The battle against online child abuse

• Published date: 21 June 2021

Aged between 25 and 50, he is unlikely to have a criminal record. He is probably a heavy internet user and tech savvy.

And he is trying to access images and video of children being sexually abused.

Somewhere in New Zealand, he will click on a link that — if he’s not careful, if he’s unlucky — could set in chain events that will lead to his downfall.

That click sends a signal across the internet, reaching for the image or video he has selected and drawing it back to New Zealand. Much of the internet travels through the United States, where that single click is most likely to trip wires intended to catch men like him.

There are at least 1000 attempts each day like this in New Zealand, and many more that travel the internet’s secret routes designed to tunnel under the tripwires.

If his click is intercepted, it will almost certainly be by a US tech company compelled by law to report every instance of possible child sexual abuse material to the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children.

The NCMEC acts as a clearinghouse for the world, identifying children at immediate risk and sending leads to the country best-placed to investigate. In 2013, it received half a million reports. In 2019, that had grown to 17 million.

Among those, a solitary click from New Zealand is bundled together with others and sent back around the world to the Department of Internal Affairs (DIA) in Wellington. In 2019 we received 3379 tips like this. And that’s where it gets complicated.

Three agencies

In New Zealand, we have three separate agencies that investigate and prosecute online child sexual exploitation.

There is Internal Affairs, where just shy of 12 staff (11.875 full-time equivalent staff) triage the NCMEC’s CyberTipline reports to New Zealand. It will investigate and prosecute some.

Others are sent to Customs, which has 14 staff, or the police’s Oceanz (Online Child Exploitation Across New Zealand) team, which has 11 specialist staff. Alongside the NCMEC reports, each team generates its own work.

Investigators across the agencies co-operate daily, and through the tri-agency Taskforce Ruru, despite being spread across a range of locations.

It’s a structure that is “far from ideal”, according to ECPAT Child Alert director Eleanor Parkes.

While she is enthusiastic about the work done by committed and hard-working staff, she says there is so much more that could be done in an area that’s struggled for years to receive attention or resourcing.

In contrast, as the problem...