Written evidence submitted by International Justice Mission UK (PCB 27)

Policing and Bill Part 9, Chapter 1, Clause 107: Child Sexual Exploitation

Executive Summary • Live streaming is a transmission format which exploits victims of online sexual exploitation (“ trafficking”) – there is very real being done to a real child. • Clause 107 of the Bill, which closes a long over-looked loophole in protecting children from online sexual exploitation, is greatly welcomed. • Consideration should be given to the inclusion in the Policing and Crime Bill of a clause to amend Section 1 of the Protection of Children Act 1978 (PCA 1978) to criminalise “accessing” indecent photographs or pseudo-photographs of a child. This would ensure that “viewing” of indecent images, including live-streaming of , is criminalised in all circumstances. • There are concerns about the difficulties of obtaining evidence of live streaming abuse, and we make recommendations to enable the effective implementation of legislation.

Introduction 1. International Justice Mission (IJM) is a global organisation which works to protect the poor from by partnering with local authorities to rescue and restore victims, bring criminals to court, and strengthen public justice systems. IJM is the world’s largest international anti-slavery organisation.

2. IJM has been working with local authorities in the to rescue and restore victims of and to prosecute traffickers since 2011. In their first 20 cases, the teams in Manila, Cebu and Pampanga helped to rescue 99 victims, including two 2-year-old children. Several cases have involved British perpetrators, and have been investigated in association with the UK and the CEOP unit.

3. This briefing outlines IJM’s thoughts on Clause 107, which makes an amendment to the Sexual Offences Act 2003 (SOA 2003), and the legislative and evidentiary issues which IJM believes require consideration at Committee stage.

Overview: A different form of 4. Cybersex is a growing and devastating form of modern-day slavery. Before the , customers had to physically go to a bar or brothel to purchase sex. Now, paedophiles and abusers located anywhere in the world can exploit children without ever leaving their bedroom. They can pay online to direct live internet-streamed of children located anywhere in the world.

5. Live streaming is an aspect of cybersex trafficking that has been long overlooked, but is devastating to the victim. Though the criminal is not present, the exploitation is happening to a real child in real time. Young girls and boys are instructed by the trafficker or consumer to engage in sex acts with other children, adults, animals, and/or on him/herself, or pose in sexually explicit photos or videos. Online abuse can also lead to contact abuse, such as in the case of Trevor Monk 1. CEOP, international and overseas law enforcement bodies and NGOs such as IJM are working together to rescue victims and prosecute the foreign criminals controlling them. It is essential that, in parallel, we are also ensuring that UK consumers of indecent images of children are held accountable under the law.

6. According to sources, the Philippines’ Office of receives between 800-1200 law enforcement referrals a month for online sexual exploitation of children uncovered or reported in the U.S. A recent article in the Daily Mail2 reported that 139 Britons were being investigated for paying to stream videos of child abuse in the Philippines via the internet in 2014. As of January 2016, nearly 40 million people in the Philippines are estimated to have internet access; that is 40% of the population and represents a 10% increase over the previous year. As the internet proliferates, opportunistic criminals may seize this chance to make money by exploiting children.

Case Study Operation Endeavour1, which began in 2012, was a joint investigation by the National Crime Agency, the Australian Federal Police and US Immigration and Customs Enforcement into an organised crime ring which facilitated the live streaming of child sexual abuse to order in the Philippines. IJM were contacted by CEOP to support the investigation. The investigation began after Northamptonshire Police found nearly four million indecent images and videos of children on in the property of a registered sex offender. Evidence showed online conversations with another suspect in which they discussed travelling to the Philippines to carry out contact abuse of children. The operation has resulted in at least:

• 29 international arrests (17 arrests in the UK have resulted in at least 5 convictions). • 15 children in the Philippines aged between 6-15 identified and safeguarded. • Over £37,500 identified as having been paid for the live abuse of children by the customer network. Over £5000 was paid by the UK customer base.

