Protect Your Child Online

Internet cafes are doing a brisk business in the Philippines.  Nearly anywhere you go in these islands, you’ll find an Internet café offering everything from Internet access to printing services to snacks and photocopiers.  These communication hubs are quite a familiar and important component of many sectors, primarily because they offer access to facilities that may otherwise be difficult for lower-income families to obtain and use.  Unfortunately, they can also be places where access to child porn can be provided and encouraged.  To address this concern, EOL (Everything Online, Inc.) is urging for the establishment and implementation of a ‘code of conduct’ that will help regulate the use of the Internet and prevent access to and distribution of child porn.

The call for stricter implementation of regulations came as a result of the ECPAT (End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography and Trafficking of Children for Sexual Purposes) conference in December 2007.  What EOL and ECPAT hope to achieve is that Internet cafes adopt and implement a self-regulating code of conduct as outlined by the ‘Make-IT-Safe’ campaign.  The goal is to focus the spotlight on the danger of child pornography and the sexual exploitation and predation of children on the Internet.

Self-policing the lines
Ensuring that laws and regulations regarding child sex pornography and related abuses are prevented through the use of Internet cafes, authorities and private organizations have to get their message across these establishments.  And it’s no small task.  It is estimated that there are about 8,000 – 14,000 Internet cafes currently operating in the Philippines. 

Probably the sector in society on which the Internet has a huge impact is the youth, as social networks, chatrooms and gaming become popular past times.  These activities have increased to such intensity that some areas have regulations that discourage minors from using Internet cafes at school hours. 

Protecting our children
According to Lois Engelbrecht, who founded the Centre for the Prevention and Treatment of Child Sexual Abuse in the Philippines, Malaysia & Vietnam, habitual child sex offenders are capable of doing more than 1,000 offences in their lives.  The Centre declares that the problem with child sexual abuse and pornography should not be considered as an individual’s problem but as a community issue and should be dealt with by the community itself.

Children in the Philippines are protected by the Child Protection Act.  Government agencies also participate in trying to eliminate the threat of child abuse.  The Department of Tourism, for example, encourages citizens such as those working in the tourism industry to report any suspicions of inappropriate behavior in foreign tourists when dealing with children.  There was also a campaign in the past that aimed to raise awareness about the plight of children being victimized online.  However, there is still a need to intensify both government and private efforts.

More work to be done
The problem with the sexual exploitation of children online is often confounded by laws that are not enforced, public and government officials who choose to look the other way in favor of more pressing concerns and even parents and guardians who encourage the criminal activities.

Campaigns also have to be sustained efforts and not just intermittent occurrences.  Stricter governmental regulations must also be implemented in order to impose better control over restricted or banned content such as those involving child pornography.  And lastly, there is a need for the Philippine government to work closely with other governments to ensure that coordinated efforts to fight this menace are applied.

Australia has long been cracking down on child pornography offenders, and its latest attempt to curb the onslaught of child pornography is to filter out a blacklist of sites from being accessed by the Australian public. However, according to Internet industry workers, the effort to stem child pornography will also rob the general Internet-using public of a faster Internet connection. One such politician, Kevin Rudd of Australia, promised before his country’s election that he would find a way to force the country’s Internet service providers to give households clean, pornography-free feeds as well as to provide schools with Internet connections that would withhold inappropriate material .

According to Australia’s Internet Industry Association, if the Internet-using public of Australia would want faster Internet access, and if they want their access to the Internet to be uncensored, then they will have to contact their Internet service provider in order to opt out of the filtering service. The Australian government, however, is optimistic about its prospects in the fight against child pornography. For instance, minister Stephen Conroy, in charge of communications, believes that the pornography-free Internet feed can be best achieved by getting the blacklist of pornographic sites together, thanks to the efforts of Australia’s Communications and Media Authority.

According to a spokesperson for the country’s Internet Industry Association, the Internet industry is indeed working with the Australian government on the blocking and filtering policy, which will be going on trial in the country’s Internet service providers soon. However, the spokesperson also warns that many Internet service providers may not be completely successful in blocking out all the sites showing pornography online, but only the sites that are on the blacklist. For instance, if a new pornography site were launched, it would most likely not be on the Internet blacklist, and the Internet service provider would therefore not be able to block access to it.

