Danish experts assist in Europol’s identification
of four child sexual abuse victims
Experts from 21 countries joined forces in Europol’s Victim Identification Taskforce from 14 to 25 October in The Hague, the Netherlands
to identify child abuse victims
to identify child abuse victims
Sometimes a chink of light can lead to a positive identification (photo: Pixabay)
by Thess Mostoles, CPH Post
Supported by Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre specialists and intelligence analysts, 30 law enforcement experts recently went through millions of images and video files of victims – some as young as a few days old.
Apart from Denmark, specialists came from Australia, Belgium, Canada, Croatia, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, the Netherlands, Norway, Romania, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the United States, Europol and Interpol.
By analysing the digital, visual, and audio content of such images and videos, these victim-identification experts retrieved vital clues, tried to find any overlap in cases and combined their efforts to locate the victims.
Millions of images to work with
More than 48 million images and video files were available on Europol’s database for this operation. Taskforce participants had 1,000 series of related images to process. In just eleven days, the taskforce managed to analyse a total of 925 series.
For 173 of these series, Europol stated the country of production has likely been pinpointed. Those countries have been informed so that they can start their own investigation.
More importantly, the identities of four victims have been confirmed and Europol’s European Cybercrime Centre is now providing support to the involved EU states to safeguard the children concerned.
Although the taskforce is over, the investigation is not. All the series have been uploaded to the Interpol International Child Sexual Exploitation (ICSE) database. This will allow investigators to continue working on the datasets, therefore increasing the chances of more victims being identified and safeguarded.
Identifying objects to save lives
In June 2017, Europol launched its crowdsourcing ‘Stop Child Abuse – Trace an Object‘ initiative. It asks citizens for collaboration in identifying small objects, places, or logos on victims’ images in the hope it can lead to the identification of victims down the line
Last Friday, Europol published a new set of images. In the past, this tool has provided Europol with 24,000 tip-offs, leading to the identification of nine children and to the prosecution of two offenders.
Meager results, but it's a start. I'm glad to see there's so much interest and international involvement.
Push to Bar Puberty-Blocking Drugs, Gender-Transitioning of Children Widens to 3 States
By Brandon Showalter, CP Reporter|
A man holds up a sign supporting North Carolina's anti-transgender bathroom law in Charlotte, North Carolina, U.S., August 18, 2016. | (Photo: REUTERS/Carlo Allegri)
It's a little unfortunate that there are only men in this photo.
Following the outcry over 7-year-old James Younger in Texas, whose mother is seeking to medically transition him into a girl named Luna, the push to ban medical gender-transitioning for minors is expanding to other states.
Republicans in three states have now either announced their intentions to or are already drafting bills that would restrict or assign criminal penalties to the practice of medically altering the biological sex of a child in pursuit of becoming the opposite sex, known as "transitioning."
In Georgia, state representative Ginny Ehrhart (R-Powder Springs) is introducing legislation making it a felony act for medical professional to assist a minor child with a gender transition.
“We’re talking about children that can’t get a tattoo or smoke a cigar or a cigarette in the state of Georgia but can be castrated and get sterilized,” Ehrhart said, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
“There may be some implication for the responsibility of the parent to subject the child to this sort of dangerous medical intervention,” she said.
The Republican legislator, who last year defeated an incumbent Democrat with a transgender-identifying child, indicated she was compelled to propose the bill in light of the situation with Younger, who is at the center of a custody battle and gained international attention last month.
Republican Texas Rep. Matt Krause said amid the swirl of news about Younger that he would introduce legislation prohibiting puberty-blocking drugs for children under the age of 18 during the next session, which will occur in 2021, unless a special session is called before then.
Say what? There will be no legislative sessions in 2020. I suspect that's an error.
In Kentucky, state representative Savannah Maddox, also a Republican, announced she was drafting a similar bill for her state.
"I am sure that many of you have read about the shocking case of this 7 yr old boy in Texas whose parents are in the midst of an ugly courtroom battle as a result of his mother's desire to transition his gender from male to female, but truth be told this has been in my mind and on my heart for quite a while," Maddox wrote in an Oct 25 post on her Facebook page.
“I am a strong advocate for parents' rights — but it is not the right of a parent to permanently alter a child's gender or identity, even when based upon certain behaviors or the perceptions of a child's mind which has not yet had time to fully develop.”
Pre-frontal cortex
It is a widely held consensus that the pre-frontal cortex, the decision-making part of the brain, does is not fully form until people are into their 20s.
