'BEE SECURE STOPLINE': The Luxembourg Reporting Website For Online Criminal Content

The BEE SECURE STOPLINE website is the Luxembourg one-stop shop for reporting criminal content published on the Internet. This online tool is an initiative of the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg and co-funded by the European Commission under the Safe Internet Programme. It participates in a wide network with international members coordinated by the "INHOPE" association.

Why "BEE"?

As the initiative first aims at combating child sexual abuse, particularly online, a bee cartoon character has been created to get children accustomed to and advised of the dangers of the Internet. The website "www.bee.lu" is specially dedicated to this mission.

What content?

This website particularly concerns criminal content that affects the protection of the public interest in a digital public space. It mainly targets child sexual abuse material, racism, revisionism and discrimination, as well as terrorism and crimes of incitement such as incitement to hatred. In the case of discrimination, for example, advertisements which select individuals based on sex, racial or ethnic origin, nationality, religion or belief, disability, age or sexual orientation are prohibited. Criminal content may also include indecency in advertising where an affront to public decency is committed. This covers any statements or audio or visual treatments that offend standards of decency currently prevailing in the related country and culture.

How to report?

The BEE SECURE STOPLINE website permits anybody to report potential criminal content. The report can be anonymous and include replies to certain questions in order to gather as much information as possible on the suspected offence (i.e. type of content, website, screenshots). The user can also track the status of his/her report, via a tracking report number generated after the registration of the report.

Which process?

Once the operators of the BEE SECURE STOPLINE website have identified criminal content in the report, a technical investigation is set in motion which will determine the country hosting the criminal content. This information is then transmitted to the competent departments of the Grand-Ducal Police. If the reported criminal content originates from a country that is a member of the international network of the Safe Internet Programme, the matter is...