Filipino children face increasing cases of horrific abuse online

BLANCA and Arlyn (not their real names) are just two of the nearly 500,000 Filipino children who have been trafficked, abused or raped. They were used to target online paying audiences, most of whom are foreigners.

As the Philippines has emerged as the world’s largest hub for online child sexual abuse and exploitation (OSAEC), the government remains committed to combating this transnational crime.

“I hope the government knows that a lot of bad things happened to the children,” said Blanca, 11.

Blanca became a victim of Osaec, which started back in 2020.

Today, Bianca is fortunate to have found shelter with 60 other children in a therapeutic home for children who have been victims of human trafficking and sexual abuse. The home is managed by the People’s Recovery, Empowerment and Development Assistance (Preda) Foundation, an award-winning human rights nonprofit founded in 1974 and based in Olongapo City.

“I am happy now because I am already free from the abuse,” Blanca told Sunstar Philippines in an interview.

Father Shay Cullen, an 81-year-old Irish priest and founder of the Preda Foundation, said their charity is committed “to rescuing, healing and empowering trafficked and abused children to help them start a new life with education and to fighting legal cases against abusers.”

At the Preda Foundation therapeutic home, staff protect, heal and empower abused children through emotional release therapy.

“This gives them the strength and courage to express all of their anger and pain to their abusers and then they are free and confident to testify in court,” Cullen said.

The Preda Foundation receives 20 convictions each year, and by early 2024 that number had already risen to 12.

Arlyn, 15, is appealing to authorities to ‘act quickly’ to rescue the abused children.

As Arly “slowly recovers” from the abuse, she sympathizes with other child victims who are still demanding justice for their plight.

“I am grateful to Preda for not leaving me alone despite the difficult process of my case,” said Arlyn.

When asked why the Philippine government is finding it so difficult to contain Osaec, Cullen replied that it is “because they lack dedication and commitment.”

The missionary priest indicated that there is a shortage of shelters with therapeutic, healing and legal assistance for children who are victims of human trafficking and sexual abuse.

There are also known cases where children are sent home after being rescued and are no longer allowed to testify in court.

“The traffickers get out and pick up the children,” Cullen said.

The Irish missionary priest hopes the government will introduce new legislation “that will create a children’s court with ongoing hearings and where children will be protected and helped in new government-sponsored therapeutic homes.”

“It can take up to two years for a victim of rape or human trafficking to get justice through the courts, with endless delays and in many cases the case is dismissed,” Cullen said.

Face of global appeal

Despite the concerted efforts of local, national and international law enforcement agencies, a solution against Osaec remains a long way off.

Ruby (not her real name) was 16 when a stranger sent him a friend request online, offering to work at an online store about 600 miles from where she lived.

“It felt like a gift from heaven,” Ruby recalls, as the job came after she had lost both her parents and her family had “very limited resources” to support themselves.

As the youngest of 10 children from a poor family, Ruby did not hesitate to work outside the home.

However, when Ruby arrived at the so-called computer store, she was greeted not by a workstation, but by a three-room house, from which emerged half-naked teenagers.

“It felt like a bomb went off in my head,” Ruby recalled on her award-winning podcast in August 2022 after she was rescued by local authorities, with the help of the International Justice Mission (IJM), a Washington-based nonprofit that works to protect people in poverty from violence, human trafficking and modern-day slavery.

Ruby’s traffickers were sentenced to 15 years in prison.

Ruby, now in her 20s, lends her voice to other young victims through her podcast, “The Fight of My Life: Finding Ruby,” which is available on Spotify, Apple and Google.

Cassie (not her real name) was 12 when a family friend took her to the capital Manila.

But Cassie was repeatedly abused and raped by online viewers for nearly five years.

“It’s really hard. It’s like I want to die because of the pain. I have to follow him. If I don’t follow him, he’s going to hurt me, he’s going to hit me, he’s going to punch me in front of a lot of people,” Cassie said in a YouTube video posted by IJM on November 19, 2016.

She was forced to perform sex acts in front of a computer while ‘customers’ around the world paid to watch her.

Four years later, Cassise was arrested by IJM and local police.

‘Unsolved online child trafficking cases’

According to IJM, in 2023 alone, the Philippines received 2,740,905 reports of suspected child sexual exploitation online from the US National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

However, IJM stated that the vast majority of these cases “likely went undetected, with perpetrators continuing to exploit vulnerable children.”

“The alarming prevalence of child trafficking to produce child abuse material calls for urgent and comprehensive action,” Samson Inocencio Jr., executive director of IJM Philippines, said in a statement.

The organization proposed the following steps to curb Osaec:

* Strict enforcement of the law requiring technology companies to detect, block and report child abuse material, including abuse via live streams.

* Clear guidelines and regulations from the Anti-Money Laundering Council and Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) should ensure that Philippine banks and money transfer companies detect, intercept and report transactions that indicate online sexual exploitation.

* The Supreme Court should issue clear guidelines for prosecutors and courts to consistently apply the principles of probable cause and personal knowledge of police so that law enforcement can quickly issue warrants and arrest suspected traffickers and sex offenders.

To date, IJM has assisted Philippine authorities in bringing nearly 1,300 victims and children at risk to safety and arresting nearly 400 suspected perpetrators.

More than 230 human traffickers have already been convicted.

An IJM study found that the key factors driving the rise of online child trafficking in the Philippines include cheap internet access, high levels of English proficiency, and financial disparity between remote foreign criminals and local traffickers.

Breakthrough findings

In April 2024, Rebelander Basilan, a former Filipino journalist and now Media, Communications, and Corporate Engagements Lead for IJM, spoke to Sunstar Philippines. He shared the recent findings of a study conducted by anti-human trafficking charity Justice and Care, in collaboration with researchers from Dublin City University and De La Salle University of the Philippines.

The investigation found that the crime was “facilitated by local facilitators who smuggled victims locally and passed on information on how to set up similar ‘businesses’. Many Western financial institutions and technology companies were also used to facilitate Osaec.”

Other key findings from the research include:

* Crime is common in both urban and rural areas.

* Traffickers are guided by people who give advice on how to transfer money, how to set up a transaction, and how to attract foreigners to pay for Osaec. In some cases, traffickers have themselves become victims of this crime, creating a continuous cycle of abuse.

* Convicted traffickers reported that for some the crimes were driven by economic necessity, for others as a source of “easy money,” and largely by demand from customers across Europe, other Western countries, and parts of South Asia.

* Social media platforms, dating sites, and adult cybersex sites are used to initially connect with foreign clients. In addition, there is a stark difference between the long sentences given to traffickers in the Philippines (usually 15 years, but in some cases life) and the foreign clients who create and drive the demand for these crimes, and who often go unpunished.

The research, funded by Safe Online, the only global investment vehicle dedicated to keeping children safe in the digital world, is part of the Tech Coalition and IJM’s joint Safe Online Research Fund initiative.

Ruby said that to truly end online child sexual abuse, the public needs “collaboration across society: from the tech industry to civil society, the financial sector and law enforcement.”

“When I was locked in that house, every day I waited to be found was too long,” Ruby said. (Ronald O. Reyes/SunStar Philippines)