A sick paedophile caught uploading child abuse videos to a horrific dark web website has been jailed after a global operation sparked by one of the UK's worst ever child sex offenders.

Alexander Buckley, of Hill House Drive in Minster, Ramsgate, was convicted following an international investigation, brought about by a National Crime Agency probe into Dr Matthew Falder, who is serving a 25-year jail term for 137 child sex offences.

As part of the global operation, 337 arrests were made - including Buckley's - in 38 countries and the website, Welcome To Video, taken down by an international taskforce set up by the NCA and including authorities from around the world.

The site – run from South Korea – contained more than 250,000 horrific videos and users had made more than one million downloads.

The website monetised the sexual abuse of children and was one of the first to offer sickening videos for sale using the cryptocurreny bitcoin.

In the UK, 18 investigations were developed from the intelligence and seven men convicted – including one jailed for 22 years for raping a five-year-old boy and appearing on Welcome To Video sexually abusing a three-year-old girl.

Buckley, 28, was also arrested and charged and has been sentenced to 40 months in jail for his part in using the website, which included buying credits with bitcoin and uploading three category A videos to Welcome to Video.

He admitted 10 offences of possession and distribution of indecent images of children, possession of extreme and prohibited images and possession of a class A drug.

He is also subject to an indefinite Sexual Harm Prevention Order.

The NCA uncovered Welcome To Video during its investigation into the geophysicist Falder who, in 2017, admitted 137 offences including encouraging child rape and sharing images of a newborn baby being abused.

He is serving a 25-year jail sentence.

Officers from the NCA’s National Cyber Crime Unit discovered that Welcome To Video was being run from South Korea by Jong Woo Son, 23, and they analysed cryptocurrency transactions to identify site users.

"Dark web child sex offenders – some of whom are the very worst offenders – cannot hide from law enforcement.." Nikki Holland from NCA

On Wednesday Son was charged with nine counts in the United States relating to him running the website. The South Korean national has already been convicted and jailed in his home country.

Nikki Holland, NCA director of investigations, said: “Dark web child sex offenders – some of whom are the very worst offenders – cannot hide from law enforcement.

“They’re not as cloaked as they think they are, they’re not as safe as they think they are.

“The NCA is relentless in pursuing them and we have specialist capabilities, which we use for all UK law enforcement, to unmask them and help take down sites like Welcome To Video.

"I’m immensely proud of the role we played in catching some very depraved and dangerous global offenders and for beginning the work that eventually caught Jong Woo Son."

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