding accused terrorists, the pictures were shown around the court as if the contents of someone's hard disk represented the contents of the mind of the accused, and this meant they were dangerous. With the false stories of Landslide in the press, by inference the accused were dangerous. The lies of Ore and pictures that probably had nothing to do with Landslide meant the man was dangerous and society had to be protected, children had to be protected. Truth is, children had never been so seriously exploited and far worse in many instances, with children actually being abused as a direct consequence of Operation Ore.

One court case re-examined by OBU related to a case where a large number obscene images were referred to in court by the prosecution, a common occurrence where images outside of the charges are mentioned to further incriminate the accused. It makes good headlines, but the images were perfectly legal. 'Every image is a crime scene' was a key slogan for the police and their new campaign friends, but it was confirmed beyond doubt that these images did not constitute a crime in the United Kingdom at all.

They didn't care for the damage they left in their wake. Men, woman and children were horrifically abused in Operation Ore and similar operations it set the precedent for, but the official story continued; the police were protecting children. By inference, anyone that objected, was not in favour of protecting children.

They invaded homes with small armies throughout the UK. If the man was married, the police would often revisit with social services in tow and try and have the man accused thrown out on the street. If the woman objected, the woman could be accused of being an abuser of children and the children could be taken into care. Strange how that word care is so misused, how the term child protection is misused. The police would then work frantically behind the scenes to see if any charges could be made.

NCIS originally worked on the list of details supplied following investigations in the US. A very carefully crafted statement, but this list primarily contained adult surfers, a very significant portion of whom had never seen child imagery, so why should they be known to the police? Clearly a misleading statement.

- The hostile investigation of Landslide was run by USPIS not the FBI
- USPIS enlisted the help of Dallas Police who ran an investigation from 28/04/1999 and 08/09/1999
- The FBI did run two prior investigations in relation to illicit websites at the request of Thomas Reedy, Landslide's owner. The FBI did not pursue the issues raised by Thomas Reedy, that illicit sites were using his payment system. (Two FBI agents testified at the trial of Thomas Reedy, called by the defence).
- Landslide did not own or operate a paedophile website
- there is no evidence to suggest Thomas Reedy was a paedophile, on the contrary, the FBI stated that he was not
- there is no evidence to suggest Landslide ever hosted paedophile material
- the inference that 7,200 UK citizens accessed a Texas based paedophile website is ridiculous, Landslide was a payment gateway, it did not host contentious age imagery, though the prosecution asserted they wanted to in media statements
- Online offending is an emotive term used by the UK prosecution authorities. There is no such offence.

The above information given in written evidence by NCS to parliament goes further than a reckless disregard of the truth. Dissemination of information of this nature to the public constitutes a very serious criminal offence. We not also the discrepancy in the date between Surrey Police and the National Crime Squad. The Landslide client database recorded the referring site for all transactions, the majority of subscribers were therefore exonerated by Landslide.

It should not be forgotten that NCS is to be transitioned into SOCA (Serious Organised Crime Agency), the British version of the FBI, in 2006. In Operation Candyman, the operation, despite being launched with massive publicity, was halted by the US courts after the FBI were caught busting innocent users of the Internet. The National Crime Squad have adopted the same tactics, knock over squads, false incriminating publicity, but they have not been halted in the UK courts.

Such was the pressure exerted on the accused and their families, guilty pleas or verdicts are meaningless. Innocent or guilty, people were advised to plead guilty to mitigate the sentence, the American way of converting justice to business.

Tony Blair has himself suggested lowering the standards of evidence to allow this new organisation to obtain convictions more easily.

With Tony Blair's training in law and his wife's claimed position on human rights, that is a truly remarkable statement to make in any circumstances. Justice is of course difficult, putting people in prison very easy.

Mr Bill Hughes, who oversaw Operation Ore, will be Director General of the new organisation. He himself said in response to his appointment: "The Serious Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) is all about reducing the harm caused by serious and organised crime. And I am delighted to accept the opportunity of turning this vision into reality."

Unfortunately, that reality is already with us. The laws were changed dramatically during Operation Ore, and the laws on these offences already include the presumption of guilt, in contravention of the human rights act, in direct contravention of justice.

The FBI have not just worked closely with NCS on Operation Ore and similar operations, much of the activity has been penetrated and tracked by independent investigators. Activities uncovered in relation to both organisations, fall well outside the law in both jurisdictions.

