By Matt Blomberg
MANILA, April 15 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – The tip-off came from the FBI: details of an arrest in the United States, the accused’s social media profiles, and a host of photographs showing young Filipina girls engaged in sex acts.
Led by police in the Philippines, a new global anti-child sex abuse taskforce started dissecting the U.S. citizen’s digital footprint in order to track down the exploited girls.
“Those images were very sexually explicit … disturbing,” said William Macavinta, the Filipino police general heading the unit that launched this year to combat cybersex trafficking – a form of modern slavery where children are abused over webcam.
“It was clear that we had to move fast to extract the children,” said Macavinta, whose country is considered by campaigners to be the epicentre of the fast-growing trade.
Three weeks later, British and Australian cops assembled with their local counterparts one evening just before dusk, and raided a slum located on fishing docks in the capital, Manila.
The taskforce did not find the alleged local offender but rescued five girls – aged 10 to 13 – who had been groomed and directed to perform sex acts over livestream by the American.
Tens of thousands of girls in the Philippines are estimated by charities to be trapped in the sex trade, with a growing number abused online for global clients due to the country’s cheap internet, high standard of English and widespread poverty.
The Southeast Asian nation received about 60,000 reports of online child sexual exploitation last year – up a third on 2017 – said a U.S. investigator working in the Philippines with the International Justice Mission (IJM) – an anti-trafficking group.
From Australia and the United States to Britain, major nations are boosting efforts to stop their citizens fuelling an illicit business believed to be spreading across Southeast Asia.
But obstacles are aplenty. Many victims are exploited by their own families and unable or afraid to speak out, while the encrypted nature of modern technology from messaging to video call apps makes criminals tough to track, according to police.
“This hidden crime is very difficult to shut down,” said Macavinta, citing strict privacy laws that make it tough for police to monitor suspects and make arrests without a warrant.
“Referrals from foreign law enforcement – that’s how we know these things (online child sex abuse cases) are happening.”