In the United States, criticism of the medicalization of gender has largely come from the political right and religious and conservative-leaning media outlets. Left-leaning critics of transitioning minors and of transgender ideology more generally include radical feminists and lesbians, who also stress that transgenderism erases women's sex-based rights and have said they struggle to be heard in major media.
Yet criticism of the medical treatments is slowly percolating into the mainstream press as what are known as detransitioners — individuals who once identified as transgender but no longer do — share their journeys.
Writing in New York magazine Saturday, Andrew Sullivan argued for greater caution and putting additional safeguards in place for teenagers desiring to transition, "as opposed to swift affirmation and handing out testosterone like candy," he quipped.
"Social transition is one thing. Off-label puberty blockers and irreversible hormones and surgeries are quite another. And this is zero-sum," Sullivan said, noting that he had recently interviewed several women in their early 20s, none of them religious extremists or bigoted, who recently desisted back to their biological sex.
"Their transition was based entirely on how they felt at the moment, which they now regard as a false signal about their long-term identity," he explained.
"Right now, we are effectively experimenting on minors who cannot give meaningful consent. And that alone should give us pause."
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Confronting the link between HIV and gender-based violence in Jamaica
One Survivor's Story
She admits that it’s been a long road. “I was so depressed, I didn’t know who to trust,” she remembers. “How could this happen, and everybody turned their eyes?”
Rushell Gray reflects on her past with a similar mix of sorrow and disbelief. “As a young girl everybody turned a blind eye and blamed me. I was the AIDS girl walking around in the community. Nobody said, “this man needs to go to jail.” At one point I almost gave up because the stress was too high,” she said.
Both Ms McDonald and Ms Gray are employees and past clients of Eve for Life, a Jamaican nongovernmental organization that helps to prevent new HIV infections and improve the quality of life of women and children living with or affected by HIV. Clients benefit from peer support groups, psychological care and empowerment programmes.
Joy Crawford and Patricia Watson founded Eve for Life 11 years ago. While supporting young women and girls affected by HIV, they quickly learned that there was a clear link between HIV infection, adolescent pregnancy and child sexual abuse. According to Situation analysis of Jamaican children, a 2018 report by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), more than one in five (21%) adolescent girls in Jamaica said that they had survived sexual violence.
Remember, these are adolescent girls in this survey. By the time they reach 18, the rate of sexual violence will likely have doubled.
As a long-standing provider of technical support and capacity-building around sustainability for Eve for Life, UNICEF is keen not only on supporting girls, but addressing the cultural norms that make them vulnerable.
“There is this pervasive idea that adult men should have some level of access to a girl’s body if they are in their life, supporting the family or something like that,” explains Novia Condell, UNICEF Jamaica’s Adolescent Health and Empowerment Specialist. “Of course, the girl has no power to negotiate any protection in a situation where she has been abused or exploited.”
High on UNICEF’s agenda is supporting the community engagement necessary to shift attitudes around child sexual abuse. Eve for Life has spearheaded the “Nuh guh deh” (don’t go there) campaign, which aims to stop sexual abuse. They use complementary strategies—everything from community meetings to music videos—to get the message out.
The UNAIDS country office in Jamaica also provides technical support to Eve for Life and has helped the organization build partnerships for resource mobilization. The UNAIDS Caribbean subregional office is also working with Eve for Life to create safe spaces for young survivors and leaders to raise awareness about the link between gender-based violence and HIV.
There is also a focus on meeting young women’s basic needs, including food, clothes and health care. But beyond these services, work continues to provide teenage girls and young women living with HIV with a deeper level of emotional support and mentorship.
“Jamaica’s Ministry of Health has found a strong partner in Eve for Life—one that is able to focus on resilience and life skills-building. They get the girls’ lives on track so they can improve their lot and the lot of their children,” says Ms Condell.
She used to prosecute sexual predators. Now, she teaches Seattle-area parents how to keep kids safe and healthy
By Michelle Archer
Seattle Times Explore
Meet Christy Keating, a former deputy prosecutor with the King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office who now owns The Heartful Parent and Savvy Parents Safe Kids. Organizations hire her to train their educators, caregivers and parent communities on a variety of parenting topics, including child sexual abuse prevention, consent and healthy boundaries.
Here, she answers questions about her work.
How did you get started in that field? I loved my job as a trial lawyer, and I was good at it. But after my first daughter was born 10 years ago, I found myself really struggling with my new identity and grappling with questions about how to balance my professional life with my personal one in a field that is not known for work-life balance.
