2 Airdrie men are among 16 across Alberta who were arrested and charged with child pornography offences.

It was part of a three month investigation from Alberta's Law Enforcement Response Team (ALERT) known as Operation ICEBREAKER, to combat Internet Child Exploitation.

Of the 16 arrests made, 11 of them were from Calgary, with other arrests taking place in Airdrie, Red Deer and Strathmore.

The men arrested range in age from 47 to as young as 16, with 56 charges currently laid against them.

Detective Sean Spence with the Operation says they retrieved 28 Terrabytes of data, containing nearly 7,000 pornographic images of children with some videos, which was an excruciating task for the team.

Operation ICEBREAKER recovered these materials from just one house as part of their three month investigation.

"It's important to understand that these images and videos are a crime in progress. They're difficult to watch and get through. They are children that are being sexually assaulted upon."

Spence says that the material they found contained children as young as infants and as old as 17. Some featured children being touched inappropriately, while others contained more graphic displays of sexual assault and abuse.

The investigation also led to the release of two children under the age of 16 who were used for the purposes of Internet Child Exploitation. One child hailed from Tennessee while the other came from Kingston, Ontario.

It's cases like this that send a stern warning that no one is anonymous online, and crimes like this can't go unpunished.

'"These are images and recorded evidence of a child being sexually exploited," says Spence, "There are offenders out there that will see the news and learn about this operation. I want to relay that there is help available and if they don't stop and don't seek help, then they will be arrested."

Spence and the rest of the response team say they received tremendous support from other jurisdictions, and that more arrests or charges could follow in the operation.

27 year old Curtis Brock and 28 year old Ryland Jacklin of Airdrie were arrested and charged with possessing, transmitting and accessing child pornography.

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