New cyber unit to tackle child sex abuse in Kenya
British-built cyber centre in Nairobi will help bring paedophiles, who target and abuse vulnerable children in Kenya, to justice
From: Prime Minister's Office, 10 Downing Street
British paedophiles who target and abuse vulnerable children in Kenya will be brought to justice thanks to a new cyber centre being built by Britain in Nairobi, the Prime Minister will announce today.
Online child sex abuse is a global problem with images created and shared across the world, including in Kenya. This new centre will help the Kenyan police stop these images being distributed online to help protect children from being abused.
The centre will also tackle a major barrier that prevents these predators being caught and prosecuted. Currently, Kenyan authorities do not receive reporting of material of child sexual abuse from US-based global tech companies because the specific, secure channels needed to do so do not exist in the country.
With the support of British funding, the new specialist cyber centre will, for the first time, enable Kenyan authorities to access data on abuse, provided the by tech firms, ensuring perpetrators can be brought to justice.
Britain’s funding of the cyber centre will mean the Kenyan police can now identify potential victims, investigate abuse and prosecute abusers. This builds on existing work by the UK’s National Crime Agency to set up Kenya’s Anti-Human Trafficking and Child Protection Unit (AHTCPU) and train and mentor its staff.
The new cyber centre being announced today – the first of its kind in Africa – will be based within this existing unit, which is seeing an increase in cases of child abuse. The AHTCPU has over 100 live investigations underway and since March 2016 has protected around 400 children and supported the arrest of around 40 suspects.
The child protection unit has already helped secure convictions in the UK of British paedophiles who’ve sexually abused children in Kenya. This includes:
Simon Harris from Shropshire who was sentenced to 14 years in prison at Birmingham Crown Court in 2015 for sexually abusing Kenyan street children
Keith Morris from Hull who was sentenced to 18 and a half years in prison at Leeds Crown Court in 2018 for sexually abusing Kenyan children in a village near Mombasa
Prime Minister Theresa May said:
Online child exploitation is an abhorrent crime and we are determined to ensure there is no place to hide for predators who use the internet to share images of abuse across borders, too often with impunity.
This builds on our ongoing work with Kenya on security and criminal justice – a partnership which has already helped to convict and imprison terrorists in the UK.
The cyber wing forms part of a new UK-Kenya security compact, signed today by Minister for Africa, Harriett Baldwin, and Kenya’s Cabinet Secretary for Foreign Affairs, Monica Juma, and witnessed by Prime Minister May and President Kenyatta.
Through the new security pact, the UK has also committed to:
offer training in community security to help strengthen the police’s engagement with marginalised communities, to help Kenya tackle violence against girls and women and to prevent extremism by dealing with the threat at source
share expertise with Kenya’s criminal justice system to strengthen the procedures for processing complex legal cases including terrorism and organised crime – improving the use of terrorism legislation and strengthening interagency working to help bring offenders to justice in the UK and Kenya
provide new support for aviation security including machines to detect explosives to keep the 100,000 Brits who visit Kenya every year safe by preventing attacks in the country and on direct flights to the UK
This builds on our ongoing cooperation through the first UK-Kenya Security Compact, agreed in 2015, and sets out a new programme of work for the years ahead.
The 2015 pact has led to two terrorism convictions in the UK, the establishment of a counter-IED training centre in Nairobi for regional security forces fighting Al-Shabaab, the extradition of wanted criminals from the UK to Kenya, and better aviation security – among other results.
And in a further example of UK and Kenyan domestic law enforcement working together to tackle shared threats, Minister for Africa Harriett Baldwin will sign an agreement in Nairobi today, witnessed by the Prime Minister, to return to the Kenyan people money that’s been lost to crime and corruption in Kenya and concealed in banks and assets in the UK.
Stolen funds found in Britain can now be used to fund development projects in sectors such as health and education. This includes over £3.6 million in proceeds of crime seized by courts in Jersey.
Other initiatives to be announced today to tackle corruption, increase investor confidence, encourage UK trade and investment and support economic growth in Africa include:
a new programme to counter illicit financial flows across southern and eastern Africa to help regional law enforcement recover illegal funds and disrupt serious organised crime networks
new practical guidance to help British companies overcome barriers to doing business in Kenya and other emerging markets, including advice on dealing with requests for bribes and human rights issues in supply chains – with tailored support to be offered to SMEs
Google to employ new AI technology against
child sexual abuse
The company invented new AI technology to combat online dissemination of sensitive content
Google said its cutting-edge AI technology uses deep neural networks for image processing to help discover and detect child sexual abuse material (CSAM) online.
