Austria: 40 suspects arrested in child porn case

Forty suspects were arrested and thousands of videos, CDs and DVDs were seized during Austrian yearlong investigation, authorities said Friday.

Officials detailing what they said involved months of undercover investigation said police also confiscated dozens of PCs, laptops and hard drives in an operation carried out in cooperation with authorities in neighboring Germany.

Mario Hubmann, a senior official with Austria's Federal Criminal Investigations Bureau, said the suspects range in age from 16 to retirees in their 60s.

Hubmann said the lurid images seized in raids on scores of homes nationwide included photos of one of the suspects with the man's 17-year-old stepdaughter.

He said German authorities were examining a video showing a 4-year-old child being sexually abused.

Austrian officials said the latest case was linked to the discovery in February of a child porn ring involving nearly 2,400 suspects from 77 countries.