Child Sexual Abuse Thriving in Australia

So you think child sexual abuse is not a big problem? Thousands of man hours go into global investigations that lead up to arrests such as the recent bust of 22 men in Australia. But it doesn't end there - this was part of a global initiative involving much larger numbers.

From this bust over 500,000 images of child abuse and 15,000 videos of children being abused were seized. This alone tells us something of the size of paedophile collections of which behind every picture is a child being abused. 

More shocking is the increasing appetite of paedophiles to sexually abuse children as young as one year old and record these abuses lasting in some cases as long as two hours.

Australia was able to arrest 22 men due to its strong legislation making the sexual abuse of children illegal and the possession, production, sharing, distribution and sale of imagery a very serious criminal offense with a maximum sentence of 10 years.

This bust was part of a global operation which has led to the identification of over 200 offenders in 70 countries. For the full AFP press release.

The Australian Federal Police have arrested over 300 people in Australia over the last 12 months. 

The AFP are part of the Virtual Global Taskforce who's mandate is to create a safe Internet, identify, locate and help at risk children, and make perpetrators accountable.

The VGT is made up of the Australian Federal Police, the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre in the UK, the Italian Postal and Communication Police Service, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the US Department of Homeland Security and Interpol. Jim Gamble, the Chief Executive of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre is the Chair of the VGT.