Experts say digital age provides new threats for child exploitation

WASHINGTON (CNS) - Computers, video iPods and personal live Web pages have reconfigured the way sexual predators reach minors, especially teenagers, said experts at a government-sponsored panel on child abuse.

Techniques range from sending minors pornographic e-mails to live Internet conversations in which predators entice youths to undress or commit pornographic acts on camera, they said. There are even cases of parents using the Internet to market their children for sex, they said. "The digital age presents new threats to children," making sexual solicitation online easy, said Assistant Attorney General Regina Schofield, who heads the Justice Department's Office of Justice Programs. Predators are often aided by the reluctance of teenagers to discuss with parents pornographic e-mails they receive and the sexually explicit sites they can access on the Internet, she said. Another factor that makes teens vulnerable to online predators is that teenagers regularly use the Internet for entertainment and to meet friends, she said. Schofield spoke March 29 in Washington on a panel sponsored by the Justice Department to mark April as National Child Abuse Prevention Month. David Finkelhor, director of the Crimes Against Children Research Center and sociology professor at the University of New Hampshire, said that about one of every 20 teenagers in the U.S. with access to a computer gets an "aggressive communication online" from an adult to set up a meeting. Many predators do not hide that they are adults and are explicit about their intentions, he said. "They play on a teen's desire for attention, excitement or the adventure of trying out a sexual relationship with someone older," Finkelhor said. Predators take advantage of teenagers' natural desire for sexual exploration, he said. "We need to send the message to teens themselves about prevention," he said. This means raising "awkward topics" such as "why hooking up with a 32-year-old is wrong," he said. Dr. Sharon Cooper, a pediatrician and head of a consulting firm that provides training for people dealing with abused children, said that after a predator is caught the harm is not over. The pornographic photos or videos of a child taken by a predator remain on the Internet and can be downloaded into computers, cell phones and iPods, she said. Ten years ago there were 100,000 images of child pornography on U.S. databases and today there are 7 million images, she said. Enticements to teenage girls often include the promise of a modeling career and an easy way to earn money to become independent, said Cooper. Live webcamming makes it possible for a predator to chat with a minor online in a nonthreatening, sympathetic way and then seek to arrange a meeting, she said. "If a girl is sexually abused as a child she is 28 times more likely to be arrested as an adult for prostitution," she said. There are also cases of teenagers exploiting each other by using cell-phone cameras to take pictures of themselves and their partners engaging in sex, she said. This has even led to cases of extortion in which one of the teenagers threatens to put the images on the Internet or send them to the mobile telephones of friends, Cooper said. A Justice Department publication, "Use of Computers in the Sexual Exploitation of Children," said that 30 million minors go online, making the computer "a convenient tool" for a predator to enter the homes of potential victims. "The sophisticated use of computers in criminal activity complicates law enforcement efforts" requiring police to keep abreast of technological advances, it said.

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