At the time, Andy Baker, Deputy Director of the NCA’s CEOP command, said: “Being thousands of miles away makes no difference to their guilt. In my mind they are just as responsible for the abuse of these children as the contact abusers overseas”. 1 http://www.nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk/news/312-live-online-child-abuse-29-international-arrests-made

1 http://www.nationalcrimeagency.gov.uk/news/801-uk-live-st r ea m -offender-visited-philippines-to-abuse-children 2 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3393713/She-sat-eight-year-old-girl-lap-asked-want-Inside-Filipino-cybersex-den-pot-bellied- paedophiles-pick-girls-abused-.html Victims of cybersex trafficking 7. Victims are often much younger than those who are victimised by ‘traditional’ . IJM has rescued children as young as 2 from cybersex trafficking in the Philippines. This differs from ‘traditional’ sex trafficking cases IJM has handled in the Philippines, in which only 1 out of 307 victims was younger than 10, and the median age is 16.3 years old. In IJM’s first 20 cases of cybersex trafficking, 54% of the victims have been 12 years old or younger. Cybersex trafficking also has a higher proportion of male victims than traditional trafficking.

8. For survivors, their recovery is complicated by the fact that their traffickers are often related to the victims and exploit children living with or near them. Whereas pimps or bar managers in more traditional forms of sex trafficking typically recruit vulnerable teenage girls by offering fake jobs or luring them away from home with promises of much-needed income, cybersex trafficking criminals typically leverage their existing relationship with the victims. An IJM social worker at one rescue commented, “It was not easy to remove [them] from their families, knowing that the victims and suspects’ family are related”. The youngest survivor in that case celebrated her 6th birthday the day after the rescue.

9. Unlike traditional sex trafficking, cybersex trafficking victims can be moved to and abused in any location with internet, a mobile phone, or a with a webcam. This might be in a parked car, in the back room of an internet café, or in a closet or room in the trafficker’s home. Most of the school-aged children in IJM’s cases in the Philippines were going about normal , while being exploited in their home or neighbourhood early in the morning or after school.

10. The devastating abuse of a survivor of cybersex trafficking may not end with rescue. The sad reality is that abusive images or recorded footage may remain in the dark corners of the internet, even after the child has been rescued from the abusive situation.

Case Study The National Crime Agency alerted Philippine authorities after they discovered more than 4,000 images and videos of boys and girls on a man’s laptop in London and traced these back to a cybersex trafficking ring in the Philippines. An operation by Filipino authorities and IJM in August 2005 led to the arrest of two Filipino women who were exploiting their own children, nephews and nieces, and recruiting other mothers to procure children ranging from 2 to 13 years old. The boys and girls were forced to pose for lewd photos and perform sexual acts on themselves or each other. The images and videos were broadcast online to customers in over 19 countries on four continents, including the UK, USA and .

The original suspect had directed some of the abusive acts via webcam from his home in London. This man was convicted in the UK in July 2015 for sexually abusing and exploiting children via webcam.

Many of the children are now back in school and IJM social workers visit them weekly. A staff member said that the children now “have a glow of playfulness. They love to tease; they smile and laugh constantly…Children are incredibly resilient. Through quality, trauma-informed care and new loving support systems, living in true freedom is indeed possible.”

“Viewing” live streaming 11. Live streaming is not currently included under Section 48 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003 (SOA 2003) because the event would not usually be deemed to be “recorded”, as required by that Section. The proposed clause in the Policing and Crime Bill would permit prosecution under section 48 to 50 of the SOA 2003, where the actions of the customer in making requests and directing poses would likely be considered to cause or incite sexual exploitation or arrange or facilitate sexual exploitation. The ensuing “show” would fall under “indecent image” that would be streamed or transmitted. We therefore welcome the proposed amendment in the Policing and Crime Bill on the basis that it closes the loophole in the law flowing from the SOA 2003.

12. However, we remain concerned that the proposed amendment in the Policing and Crime Bill would not cover a scenario where a consumer (A) is watching a stream, but the abuse is directed by either the trafficker controlling the children, or another consumer (B). A, therefore, is not involved in requesting or directing the action, and might not be considered to be causing or inciting the sexual exploitation, nor arranging or facilitating. While case law has filled in the gaps to capture “viewing” an indecent photograph - where the defendant is aware that the indecent images viewed on an internet browser would be automatically saved on the computer’s internet cache - there is no legislative provision that criminalises accessing or viewing indecent images.