According to the same spokesperson, if the blacklist were to be increased in length, it would translate into more efforts at blocking sites, which would then translate into poor performance of the Internet service provider. This is because every time an Internet user types a request or query into a search engine, this request or query has to get past the Internet service provider first, which checks the request or query against the sites listed on the existing blacklist. According to a pilot study, this filtering and blocking approach can decrease the access speed by as much as 78%.

Michael David Burt was once apprehended for being part of a child pornography ring, and was caught during an international sting on child porn on the Internet. The New Zealand native was sentenced recently, after entering a guilty plea for twenty charges of possessing child pornography images, as well as nineteen charges of distributing child pornography images. The sentence: a year of home detention and community work amounting to three hundred hours. This, despite the penalty of about ten years in jail for each offense involving distribution of child pornography images, and five years for each charge of possession of child pornography images .

The sentence has hitherto been criticized, not only by the New Zealand government, but by anti-child pornography groups. Steve O’Brien was dismayed and shocked by the sentence; O’Brien works with the New Zealand Government’s Internal Affairs Censorship Compliance Unit as its national manager. The sentence, O’Brien says, was disappointing, especially in the view of the much harsher penalties that should have been imposed in order to send out a message about how serious child pornography is, and how it will not be tolerated .

A barrister and founder of a charitable trust devoted to lobbying against child pornography, Denise Ritchie was also disappointed, and called the sentence both lenient and weak. Ritchie, of the Stop Demand Foundation, found the sentence unacceptable, and at best, trivialized the offense.

The judge at the trial once deferred the sentencing for Burt, saying that he was not comfortable with the length of imprisonment for such crimes, which started at around a year and a half to two months. Judge Ingram found that three years of imprisonment was more appropriate. Prosecutor Duncan McWilliam also argued that, with recent

judgments by the country’s court of appeals, house arrest was not appropriate for such an offense. Despite all these however, Judge Ingram pushed through with the house arrest sentence, provided that it was to be done under tight security, and along with community work, because many of the images that had been used at the trial did not appear too seriously offensive.

But was apprehended by the German police as he was in the process of sending out child pornography images. They had tracked him down through his posts in an online child pornography forum. During his house arrest, Burt cannot have a computer, drink any form of alcohol, or take any illegal drugs. He will also undergo routine psychological assessment, and will attend programs geared toward counseling and treatment as directed by a probation officer assigned to him.

Safe use of the Internet can protect your children from child pornography, and all that parents need to do is to be vigilant, watch their children closely, and constantly reiterate and teach how to use the Internet safely. This was the message given by policemen Dorset, England, after the BBC aired an investigation on how child pornography is still running rampant on the Internet. In one such expose, researchers posted a fake identity online on three Internet networking sites: they pretended to be a fourteen-year old girl, who was promptly, and shockingly, bombarded with personal questions from predators, and given messages that were sexually explicit.

According to Sergeant Andrew Stevenson of the Public Protection Bureau of Dorset’s Police Force, parents should always supervise their children whenever the latter use the computer. Stevenson goes on further to recommend that if the computer has an Internet connection, it should be placed in a family room, so that parents can better watch their children’s online activities – this process not only keeps parents informed about their children’s online doings, but it turns the process of surfing the Internet into an activity for the whole family.

According to the Dorset police, parents and care givers should lay down rules on Internet surfing in order to better protect their children. First, parents should have a clear idea, and at all times, exactly what their children are doing online, and who their children are talking to, associating with, or are even in proximity to. This can be tricky if parents have to wade through different forums and message boards in order to monitor their children, but if parents are constantly on the watch and know where their children are going online, this should not be too big of a problem.

Another rule, the Dorset Police says, is to be strict about unsolicited emails: tell your children to ignore spam emails, junk, and even simple text messages; if the file or email is from someone that your children do not know, tell them not to open the email and simply delete it. Moreover, be strict about who your children talk to and what they say: be clear about the importance of privacy. Your children should not give out any personal information without asking you first; such information might include phone numbers, addresses, any kinds of passwords, and even pictures. Keep your children out of your credit card and information on your bank account, and you will be much safer. Lastly, forbid them from meeting in person anyone they meet up with online.

The battle of caring parents against the issue of child pornography is gaining ground in Australia, thanks to Minister Stephen Conroy. He recently unveiled plans to increase censorship of the World Wide Web by increasing the number of websites on an official Internet blacklist. At present, the official Internet blacklist lists about one thousand websites that are to be censored; Conroy seeks to increase this number to the millions.