Once I got my feet under me, as much as any parent does, I found that I loved learning about parenting and helping other parents — and that I was good at that, too! After completing my certification, I opened my coaching practice; I later assumed ownership of Savvy Parents Safe Kids, where I use my expertise to teach parents how to prevent child sexual abuse and teach consent and boundaries.
What’s a typical day like? I don’t have a “typical day” and I love it! Most days, I coach private clients over Zoom, so no one has to drive anywhere. Many evenings I spend teaching positive discipline classes or presenting workshops at schools. In between all that, I write articles, create social media posts and manage my soon-to-launch membership site. As a small-business owner, I’m the marketing, sales, billing, IT and HR departments all rolled into one.
What’s the best part of the job? I love connecting with parents on this really tough, but incredible journey. I do not pretend to have it all figured out; I sometimes struggle just like my clients, but working together to create healthier, happier families feels amazing. I also love helping parents and organizations prevent child sexual abuse and sexual assault before it happens rather than dealing with it after the fact.
What surprises people about what you do? Two things: First, that there really is individualized support for parents out there, and that there are simple tools and skills that really can make parenting easier and more joyful. Second, I think people are surprised at the career transition and reinvention that I went through. It’s a reminder that our skills can translate to many different fields, and just because we’ve been doing one thing for a long time doesn’t mean that’s what we have to do forever.
Long Island senator proposes state-run fund supporting child sex abuse survivor's lawsuits
By DENIS SLATTERYNEW YORK DAILY NEWS |
New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo is seen signing of the Child Victims Act in the offices of the NY Daily News
on Feb. 14, 2019. (Mark Woodward / New York Daily News)
The bill from Sen. James Gaughran, a Democrat, would create the “Child Victim Foundation Fund,” a reserve of money that would be allocated through grants to nonprofit organizations that help survivors litigate child abuse claims.
“The thought was to create a legal fund that people could access for the purpose of providing legal representation for them as they try to file a civil action against the person they believe sexually assaulted or abused them when they were younger,” Gaughran told the Daily News.
Sen. James Gaughran (D-Oyster Bay) introduced during opening day of the 2019 legislative session in Albany.
(Hans Pennink/AP)
The fund, which would be run jointly by the Department of Taxation and Finance, the Division of Criminal Justice Services and the comptroller’s office, would be built upon donations from New Yorkers who could contribute when they file state taxes and from fines levied against abusers convicted of child sex crimes.
The measure is a companion piece to the Child Victims Act, which changed the statute of limitations for child sex abuse cases and created the one-year civil suit look-back that began in August.
Most of the cases filed under the CVA have targeted large institutions, like the Boys & Girls Club, Boy Scouts of America and the Catholic Church. But advocates say that victims whose abusers aren’t connected to a school or organization with significant financial backing are unable to find attorneys to take up their cases.
“It became obvious to me that there were people who are not able to access the legal system because they couldn’t afford lawyers or find lawyers who would take their case on a contingency basis,” Gaughran said.
Gary Greenberg, a longtime advocate of the Child Victims Act who was sexually assaulted by a hospital orderly when he was seven years old, called the measure a “good start.”
But he thinks more can be done to help survivors cover financial burdens including the costs of therapy, medical and living expenses.
“They should broaden that language to include the widest spectrum of victims services, not just to pay lawyers,” he said. “There are many cases that even with a legal fund, that lawyers cannot adjudicate.”
Greenberg has in the past called for a child victim reconciliation and compensation fund meant to help those whose abusers were not part of a major organization or church or school.
In his compensation fund — a version of which was included in previous iterations of the Child Victims Act that failed to pass the Legislature — survivors would be able to file a claim, which would be investigated by a team of experts. An administrator would oversee the fund and dole out money in certain circumstances.
Gaughran said he and other lawmakers are considering ways to expand on Greenberg’s proposal and assist victims further when they reconvene in Albany next year.
Excellent! therapy is an absolutely necessary part of recovering from CSA and very often it takes years of therapy. Well done Senator Gaughan; keep up the pressure Gary Greenberg, you're a hero in my book, er, at least my blogs.
CBI (India's FBI) forms unit to tackle child porn
| Rakesh K Singh | New Delhi
In what could be bad news for paedophiles, the CBI has set up an Online Child Sexual Abuse and Exploitation (OCSAE) Prevention/ Investigation Unit in the national Capital under its Special Crime Zone to proactively check child porn and associated crimes through detailed investigation.