13. Moreover, Article 5(3) of the Directive 2011/93/EU states that “Knowingly obtaining access, by means of information and communication , to child shall be punishable by a maximum term of imprisonment of at least one year.” To ensure that “viewing” of indecent images including live-streaming of child abuse is criminalised in all circumstances, the Protection of Children Act 1978, Section 1 would require amendment, to include as part of the offence “access” of the image.

14. We therefore recommend an amendment to the PCA 1978, for instance as follows: (1) It is an offence for a person - (a) To take, permit to be taken, to make or to access any indecent photograph or pseudo-photograph of a child. [proposed wording underlined] The term “access” could be defined in the legislation, for example, as “knowingly causes to be viewed by, or transmitted to, him/herself.” The penalty upon conviction should also comply with article 5(3) of the Directive.

Evidentiary Concerns 15. Previous court cases have demonstrated an evidentiary issue with prosecuting cases of live streaming – as materials have not been downloaded, a suspect does not possess indecent images. Further, without downloaded materials it is difficult to prove they have made the image. Even though case law suggests that ‘making’ extends to viewing on a computer screen even if it has not been downloaded - R v Smith; R v Jayson [2003] 1 Cr App R 13 – this is difficult to prove in cases of live streaming. It is unlikely that streaming would be considered as “making” an image under the PCA 1978 as currently worded and interpreted by the courts, unless it is able to prove (either via data stored on the computer or by other means) that a person had viewed indecent images via streaming.

16. Reliance on victim testimony is not advised due to the overseas location of survivors and their young age. Additionally, video testimony can create a particularly unwelcome association in children for whom the camera has been a source of abuse. Therefore, there remains a question of whether Clause 107 would actually be effective at court stage or whether the inability to gather evidence utilising current technology would render it unserviceable.

Case study In October 2015, five girls aged 9-12 years old were rescued from a home in a Filipino slum by Filipino authorities and IJM. When the team entered the house, they found girls waving at a camera attached to the computer. The girls were rescued just as another sex-show was about to begin.

One girl explained that they had been asked to stand in front of the computer, remove their clothes, and put on a “show” at least five other times. She said she could see the face of “an old American man” on the computer. Another girl, who had been forced to ‘perform’ since 2014, was related to two of the three suspects arrested during the operation.

Evidence of the abuse and violence was collected during the operation, but building a strong legal case will take time. IJM will track the legal case and help bring charges against the three suspects arrested, and provide ongoing aftercare to the survivors.

Recommendations for improved law enforcement response 17. In addition to our recommendation to amend Section 1 of PCA 1978, we make the following recommendations to enable the successful prosecution of live streaming cases:

• Create UK awareness programmes to ensure that there is knowledge that so-called ‘child pornography’ represents the real abuse and exploitation of a real child. • Provide powers and resources to support UK police operations and prosecutions in relation to live streaming specifically. • Heavy investment in technological resources so that police are at the forefront of identifying and tracking both victims and offenders. • Cultivate partnerships with tech companies and NGOs with relevant expertise to revolutionise the fight against cybersex trafficking. • Improve co-operation and referral processes with international and overseas national and local police forces, in order to effectively communicate on cases of cross-jurisdictional international abuse. • Continue – and increase – investment in CEOP training programmes for law enforcement across the world. This includes identifying key partners and investing in ‘train the trainer’ programmes, to ensure that training is sustained in-country. • Develop processes to share global best practice to prevent access to online exploitation imagery, particularly live streaming video, to identify victims, and to effectively track and prosecute offenders. • Financial investment through DfID in specialist aftercare programmes to serve survivors of cybersex trafficking, particularly in hotspots such as the Philippines.

Conclusion We welcome Clause 107 which amends the SOA 2003 to close the loophole on live streaming. We recommend a further amendment to the PCA 1978, to criminalise “access” of images in line with Article 5(3) of the Directive 2011/93/EU. Finally, we suggest that consideration needs to be taken on the powers and resources provided to UK law enforcement, and training and resourcing of international partners, in order to ensure that investigations result in successful prosecutions of British consumers of online sexual exploitation of children.

April 2016