Court dissects file-sharing programs as child porn trial continues

The cross-examination of a city police computer forensic expert Thursday at the trial of a Sault Ste. Marie man charged with child pornography offences centred on whether an "average person" would understand the properties of file-sharing programs.

Using the example of downloading movies on such a program, defense counsel Bruce Willson questioned whether a person would be aware that the information also was being uploaded from his computer.

"If I get a movie I have to share it?" he asked Det. Const. Doug Erkkila, during the  fourth day of Robert Capancioni's trial.

"Yes, it's file sharing," the technical crime unit officer said.

When doing the download there are ways to limit the amount of information going out (from your computer), but you can't negate it,  Erkkila told him.

Capancioni has pleaded not guilty to possession of child pornography and distributing it on the Internet.

Since the trial began Monday, Superior Court Justice Edward Gareau has only heard evidence from Erkkila, the first witness called by assistant Crown attorney David Kirk.

During his cross-examination about the file-sharing application on his client's computer, Willson also questioned whether the average person who was installing it would read what he called "all the fine print" in the contract at the beginning of the program.

Erkkila responded that the information is presented to the person and it "is ample information" to the user that "it's two-way traffic," that you are downloading and uploading information.

When Willson asked if this should be obvious to any user, the officer replied that he personally believes that "with all the information available the user should know this is a two-way highway."

"Anybody who has downloaded things should know this off the bat?" the defence lawyer wondered.

"I don't feel someone can be willfully blind to this," the officer replied, saying if a person is computer literate enough to install the program he can understand it.

Whether a person cares or not, there is information available to the user that shows the transactions involved, he said.

Earlier this week, Erkkila testified that he discovered in 2012 that a computer used by Capancioni was making child pornography available on the Internet. 

He said that he monitored the IP address until he obtained enough information for a search warrant. 

The officer told Gareau he downloaded 734 files, of which 244 he determined were child pornography, from Capancioni's computer on Dec. 31, 2012.

When the warrant was executed on Jan. 15, 2013, police seized a number of devices including a laptop computer. 

When he conducted a forensic analysis of the computer, Erkkila said he discovered the hard drive had been divided into two sections.

Although he was provided with some passwords, he said he was unable to open one section because it had been encrypted.

Erkkila then ran a keyword search on the seized laptop and another device using words and titles that he had garnered during his online investigation and found 16,000 separate entries for these words, the court heard.

On Thursday, Willson also wanted to know how someone would know what words to enter when searching for child pornography.

"There are a lot words synonymous with child pornography," that people searching for it know to use, Erkkila said, indicating he couldn't say where suspects get the words.

Is there child pornography DNA, that "they know when a search is going (to get a) hit," Willson retorted.

"There are hundreds of words synonymous with child pornography,"  Erkkila told him again.

The officer agreed that when a list comes up from a search you can't see what is in there unless you open the items.

"You may get things there you don't want," Willson suggested.

"Okay," the officer responded.

Erkkila said although he couldn't tell the court what a person would see when downloading "I can tell you some person entered key words prior to that."

He added that he doesn't what know those words are.

The trial wrapped up this morning.

Closing arguments are scheduled to take place in April.