The newly-established specialised unit will collect, collate and disseminate information regarding publication, transmission, creation, collection, seeking, browsing, downloading advertising, promoting, exchanging, distribution of information relating to online child sexual abuse and exploitation and probe related crimes.
The unit will also conduct investigation of such offences covered under the provisions of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act and the Information Technology Act 2000 and under various other laws.
“Rapid growth of the internet and information & communication tools over the past two decades has created unparalleled opportunities for children and adults alike to learn and explore the world around them. Today, in many countries, these technologies are ubiquitous — permeating every aspect of our lives — personal and professional, individual and social. These technologies have simultaneously created a new dimension, wherein the sexual exploitation of children can multiply, if unchecked.
And it is multiplying, and it is unchecked for the most part. You will be doing well just to slow down the growth.
“Children, every day, all around the world are prone to suffer online sexual abuse and exploitation,” the CBI said in a statement.
Numerous references related to dissemination of CSAM (Child Sexual Abuse Material) are received from Interpol and other national / international organisations. The incidence of online child sexual abuse and exploitation generally transcends international borders. Victims are mostly helpless innocent children, it said.
Helpless, yes, but they're innocent no more. Their innocence is stolen and destroyed.
The territorial jurisdiction of the OCSAE Prevention/Investigation Unit will be throughout India and will help in countering the menace of child porn on the internet and related crimes, officials said.
The unit will collect intelligence not only on those who are allegedly creating and transmitting such material on the internet but also those who are browsing and downloading such material, they said.
The agency had registered a case last month against seven persons in alleged connection with a child pornography case in which they were alleged to be part of various WhatsApp groups involved in the transmission of child sexual abuse material. The information on the international porn group had come from the German embassy in India. The CBI had received information from Germany about the conviction of one Sasche Treppke in that country for sexual abuse of children and distribution of child pornography. The convicted criminal Treppke was a member of 29 WhatsApp groups that were used to share pornographic content. The seven accused in the CBI case were also the members of the groups operated by Treppke and were also sharing such content, according to the CBI FIR.
In February 2018, the CBI had busted an international racket involved in child pornography. The racket was operated through WhatsApp groups and the administrator of the group Nikhil Verma was nabbed. Some of the 119 members of the WhatsApp group hailed from the US, Pakistan, China and Sri Lanka.
Paypal abandons Pornhub, finally
TMZPayPal is putting an end to processing payments on Pornhub.
The devastating news for independent porn actors was announced late Wednesday night when PayPal decided to join several other banks and apps refusing to help them get paid for personal video clips posted on the porn site.
Pornhub is the largest porn site in the world.
Pornhub allows independent performers to upload and sell their own videos, but they need a method to collect money from users. Financial institutions like JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, Capital One, Square and Venmo have been out of the Pornhub biz for awhile ... so PayPal was one of the last remaining ways for performers to get paid.
Not anymore ... Pornhub says it's devastated by PayPal's decision to stop payouts "to over a hundred thousand performers who rely on them for their livelihoods." The platform is now scrambling to help performers who have pending PayPal payments.
PayPal hasn't said exactly why they're bailing, but the other financial institutions started making the same move after Congress passed the Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act in 2018.
This is the latest blow for Pornhub, which just last month cut off all content from Girls Do Porn -- a separate company that was accused of coercing dozens of women into adult videos.
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Come Next Year, Schools in Bengal to Include Classes on 'Good and Bad Touch' to Deal with Child Sexual Abuse
As far as students are concerned, the focus would be on understanding their psychology, change in behaviour and how to react during physical training sessions inside or outside the school
Kolkata: In a bid to deal with the menace of sexual harassment, the West Bengal government has decided to include ‘good touch’ and ‘bad touch’ courses in the school syllabus from the next academic session.
The school education department has roped in the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII) and Child Relief and You (CRY) to implement the project.
The introduction of the concepts of ‘good and bad touch’ in schools would be done in a phased manner. “Initially, the project will be covered in more than 300 schools in Kolkata, Howrah, North 24-Parganas, South 24-Parganas, Malda and West Midnapore. The target age-group will be four to 12 years,” an official attached with this project said.
“We don’t want to complete this project in a haste. This is a serious matter and we want to complete it in a proper way to protect children from any kind of sexual harassment. Once we are done in the selected districts, we will move on to another five to six districts,” he added.
The syllabus will have two parts — one for the students and the other for guardians, teachers and school staff.
As far as students are concerned, the focus would be on understanding their psychology, change in behaviour and how to react during physical training sessions inside or outside the school.