Contrary to the police reports and organisations and persons they teamed up with, arrests were pursued without reasonable grounds for suspicion and conviction rates cannot be accounted for by the Landslide data. The conviction rates of some forces far exceeded the results expected of a blanket sweep of this kind.

The transgression of laws and civil rights set a unique precedent for the police force as a whole in the United Kingdom. There are thousands of victims out there as a result of Operation Ore, countless Men, Women and Children. As the Internet was rife with illicit material, it was not unlikely at all for adult surfers to have material of this kind on their computers, especially if they accessed newsgroups or used peer to peer software. For those that surfed the net, it just took one click on the wrong site. As the FBI like to say; 'you are just one click away from a bust' or Texas prosecutor Terri Moore put it 'if you have it, you are guilty'. The SOA 2003, which came into force during Operation Ore, abandoned the whole concept of innocent until proven guilty, you had to prove you were innocent. To prove innocence, many people were asked to account for images from years before that they might never have seen and indeed could not even be viewed by a user of the computer. Even when innocent was proven in court, the jury, the judges and magistrates had seen the false pre-trial publicity, and by and large, if you were accused, you were deemed guilty.

Such is human nature, it is not unlikely for significant numbers to look at any material available on the Internet, to describe people that had this material on or recoverable from their computers as a threat to children was a monstrous lie, and continued reference was made to false statistics that had been used in the US media. It was however a malicious lie told by the police, the IWF, child advocates, social services, the courts and of course, the media, all of whom profited substantially from the enterprise. There was even a case where a reporter told the police a man had confessed to him he was guilty just for the story, a confession that had never taken place, though of some help to the accused, the NG for not guilty in his notebook recorded the truth. Vile Internet pervert was an enduring headline as the worst contents of people's hard drives were presented to the courts as if it represented the contents of the minds that owned them.

Meantime, the police are increasing their levels of aggression in invading and destroying more lives, obtaining more money by the millions, and enough power to rule out a future for the United Kingdom as a free society. Overnight, the police were expert psychiatrists of a thought crime. (Expert psychiatrists do not share the police view).

The world currently on offer is not safe for anyone, what kind of world do you want for your children?

Whilst 'child protection is a priority for the police' was an effective advertising banner in the campaign for new money, the reality was quite the opposite. An official report published on the 2nd of March 2005 made it quite clear that police were spending less time on battered babies and child abuse, not more. Real child protection work is always an unglamorous role for the police and out of at least half of the forces surveyed, child protection was not even part of the policing plan. Sir Ronnie Flanagan, the Chief Inspector of Constabulary said that many investigations into the images did not involve continuing child protection issues. The report stated in one force, staff estimated that approximately one third of their time was committed to these investigations.

The long story goes into further detail to explain that these investigations represent a fraud of such a nature and scale, that when exposed, they should send shockwaves throughout the world, just as the original story did. Thomas Reedy, the king of child pornography, child protection a priority for the police, every image a crime scene? All lies, and the truth is far less exciting, just plain old fashioned fraud. This time, it was not the public that were culprits. With the police having the power, money and information, it almost seemed the perfect crime and if you tell a lie so large and so often, people will believe it. It was the principle of the 'big lie', and it seems most people fell for it, but the truth is out here, and some of it is here on this site.

Jim Gamble, a former Special Branch detective, was Assistant Chief Constable of NCS then promoted to Deputy Director General and played a key lead role in co-ordinating Operation Ore activities. He describes himself as a sheriff of the Internet.

"We are confident that investigations are focused on real offenders, We're determined and I think we've demonstrated that in the way we've approached Operation Ore, to protect the innocent ..."

It would be hard to imagine a statement that strays further from the motto of the organisation concerned but one of so many statements now secured in archives around the world. Jim Gamble made statements to the press, to selective groups, taking almost every opportunity through time to mislead the public, the government and the courts. They used the same trick used in the courts, flashing round child pornography.

"We are very conscious that if we make this kind of allegation against you today, we cannot simply wipe the slate clean tomorrow if we get it wrong."

He said those charged were suspected of involvement in the "worst kind of hands-on physical abuse."

"What we need now is greater resilience and more funding for this type of policing activity."