The new tool based on the deep neural networks will be made available for free to non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and other technology companies. The new AI technology will significantly help service providers, NGOs and other tech firms to improve the efficiency of CSAM detection and reduce human reviewers’ exposure to the content, said the two Google engineers.
Quick identification of new images means that children who are being sexually abused today are much more likely to be identified and protected from further abuse.
This system can help a reviewer find and take action on 700 per cent more CSAM content over the same time period.
Google has been cooperating with some of its partners in combating online child sexual abuse, including the Britain-based charity the Internet Watch Foundation, the Technology Coalition and the WePROTECT Global Alliance, as well as other NGO organisations.
Stop Child Sexual Abuse – Lagos teenagers
Dayo Johnson, Akure OVER 200 teenagers have participated in a four- kilometre walk to raise awareness about and against child sexual abuse in the country.
The walk which was the brainchild of a non-governmental organisation, OLO Foundation, is coordinated by Mrs Oluwatomi Oyinsan who said the walk reached out to teenagers with the purpose of helping them to speak up against any form of sexual abuse.
The walk marked the first year anniversary of the foundation and it has as theme: Breaking The Silence– A walk against child sexual abuse.
The walk took off from Igbo-Efon Bus/stop and ended at Jakande White-Sand Field, Lagos State.
”The focus is to let children and teenagers experiencing any form of abuse know that they can speak out (break the silence) and get help.
“For many of those being abused, even though they realise it is not right, they have come to accept it as normal. We are here to tell them it is not! Child Sexual Abuse is a crime and should be treated as such.
These innocent children can speak up and get help. These span from legal (prosecution of the offenders), medical to psychological."
“It is a very uncomfortable topic that we will continue talking about until the perpetrators get very uncomfortable and stop these evil acts or are brought to book."
The objectives of the Foundation include; mentoring teenage girls to live a godly life, helping abused teenage girls find help and speak up against sexual abuse, and assisting them in vocational and soft skills acquisition.
Oyinsan added that the target audience was spoken to and provided necessary information and details of what to do in a case of abuse. “They will also be given tips on how to spot potential abusers and ways to avoid vulnerable situations."
The coordinator added that “the Foundation is essentially set up to help children and teenagers grow up safe by sensitizing them and helping those who have been or are being sexually abused.
In an interview after the walk, the coordinator of the foundation, Oyinsan said: “We just took a walk against child sexual abuse under the umbrella of OLO Foundation. This is a dream that I’ve always nurtured and it’s about creating awareness to stop child sexual abuse.
OLO Foundation started operation on the 17th of August 2017 and to mark our one year anniversary, we decided to do a walk to create awareness in Lekki part of Lagos to talk to teenage children between the ages of 10 and 19 years, to speak to them about Child Sexual Abuse and how they can be safe, and keep themselves away from sexual predators.
On how the foundation passes the message across to the teenagers, she said: “We educate them on the need and ways to keep their body, and preserve their dignity. Letting them know that there are sexual predators around them, and they should report any incidence of sexual molestation to someone that they trust; someone they can talk to and hopefully, the person can take it on."
“Also, recognising the fact that they would need some basic household items, we shared some gift items to them, like sanitary pads, toothbrushes, clothes, shoes and school materials.”
Speaking on government’s involvement, Oyinsan said: “The government is very pleased with what we’re doing. We sent a message to the Domestic and Sexual Violence Response, DSVR Team and they have responded positively. They are willing to support us in the future as well. So, we can say the Lagos State Government actually is doing a very good job concerning Domestic Violence and Child Sexual Abuse and all that. It’s amazing."
Foundation’s advice to parents: “Parents should please always keep an eye on their children, even if they have to be paranoid, they should be. A lot of things are happening- uncles are sleeping with their nieces even their nephews, aunties are sleeping with these kids; grandfathers are sleeping with their grandchildren (even nannies, house helps etc)."