“We have introduced a paragraph on children going for swimming classes. We have highlighted that they should not allow anyone to touch the uncovered parts of their body except their parents. Even in case of doctors, they should allow them to touch an injured area only in front of their parents. There is a line where we are asking them to shout for help without any hesitating if someone touches them inappropriately,” the official said.
Ummm, isn't it the parts of the body that are covered by swimsuits that are inappropriate to touch? I'm not sure they have the concept correct here!
School teachers and parents would be asked to communicate with children through storytelling to know whether they have been touched improperly, harassed or assaulted by anyone.
They (teachers and parents) would also be asked to be alert if someone tries to be over friendly with students/children and tries to interact with him/her alone.
According to the National Crime Records Bureau’s report for 2016, crime against children had increased by nearly 11% between 2015 and 2016 and Bengal registered the highest number of such cases.
In 2017, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights had conducted a survey that came up with some shocking revelations. It found that more than 50% children they interacted with or surveyed had faced some form of sexual abuse.
And I would be surprised that by the time they are 18, at least 75% of those children weren't sexually abused. And that might be a conservative estimate.
France unveils tougher penalties for domestic violence
By Clyde Hughes
French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe speaks Monday about addressing domestic violence, standing next to French Junior Minister for Gender Equality Marlene Schiappa during the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women in Paris, France. Photo by Stephane de Sakutin/EPA-EFE
(UPI) -- French Prime Minister Edouard Philippe announced new measures Monday to prevent deadly domestic violence against amid a rising number of cases.
Philippe said the updated measures would account for psychological forms of harassment that frequently lead to physical violence. The changes also would include tougher penalties, the ability to seize firearms from abusive spouses and better train police to respond to cases, he said.
The legislation would help create 1,000 new shelters for domestic violence victims and expand the use of electronic bracelets for offenders.
Authorities said that at least 137 women have been killed this year by domestic violence and 121 were killed last year. An estimated 220,000 suffer from domestic violence in France every year, according to the National Observatory of Violence Against Women.
France's Justice Ministry said this month 41 percent of "conjugal homicide" victims had previously reported domestic violence incidents, and 80 percent of complaints sent to prosecutors were not investigated.
"Clearly, our system is failing to protect women," French Justice Minister Nicole Belloubet said.
French feminist activist Caroline de Haas argued the new measures are not enough to make a difference.
"The prime minister announces exactly the same budget allocated against violence in 2020 as in 2019," de Haas said on social media. "They're not changing public policy. The domestic violence figures will not drop. I am disgusted."
Organizers supported about 30 rallies in France Saturday that called on the government to invest more money in violence prevention. They argued the response by authorities is unacceptable and the government should invest more than $1 billion to address the problem.
Tennis Player Roger Federer Provides Schooling and Food for a Million Children
..
In the past 15 years, Federer has opened schools all over the world
His primary focus with the foundation is to improve education for children, especially in places where they have extremely limited access. In the past 15 years, Federer has opened schools all over the world. In Malawi, in Southen Africa, Federer has already built over 50 preschools.
During one of his visits to the schools in Malawi, Federer said, “I’m so happy and emotional that I can see a preschool of this quality here–it’s quite extraordinary. The community is so committed to helping the kids, it’s so important (as) the foundation for learning.”
In 2015, the Roger Federer Foundation said that they hoped to be feeding and teaching one million kids by 2018. The goal seemed incredible, but the foundation was able to make it happen by the time that they promised.
In a statement after the goal was completed, Roger Federer Foundation CEO Janine Händel said that it took a lot of hard work to see their task through.
“It took a lot of work and determination to achieve this amazing thing. There was no other possibility than achieving this goal because Roger always achieves his goals. There are one million children which benefits from the major quality of education in the school, pre-school, kindergarten. One million children have now a better chance to make their way in life, to get a job, to exit from poverty… Roger believes in the empowerment of the people and their potential. That’s a fundamental value in our every-day work. We strongly believe early education is one of the most powerful weapons to empower children exiting from poverty. It’s actually proven that education makes people better citizen, be more prepared when it comes to dealing with issues, and they have more instruments to manage their life,” Händel said.
Federer has won 20 Grand Slam singles titles, which is the most in history by a male player, and has held the world’s top spot in the ATP rankings for a record total of 310 weeks. He is also the only person to have won the BBC Overseas Sports Personality of the Year award four times.
Sometimes greatness comes from having great character. God bless you Roger.
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