Two Sussex men have been jailed for two-and-a-half years for their part in the world's largest internet paedophile ring.

David Hines, 30, of Chichester Road, Bognor, and Ian Baldock, 31, of Upper Maze Hill, St Leonards, were among seven men sentenced at Kingston Crown Court this afternoon.

They escaped the maximum sentence, three years, because they admitted conspiring to distribute indecent images of children.

They were members of the so-called Wonderland Club, an international ring of 180 paedophiles who swapped thousands of pictures of child abuse.

Sentencing the seven, Judge Kenneth Macrae said: "Children represent the future. They should be cared for and protected.

"All of you subscribed to Wonderland and similar operations, betraying the principle by the use and abuse of children for your own perverted gratification."

But he said despite "pandering to the basest interests of man" they would have to be given credit for pleading guilty.

Baldock and Hines were handed the longest sentences out of the seven.

Gavin Seagers, 29, of Dartford, Kent, Ahmed Ali, 31, of Tulse Hill, London, and Andrew Barlow, 25, of Bletchley, Bucks, were given two years.

Antoni Skinner of Cheltenham, Gloucester, got 18 months and Frederick Stephens, 46, of Hayes, London, got 12 months.

The seven helped compile a vast Internet database of horrific images.

They were among 107 people arrested in a global police operation spanning three continents.

A staggering 750,000 pictures were seized by police, as well as a library of 1,800 computerised videos depicting children suffering sexual abuse.

More than 1,263 children were featured, but so far only 17 had been identified - six in the UK, seven in the United States, one in Portugal, one in Chile and one in Argentina.

The court heard yesterday how the defendants, using nicknames, would trade pictures though the Wonderland Club, often using encryption software which made it difficult for police to access pictures.

Wonderland prided itself on containing "the cream of paedophiles" and new members were carefully screened.

The entry fee was to provide 10,000 new indecent pictures of children.

Hines, who traded images under the nickname Mutt's Nutts, said: "We just didn't see it as abuse. We saw it as there were some children involved in relationships."

The sentences were immediately condemned.

Dr Michelle Elliott, director of child protection charity Kidscape, said the sentences were a "joke" which suggested the crimes were not being taken seriously.

She said: "You would get a longer sentence for accumulating masses of parking tickets or for burglary.

"I am absolutely stupefied by this leniency. It sends a clear message that these crimes are not being taken seriously."