“As a parent, you need to always make sure that you talk to your children, develop a good cordial relationship with your children. It’s very important and very necessary for you to be able to get information out of them that is the only way you can know exactly what they are going through."
Also, we want to plead with leaders everywhere, “let’s stop covering these things up, It’s wrong.
The best way to handle any form of child sexual abuse is to report the person and let the Law do something about it”.
Oyinsan appealed to “parents, teachers, leaders, please be watchful, report and in some cases, remove the child from the situation and we believe that with this, we can end this silence epidemic.
White Balloon Day
Preventing child sexual assault in Australia
Today is White Balloon Day, Australia’s only national awareness and fundraising campaign dedicated to preventing child sexual assault.
Member for Tweed Geoff Provest said child protection is everybody’s business. This crime does not discriminate and children of all ages, genders, socio-economic and cultural backgrounds are affected, he said.
‘Children deserve to grow up feeling safe and secure, and be able to trust the adults in their life,’ Mr Provest said.
‘White Balloon Day is about “breaking the silence” and empowering children and young people to speak out and speak up if they feel unsafe’.
During National Child Protection Week everyone with the responsibility to care for children can help them stay safe by participating in White Balloon Day, or you can make a donation to support Bravehearts’ vital work.
Bravehearts offers specialised support, education and training services for children, families, schools, childcare centres and organisations.
For more information on how you can support the prevention of child sexual assault, go to:
White Balloon Day.
'See something, say something,' FBI fighting
to end child abuse
by Mckenna Eubank
The F.B.I. is raising awareness about how they fight crimes against kids (KOKH).
OKLAHOMA CITY (KOKH) — Thousands of children fall victim to abuse every year, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Kidnapping, online predators, violent attacks or even sexual abuse are just some of the crimes these investigators face every single day.
The FBI's Exploitation Task Forces want to end those crimes against kids all around the world.
"We see a lot of child sex tourism that goes overseas and children become victims overseas," said Adam Aichele, a supervisory special agent with the FBI Task Force out of Tulsa.
"The citizens from the U.S. that went over there to conduct that behavior and that business, they can help stop it on their end and they can help us in making an arrest in a case on our end here."
There are 80 Child Exploitation Task Forces across the United States. They work internationally and team up with law enforcement agencies all the way down to the local level to bust crimes that our youngest citizens fall victim to.
"As a country, and in a global picture,” Aichele said, “Our children are our No. 1 resource and we need to protect them."
He added, the job can be a tough one, but well worth it.
"These cases are not glorious, not glamorous, and the individuals we have as part of the Task Force devote their entire lives to helping kids, and that's why we are so successful," he said.
Aichele also explained the importance of educating people — especially those who are around children every day — about red flags you might see when a child is going through abuse.
"With children, obviously if they withdraw from their activities, they show any kind of aggression toward their siblings or cousins or other relatives or other kids, if the school has concern about them, these are all kind of indicators. Maybe they're not involved in something that we can look at, but there's obviously something going on, and somebody needs to dig a little deeper," he said.
As a rule of thumb, he said, "Obviously, see something, say something."
"Even if they're not sure what's going on or they just have an inkling about what's going on, they can provide that information to us, or our local partners, and then that opens us up to be able to go out and investigate it," Aichele said.
Remember, if a child is in immediate danger, always call 911.
Marital rape, voyeurism to become offences in ‘sweeping’ changes proposed for Singapore’s penal code
Enhanced protection for the vulnerable is one of five main areas of recommendations submitted to the Government by a review committee.
By Justin Ong @JustinOngCNA
SINGAPORE: The abolishment of marital immunity for rape and the introduction of voyeurism as an offence form part of what Home Affairs and Law Minister K Shanmugam described as “sweeping” changes to Singapore’s penal code proposed by a review committee in its 500-page report.
A total of 169 recommendations were submitted to the Government at the end of August and will be open to public feedback from Monday (Sep 10) till the end of the month. A Penal Code Amendment Bill is targeted to be tabled in Parliament in November.
The recommendations are spread over five main areas - the largest of which is dedicated to strengthening protection for the vulnerable in society.
For instance, the committee has proposed creating new offences involving child abuse material - from using or involving a child in the production of, to the making, distributing, selling, advertising, seeking, accessing and possession of such material. This includes fictional material.
