Dogsey

The trading of child pornography is an every-increasing problem and paedophiles have been known to conceal hard drives of images in walls, ceilings and cabinets to avoid being caught.

These small storage devices are typically difficult for police to find, but one force has found an alternative - sniffer dogs.

Connecticut State Police is now using a golden labrador to find concealed memory cards in return for food, and the scheme has already led to arrests.

Golden labrador Thoreau, owned by handler Detective Adam Houston, can also find hard drives, USB sticks and other similar gadgets by identifying the scent of the metal and components used in the devices.

The dog is dog is being used to find storage devices containing images of child porn, hidden by paedophiles.

Thoreau received 22 weeks of training in how to detect devices in exchange for food at the Connecticut State Police Training Academy.

But Maggie Gwynne, of Sniffer Dogs UK & International, told the BBC this was "completely contrary" to the UK police and prison service's training methods.

"Offering a sniffer dog food in exchange for a 'find' opens the way for an abuse of the system - if its hungry enough it will take food from anybody, not just its handler and therefore defeats the object of the search," she said.

It is unclear whether the dog can distinguish between a memory stick and other electrical equipment likely to be around a suspect's house, such as TV remotes, radios and computers.

Ms Gwynne said she had no doubt dogs could be trained to locate hard drives and/or memory sticks, in the same way firearms dogs were trained to find metallic objects but the idea "that it could make a distinction as to what it has found, seems unrealistic".