Given how unlikely this is, it's almost certainly the case that he is a pedophile who has trafficked in child pornography with other pedophiles. I don't know about you, but my sympathy level for such people is approximately zero.
And imagine you wouldn't get to defend yourself, and no one would speak up and say "Hey come on, obviously that's not remotely CSAM" because they hated you for being a "traitor".
It doesn't take a conspiracy at all, all it takes is a handful of people willing to say "So what, I don't care what happens to such people". Which, you'll notice, is what you're saying right now.
Speak for yourself, there's absolutely nothing in my files that could even marginally be classified as child pornography. I would think this is the same for most people.
With this guy, investigators found hundreds of thousands of photos and videos of child sexual abuse on his disks. And then he tried to defend himself by claiming it's a victimless crime.
I know people like a good conspiracy theory, especially if it involves the government, but this isn't it.
You're going to run into your Cardinal Richelieu one day, person who signed up to HN two hours ago in order to defend the honour of the CIA.
Apparently there's some in the bitcoin blockchain. Never went looking for it personally, but I assume it's encoded the same way as the image of the bitcoin logo in there.
This sounds like projection.
Not everyone blunders through life with a massive stash of questionable pornography.
The criteria for determining what is and is not child pornography are quite clear: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2252A
The most reliable way of not getting caught out storing dodgy images on your computer is to not procure them in the first place.
And, it's better for keeping a healthy and well-adjusted attitude towards sexual desire, rather than being trained on whatever pornographers want to you see. From an ethical point of view, not being complicit in the sexual abuse that is so rife in the porn industry is also a big plus.
Holy cow did previous generations / civilizations love to collect lewd sculptures and paintings.
My position on the findings of the various juries involved in the various trials is that I should defer to their analysis of the evidence-- and that is the only reasonable position to take in the absence of more information, information neither of us has.
That's up to the jury. I'll defer to their judgement and in the absence of additional information (information neither of us possesses) that is the only reasonable position to take.