The broadcaster said it had sent Facebook the images after the firm’s director of policy agreed to be interviewed but only on the proviso the BBC could provide examples of the improper material that had not been taken off Facebook’s site.
However, instead of carrying out the interview to answer the claims, Facebook instead reported the BBC to the police.
Facebook provided CNBC with a statement Tuesday.
“We have carefully reviewed the content referred to us and have now removed all items that were illegal or against our standards,” it said.
“This content is no longer on our platform. We take this matter extremely seriously and we continue to improve our reporting and take-down measures.
“It is against the law for anyone to distribute images of child exploitation.
“When the BBC sent us such images we followed our industry’s standard practice and reported them to Ceop [Child Exploitation & Online Protection Centre].
“We also reported the child exploitation images that had been shared on our own platform. This matter is now in the hands of the authorities.”