The censored access will include not only child pornography, but other objectionable material online as well, such as adult videos and materials depicting violence. The filtering of the Internet will be mandatory, and will be done through an Internet service provider. Although the effort is well-meaning, Conroy has his critics: those who work in the Internet industries cite how difficult it would be to block all the materials that Conroy is proposing.
 
Child pornography itself is already difficult to control. There are over ten thousand websites that offer child pornography online, says Bernadette McMenamin, chief executive of Child Wise, an anti-child abuse group. McMenamin further states that there are over twenty thousand child pornography images that are posted to the Internet each week, making the perpetrators difficult to pin down and arrest, not to mention block.

Despite the daunting numbers, Conroy’s office is still seeking to enlarge the blacklist of sites. According to a spokesperson for the politician, the process of monitoring the Internet will obviously not be foolproof. Moreover, the filtering at the level of the service provider may not work for many sites; for instance, Google caches different sites at certain times each month, so if a child pornography site remains in cache, it can still be viewed by anyone who knows how to use the popular search engine’s features. What Conroy is seeking to do is to make the blanket of censorship much wider, covering the entire population, which some critics deride.

Free speech advocates, for instance, are asking that people instead use PC-based Internet filters. The battle against child pornography has been raging for quite a while in Australia. Its Communications and Media Authority has long worked to stop prohibited web content from entering the country, but its work is limited mostly to complaints, and it has a difficult time filtering material that is hosted outside of the country. According to statistics, the United States is the biggest source of materials that are considered offensive in Australia, making up over half of the total of illegal, offensive materials online that have been blocked by the country.

Human trafficking is not a straightforward problem.  It is actually rather complicated, involving a network of individuals, governments and businesses, all involved in one way or another in the problem that continues to haunt us today.  In the Coordinated Mekong Ministerial Initiative Against Trafficking or COMMIT concluded in mid-December of 2007, the issue of trafficking was brought to light.  The meeting involved the governments and authorities of countries such as China, Laos, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia and Myanmar.  Their aim was to ensure that the needs and rights of children and other victims are recognized in a new anti-trafficking policy.

Trafficking defined
Trafficking refers to the illegal trade of people with the use of fraud, coercion, force or violence, usually for the purpose of utilizing them for forced labor, sexual exploitation and other practices that serve to demean and enslave.  People who are trafficked are paid wages that are way below the standard rate in exchange for difficult, degrading and even dangerous working conditions.  Oftentimes, though, these people aren’t even paid and are kept against their will.

It is estimated that about 4 million men, women and children are trafficked annually, crossing national and international borders.  They may be victims of false employment promises, kidnapping or may have been sold by their families in exchange for money or favors. 

Trafficking is big business, bringing in an average of $8.5 billion a year.  It is a criminal industry and continues to be a threat to the integrity of families and the society in general.

The Mekong Initiative
The reality about human trafficking, especially those involving children, is sobering.  Young girls, for example, are being trafficked out of Riau Islands in Indonesia and moved to Singapore and Malaysia as sex workers.  In China, there had been approximately 2,500 human trafficking cases recorded in 2006 alone. 

Millions of young children are involved in the trade, many of whom are kept in debt bondage, married off as child brides, forced to work as prostitutes or held illegally.  The joint declaration in the anti-trafficking policy is intended to strengthen the region’s policies to protect children and other victims of human trade.  It is also designed to encourage and sustain both bilateral and multi-lateral collaborations and consultations involving countries in the region. 

The first COMMIT meeting was held in Myanmar in 2004, where the six countries involved collectively signed a memorandum of understanding.  The MOU calls for their cooperation to work together to fight human trafficking. 

The anti-trafficking policy aims to prevent human trafficking by implementing measures that will help governments identify and protect people who are being trafficked, regardless of where they are at the trafficking cycle.  The initiative also aims to ensure that all activities are legal and that they protect the trafficked person’s right to safety and dignity.

China has also volunteered to perform an important part in the initiative.  It started by setting liaison offices in its Myanmar and Vietnam borders in order to deal exclusively with trafficking in children and women and is planning on setting more offices.  It is also planning to set up a DNA database that contains information about people involved in trafficking, including criminals, suspects and their victims.  This will help in the identification and monitoring of persons in this trade.  The country is also scheduled to publish its 5-year plan of action for reducing trafficking cases.

