Four Albertans have been charged as a part of an interprovincial sting operation against child pornography and investigations are continuing into other files.

As well, RCMP members leading the mass investigation, dubbed Operation Snapshot, revealed they are seeing more explicit material involving Canadian minors.

Saskatoon Sgt. Darren Parisien told reporters Wednesday most of the hundreds of thousands of images seized as part of the operation were “homegrown.”

He added, “(The operation) involved us going to places where people are sharing and creating child pornography. We are undercover posing as children and posing as offenders. We go where kids go. That’s where predators go.”

Det. Justin Brookes with the Southern Alberta Internet Child Exploitation unit said 5-10 years ago most of the child pornography seized originated overseas.

“Things have changed quite a bit since then,” he said.

Operation Snapshot has spanned through Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Nunavut and the Northwest Territories — 19 arrests have been made to date.

Charges against four Alberta men, three from Calgary and one from Edmonton, including accessing, possessing and distributing child pornography as well as one charge of luring.

Brookes said the Calgary accused do not appear to have gained access to any local children, adding the luring charge stems from an undercover operation in which a police member posed as a minor.

Brookes said much work remains to determine the scale of illegal material seized.

“Typically, for these types of files we see thousands to tens of thousands of items we need to go through,” he said.

— With files from Rob Brown, Metro Regina