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LONDON (Reuters) - Police plan to patrol Internet chatrooms as part of a multinational crackdown on paedophile rings.

They will also seize the finances of website operators who peddle child pornography and freeze the credit cards of their customers.

"We want to create the equivalent of a beat cop for the Internet," said National Crime Squad Assistant Chief Constable Jim Gamble.

Police from Britain, the United States, Canada and Australia are to form a global taskforce with the primary aim of stopping paedophiles luring children into offline encounters.

"This should not be viewed as a Big Brother tactic -- this is about police becoming more visible on the Internet," Gamble told Reuters on Wednesday.

Under the plan, an officer would appear in a chat area from time to time to observe conversations and would be identified with a type of "cyber badge" or icon for the "Virtual Global Task Force" to let everyone in the chatroom know, Gamble said.

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Source: Reuters