News

Our Victim and Survivor Advocate delivered a keynote presentation at the RedPapaz webinar: ‘Risks and Challenges of Boys, Girls and Adolescents in the Digital Environment.

The event, which was split into three sections, brought together policy makers from across South America including Columbia, Bolivia, Mexico and Brazil. The first two sections of the webinar focused on research into online harms and professional practice learning about how to respond to Technology-Assisted Child Sexual Abuse (TACSA).

During the last section of the webinar, our Victim and Survivor Advocate Megan, spoke about the lifelong impact that TACSA has on victims and survivors. During the presentation she highlighted that often online abuse is deemed as less harmful in comparison to ‘contact’ abuse. But during the presentation Megan told delegates that ‘there is no hierarchy of abuse’ and shone a light on the additional harm caused by TACSA, for example the lack of control and permanency of images, which is often missed by professionals.

Drawing upon her own lived experience, Megan conveyed the importance of regulation of online spaces in order to protect children and young people who are facing increasing threats. Quoting statistics from NCMEC’s Cyber Tipline, she highlighted that the organisation received 36.2 million reports of suspected child sexual exploitation online in 2023 alone. Megan added that risks are increasing for children and young people as new and emerging technologies such as Artificial Intelligence are seeping into mainstream use without consideration of safety by design or regulation.

She told policy makers: “It is not children’s responsibility to keep themselves safe online. That is our job, as professionals and policy makers, and of technology companies to ensure perpetrators cannot hide on their platforms and carry out their heinous crimes.”

The presentation was met with praise from attendees who valued the input of lived experience in the webinar. Delegates described the input as “powerful” adding: “Your insights and expertise were highly valuable, and the feedback from attendees has been overwhelmingly positive”.