The second phase of the anti-trafficking plan is scheduled for 2008 until 2010.  This initiative, these nations hope, will impact the drive to eliminate the practice and business of human trafficking and promote the welfare of those who have fallen and might fall victim to this illegal trade.

A Seattle Times editorial calls for a stop to child pornography, and cites the efforts of Puyallup police in helping wage the war against this offense. The work of the Puyallup police led them to be able to locate two young girls who had been photographed in offensive poses, and whose photographs were pat of a collection in a large cache of pornography.

The arrest began in Oregon, where a fugitive was taken in on the charge of identity theft. When forensic specialists examined his camera and logged into his computer, however, they found hard-core sexual images of children: the photographs showed girls between the ages of five and eight – disturbing photographs that made police vow to search for the girls. Instead of releasing pictures of the children, the detectives released pictures of five women who were also found in the files of the man that they had apprehended. They did so not so much because they suspected these women of any wrongdoing, but because they believed that the women in the photographs could hold the answer to the location of the young girls.

When the images were released publicly, they started receiving tips from Oregon and the Puget Sound, which identified two of the five women in the pictures that had been released. Soon, two children were located: they were twins, two five-year olds who were safely kept in a foster home in Oregon. The police recovered nearly one terabyte of child pornography data from the offender, and in this cache are many other photographs of children that the police are working hard to locate .

However, not all the images in the files were pornographic. Moreover, the police has to find the children in the photographs not only for purposes of location, but to determine who of the children were sexually abused, and who of them were merely photographed. According to a spokeswomen for the police, the distinction can be important, because it can prevent the young girls from being improperly labeled.

The editorial does call for an end to stop child pornography, and the efforts of the Puyallup police are laudable. There are still many child pornography rings operating in the world, and not only on the Internet. It will take a long while for this offense and social disease to die down, but it is comforting to see that people are taking a stand and fighting against it.

What is the point of having a law when it’s not put to work?  This is the question that is currently hounding Canada for its recent failure to prosecute violators of its sex tourism laws.  Two men who were recently arrested as child sex offenders are Christopher Neil and Orville Mader, both Canadian citizens.  Neil’s arrest came as a result of findings produced by the digital unscrambling of photos showing a man molesting young boys presumably in Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam.  The man in the photos, previously published online, turned out to be Neil. 

A few weeks later, Orville Mader became the central figure in a search launched in Thailand on charges of sexually abusing a local boy.  Mader made it back to Canada but Neil was unfortunate enough to be caught and detained in Thailand.  To this date, neither man was charged under Canadian law.  Although he may be monitored, Mader is free to move in Canada.  He only has to stay away from youths under 14 years of age and avoid using the Internet and he can keep clear of the law.  Mader has yet to be charged.

International pariah
The incident has caused international criticism for Canada, who is known to have anti-child sex offense laws that it rarely enforces.  The law allows Canada to prosecute its citizens for child sex crimes they have committed in other countries.  According to University of British Columbia’s School of Law assistant professor Benjamin Perrin, the country has one of the lowest records of prosecution of native violators of child-sex tourism laws.  Currently, there is only one conviction and another case still being tried.  This, in spite of the fact that this Canadian law is at least 10 years old. 

The recent news about these events highlighted the differences in the implementation of related laws in Canada, the U.K. and Australia.  In Australia, for example, convicted child sex offenders are monitored closely when they travel abroad.  In 2004, for instance, in the light of the Southeast Asian tsunami, police in Queensland were able to identify 60 convicted offenders who left the area in order to volunteer for efforts in the affected countries. 

Under Australian law, the government can prevent a child sex offender from leaving the country if they believe that person may place a child in danger in other countries.  Canada doesn’t have these laws.

The need for stricter laws and international coordination
Canada is not the only country that has shown little bite when it comes to prosecuting its child sex criminals.  To effectively implement restrictions and stop this type of crime, Canada and the rest of the world has to design more stringent laws that will cover the protection of children in these nations and prosecute child sex offenders.  Laws should also show more teeth in ensuring that these criminals are tried, charged and prevented from abusing another child.