The committee said fictional material could be used for grooming children, and could fuel child abuse by reinforcing potential abusers’ inappropriate feelings towards children.
It has also suggested enhanced penalties for committing a penal code offence against domestic helpers; children below 14; and vulnerable persons - defined as those unable to protect themselves by way of mental or physical disability. Those convicted could face up to two times the maximum punishment prescribed for such offences.
Mr Shanmugam added: “With the Joshua Robinson-type cases, where young children are being exposed to unacceptable material, being sexually groomed, we want to deal very severely with that.”
Robinson, an American mixed martial arts instructor, was in 2017 jailed four years for various offences including sex with minors, showing an obscene film to a six-year-old girl and possessing nearly 6,000 obscene films including child pornography.
The committee has thus proposed that it shall be an offence to cause a minor to look at sexual images. It will also be an offence for anyone to cause or allow the death or serious injury of a child or vulnerable person. Offenders can be jailed for up to 20 years, fined and caned. Causing the death of a vulnerable person by sustained abuse will also be an offence.
Explaining the latter, Mr Shanmugam said: “For example, a child gets badly treated over a period of six, eight weeks … starved, beaten, dunked in water and so on - and all of these have happened - the final act that caused the death would not by itself have killed a healthy child.
“With the current state of the law, the prosecution has got to prove that with the final thing that made the child die, the person had intention to kill and that the act itself would have killed. That’s not easy.”
“NO MEANS NO”
A full, unqualified repeal of marital immunity for rape was another key proposal - “based on the principle that all women should be protected from sexual abuse, regardless of their marital status or the identity of the perpetrator”, said a joint press release by the ministries of home affairs and law.
“The majority of our population no longer subscribe to the belief that a wife had irrevocably surrendered herself to sexual intercourse with her husband upon marriage,” the release added.
Said Mr Shanmugam: “I’ve thought it odd that we still have immunity for husbands who rape their wives. A woman’s body is her own. And even if she’s your wife, she’s entitled to say no - and no means no.”
Asked if this proposal could potentially come into conflict with Islamic beliefs, he said: “We have consulted Muslim scholars. Our understanding is it doesn’t contradict.
“The Muslim community, in reactions we had in our consultations, has taken a similar approach in today’s Singapore - that the woman’s autonomy should be respected and all religions, including Islam, do not prohibit that. But it’s something we need to engage and explain much more.”
ADAPTING TO A CHANGING ENVIRONMENT
The committee also sought to tackle emerging crime trends brought about by technology as well as the proliferation of mobile devices and social media.
It has recommended specific offences be created for the making, distributing, possessing and accessing of voyeuristic recordings regardless of gender. Distributing or threatening to distribute an intimate image, along with sexual exposure, are other new offences being suggested.
In the area of white-collar crime, the committee recommended a new offence of fraud, adapted from the United Kingdom, to deal with emerging crime tactics that target financial systems. Given that technology and the Internet has enabled crime and criminals to cross borders, it has also recommended the clarification and expansion of extra-territorial jurisdiction for selected white-collar and property offences.
“We see increasingly sophisticated and complex criminal schemes which threaten the integrity of our financial systems and prey on vulnerable consumers,” the joint press release said.
Under the third category of updating the penal code, a key suggestion is the decriminalising of attempted suicide.
“When a person is desperate enough to want to take his own life, putting him in jail doesn’t seem to be the most obvious thing to do,” said Mr Shanmugam. “I don’t think the deterrent effect will be softened because if you were intending to kill yourself, you’re not really going to worry whether you’re going to jail or not - you’ve already assumed you’re not going to be living anymore.
“But abetting someone to commit suicide is still an offence. So people who can be deterred will continue to be deterred.”
The committee has instead recommended amending the legislation to empower the police to intervene when responding to suicide attempts, as well as empowering medical practitioners and the courts to order detention at a psychiatric institution for treatment.
Other areas of suggested amendments lie in the removal of outdated criminal laws and updating of the sentencing framework.
Section 377A of the penal code, which criminalises acts of “gross indecency” between men, was not part of the review. A similar law was repealed by India earlier this week, prompting reactions in Singapore from Mr Shanmugam, diplomat Tommy Koh and others.