People were charged for material resulting from incidental downloads, where the user had no responsibility for the material deposited. People were charged where no incriminating images were found at all. People were aggressively targeted when there was no lawful basis to do so, indeed attempts were made to destroy the lives of entirely innocent people though destroying anyone's life is not the function of a civilised police force. The above remarks are therefore not simply spin, but part of a whole cascade of scripted statements which perverted the course of justice, corrupted public morals, tore families apart, and even killed people.

As a direct consequence of the statements and decisions of Jim Gamble and associated people, the innocent were incriminated, guilt was overstated, lives were endangered or lost, public morals were corrupted, justice was denied wholesale, and the men, women and children of the United Kingdom have never been so at risk since the war.

The headquarters of MI5 is a public landmark. NCS operate only behind a PO box number, and also unlike MI5, communications should not include National Crime Squad or police on the outer cover. This organisation does of course have secrets it would rather protect. The fact that such large lies can be told and remain hidden for so long is a chilling testament to the state of the UK as a whole.

"The individual is handicapped by coming face to face with a conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists." J. Edgar Hoover

IWF (Internet Watch Foundation), a government quango, reported its own news site:

The conviction rates were also hailed a success by the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF), an Oakington-based organisation set up nine years ago to monitor the web for images of child abuse. A spokeswoman said:

"Given the volume of suspects which stemmed from Operation Ore and the specialist police resources required to carry out thorough investigations of this nature, successfully prosecuting nearly 50 per cent of suspects in one area is a significant result.

"The IWF continue to work closely with all UK Police Forces and on average forwards intelligence relating to potential offenders every working day. In 2004, information which was forwarded and tracked by our internet hotline team contributed to at least nine arrests in the UK."

Operation Ore began when names of more than 7,000 people linked to an American child porn website were handed to police. Thomas Reedy was arrested for masterminding the child pornography ring which the police called 'Operation Landslide' and was jailed for 1,335 years.

In the UK, police have arrested more than 1,300 people who used credit cards to pay for downloading images from pay-per-view sites.

The above report relates to an operation conducted by Cambridge police. Thomas Reedy masterminding a paedophile ring with 7,000 members? This is not just a perversion of the truth, blatant profiteering. Some forces have reported way higher than 50% charge rates, but even 50% is higher than OBU would expect and these results are viewed with deep suspicion. A very dangerous lie relates to where the report states that 1,300 were charged with using their credit cards. The long story details what happened at Landslide and 1,300 were not charged for using their credit cards for downloading illicit images, though a card trick was played.

The majority of contentious age imagery, was naturalist type imagery, people smiling whilst on holiday. Such imagery is illegal when under the legal age, perceived as under 18 according to SOA 2003. It may well suit the purposes of the IWF to mention child abuse at every turn, but it is very misleading, as many people in the judicial process would not be familiar with how the Internet worked, let alone what was there.

The Internet is rife with scam, sometimes involving money, sometimes just malice. To be taken to a website you didn't want to go to is very common, often as part of a money scam based on a credit card or dial up charge. Dumping extreme material on computers is often part of these scams, particularly dialler scams, to prevent the person from complaining. BT reported (06/2005) 300 dialler scams came to their attention each day, and yes, some diallers download cp .

Being hit for money is one thing, getting arrested for it afterwards is quite another. But some Orees were victims of such scams. The typical police methods of simply presenting the count of illicit images meant the details of this seldom came out. On top of all that, foreign and domestic LEA's have been distributing this material. Where peer to peer software is in use, it is child's play to infect a computer. Computer hacking in general has often been found to be exactly that, children playing, sometimes on the most secure and sensitive sites in the world.

To inject material into people's computers without leaving a trace of the cause being detectible by the police, is not a complex task for any able programmer. Before Operation Ore, you were probably safe. Since Operation Ore, that safety has gone.

The operational tactics used in Operation Ore are text book 'shock and awe' military tactics, designed to destroy the accused, to secure verdicts and to prevent the accused from coming back. It very nearly worked, but the strength of the human spirit and the power of good are the very forces that have always rescued mankind from the brink of catastrophe.

Courtesy of the Internet, those forces have combined and there are organisations and ordinary members of the public working day and night to protect and reclaim the world from those who have sought to control and corrupt it. The corruption involved in orchestrating these investigations cannot remain buried. This site provides some rebuttal to the offending behaviour of individuals and organisations that are involved in operations of this type. Their place in history has already been reserved. Sufficient supporting information is provided to justify the claims made and further information would be made available in appropriate circumstances.