There is also a need for police in countries involved to coordinate closely with one another, particularly in the monitoring of sex offenders who travel from one country to the next.  Lately, there has been a growing number of child sex offenders living as expatriates in other countries, volunteering as teachers or aid workers.  These positions leave them with opportunities to get in touch with and prey on young children.

An estimated 1 million children around the world fall victim to illegal sex trade and only a tiny percentage of child sex offenders are actually apprehended and charged.

Protection of innocent children.  This is no longer just a cry for children’s rights against physical and emotional battery but also against online violence and maliciousness.  Although the internet is a great tool to further advance our knowledge, it also has its disadvantages.  There are sick minds out there that are bent on destroying even the innocent.

We should be thankful that there are also concerned people who are countering these predators.  One of them is the Internet Watch Foundation. This organization works together with the UK government, police, and internet service providers (wikipedia.org.).  This is the sole organization that is recognized by the UK government which aims to report online suspects to the law enforcement agencies (Ibid.).

IWF serves as the ‘hotline’ to the public and is also the medium to which the law is able to reach out the offenders.  This organization aims to bust websites that foster child pornography, obscenity, and even racism in the UK .  Even if a person is only suspicious of a certain website, he should report it and IWF makes it a point to process the complaint within 24 hours and if the law finds that the report is valid, action will be taken immediately (Ibid.). 

In the United States, a law has been concocted to counteract dangers online.  The COPA or Child Online Protection Act was passed in 1998 but hasn’t been approved since then because of the issue on freedom of speech (wikipedia.org).  More states followed suit but no specific law has been approved since passing those laws would be ‘unconstitutional’ (Ibid.).  Since this is so, parents in the US are becoming more vigilant when it comes to their child’s safety online.  Some software are marketed to filter websites that are not ‘healthy’ for minor viewing.  Using these would not mean fool proof protection, though.  Parents are still cautioned to be up on their toes and know their kids’ activities on the net. 

MySpace is a site that fosters public networking. With its popularity, more and more kids (especially teenagers) are being hooked to join the network. But it is one concerned website since it has cooperated with attorneys general (of 49 states) and also the District of Columbia to put up security measures against sexual perpetrators online (Chicago Tribune). 

These are just a few of the concerned people who want to fight the battle on online sexual predators. The battle is now not solely focused on sexual dangers but also bullying and other forms of dangers.  It is good to know that parents and teachers have other people to depend upon since they need all the help they can get.  After all, once an innocent mind is destroyed, who knows what can totally heal it?

The primary purpose of each parent is to love and nurture the child that is given to him.  And most parents, somehow, are bestowed with a wonderful gift of unending compassion for their children.  That is why, with the surge of technological advancements on the internet, the parents try so hard to keep up to their children’s know-how.  And along with these advancements, come lurking predators that are there to destroy the very person that parents value the most.

It is so sad to know that although internet filters are designed to block malicious websites, still, the predators have worked their way around such deterrents.  According to recent news, there were six filters that were tested and the study showed that they only work best with ISPs that are small; but for larger ISPs, their performance is greatly reduced.  Since filter installation can get expensive, Senator Helen Coonan opted to give away free filters to homes but this backfired when a teenager was able to get through anyway using his parents identities online (Ibid.).

To be able to protect children or even teenagers from the dangers of the internet, parents and even teachers should know what’s ‘in’ on the world of technology.  They should know what YouTube and MySpace are.  Be computer savvy.  It is also wise for them to familiarize themselves with online chat terms such as eyeball or SEB (sex eyeball). 

Vigilance is the key.  Although some filters may not totally work, at least, to some degree, they still do so it is still better to have some form of ‘firewall’ rather than have none.  Technical means to prevent online predators is not sufficient.  A parent should have a good and open relationship with his child.  The parent should be able to discuss with the child issues such as safety on using the internet.  Parent, be involved!

Putting the computer in a conspicuous area of your home is also a good way to monitor what your child delves into. Also, be aware of the photos that your teenagers post on the net; make sure that younger kids do not post any photographs of themselves.  Discourage your children from using webcams (Ibid.).  Also, be open about your family rule that they should not chat with strangers more so meet up with them!  Be concerned.

The parents are the primary shield of their children and while they are incapable of protecting themselves, the parents should safeguard them from any harm—physical or technological.  Computers ease our tasks but we should not let it become the origin of a tragedy—for as much as we could help it.