The review committee was convened in mid-2016 and is made up of leading practitioners and thought leaders from the private sector, academia and the public sector, including the Attorney-General’s Chambers and the Judiciary. It is co-chaired by Minister in the Prime Minister’s Office Indranee Rajah and Senior Parliamentary Secretary for Home Affairs and Health Amrin Amin.
Thanking the committee for its efforts on behalf of the Government, Mr Shanmugam said: “The Committee has proposed wide-ranging changes to the Penal Code, which the Government will now discuss, with the benefit of views obtained from consultation sessions with various stakeholders. It is my hope that this process will culminate in a revised Penal Code that is principled, proportionate, and practical; one which will continue to serve Singapore well in the years to come.”
Children as young as four to be taught
dangers of online sex abuse
Four year-olds are to be taught about the risks of online abuse as part of a four-point blueprint by police chiefs to counter the “explosion” in child sex crimes on the internet.
The National Crime Agency (NCA) will this autumn launch its first teaching packages for four to seven year olds warning them not to share pictures, reveal personal details or go online without telling an adult.
The nationwide programme, run by 7,000 teachers and care professionals, comes amid a surge in tech ownership among nursery age pupils and growing anger from police chiefs at the failure of social media and tech firms to prevent thousands of child abuse cases.
The youngest victim of the new crime of sexual communication with a child was just five years old, one of 3,000 such offences in the first year since its introduction, according to freedom of information requests by the NSPCC.
“It can’t be the responsibility of the police service to police the services that these companies provide. That has to be their responsibility. I don’t know why they are not taking it more seriously.”
As part of the blueprint, he wants the tech giants from Google to Facebook to put 5 per cent to 10 per cent of their R&D budgets into measures to prevent online abuse, a “fighting fund” worth $6.5bn a year just from the biggest five.
And if they did not take action, they should be forced to do so by law.
He said they had the technology to prevent the uploading and sharing of indecent images of children and to stop groomers targeting children online.
Only sites or apps that demonstrated they could identify and stop groomers should have kitemarks so parents were aware, he said.
“The biggest point of that type of investment is that it would be a demonstration of how seriously they are taking it,” said Simon Bailey, Norfolk’s chief constable.
“Ultimately that would prevent a huge amount of this crime and probably the majority of it.” He said education was “massively important.”
“We as a society have got to build resilience in young people so they understand when they are being groomed, the risks of sharing a naked image of themselves, the risks of county lines [gangs] threats,” he said.
“We have got to educate young people so they are able make informed choices and spot and recognise the signs of abuse and exploitation. It’s got to be taking place within the primary school environment reinforced throughout secondary education.
“It’s got to be delivered by people who are not going on to teach maths or geography in the next lesson. It has to be done by people with credibility that children will listen to.”
Mr Bailey said technology had changed the threat with the proportion of cases where children were groomed by an adult outside the family doubling from 20 per cent to 40 per cent in just four years.
More than a third (36 per cent) of the indecent images online were now generated by children themselves amid a surge in children sharing sexual images with each other.
“Children are sharing images of their groins, breasts, up their skirts but never ever think it could end up on the screen of a paedophile. If they are going to do it, they need to know the risks they are taking,” he said.
Describing online child abuse as “one of the greatest threats” to society, he said the tech firms were “almost entirely responsible” for the explosion in indecent images from 10,000 20 years ago to 10m today on police databases.
Yet, all he had had from them in meetings was “platitudes.”
He said the blueprint, endorsed by the NCA and NPCC, should therefore be forced on the tech giants through legislation if they failed to act, echoing the threat by home secretary Sajid Javid last week.
“If nothing happens and the situation doesn’t improve then I am not sure we have a choice but to introduce legislation. It is not easy because the vast majority of firms are based in the US.”
Describing his worst experience as the case of a baby being raped before its first birthday, he warned new threats are emerging from live-streaming and paedophiles commissioning for as little as £12 filmed sex acts on children abroad, with the men designating age, ethnicity and clothing to order.
No social class was immune and some of the most appalling cases involved children from parents in professions. “One of the biggest new threats are the use of live streaming apps like Periscope by children coming home from school, just turning it on and it being a magnet for paedophiles.”
The tech firms say they take child exploitation very seriously and have invested heavily in technology to proactively search for videos and posts that contravene their policies or the laws of the countries in which they operate.
Obviously, they have not invested heavily enough. Not by a long shot!
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