Covid 19 and Children Vulnerability : By Kuldeep Singh Chauhan

In India and worldwide the COVID-19 is exacerbating the vulnerabilities of children to sexual exploitation and trafficking. The closure of schools worldwide has heightened the risk of online child sexual exploitation, with children spending more time online, possibly without the constant oversight of their parents, and exploiters who could easily reach them. Demand for sexual materials from isolated and bored offenders across the world has continued increasing. Law enforcement partners reported increased online activity by those seeking child abuse material. In this situation, there is a risk that families who have lost their jobs might look for alternative, illegal means of having an income; one of these could be selling videos of sexual abuse of their children. The police have also warned on new types of live-streaming, due to the increased demand for the creation of pornographic content. Organisations like Europol, the United Nations and ECPAT report that COVID-19 lockdowns have led to an increase in the demand for CSAM and other forms of online child sexual abuse like grooming and sexual coercion. Education has been affected with 191 countries closing schools, impacting about 1.6 billion students, which are 91.3% of the world’s total enrolled learners. A recent study shows tremendous spike in child sexual abuse material (CASM) demand during ongoing COVID related lockdown. The study by India Child Protection Fund undertook to understand the landscape of child sexual abuse material (‘CSAM’ or ‘child pornography’). The demand for child pornography was an average of 5 million per month in 100 cities and only on the public web .A vast majority of individuals were interested in generic CSAM content involving ‘school girls sex’, the demand for content with specific age groups, sexual actions and locations was growing as much as 200% .The user base for CSAM content was more than 90% male and the demand for CSAM was present across age groups. The demand was prevalent and active across the nation, with some cities showing increased trends. Many individuals were using virtual private networks (VPN) to circumvent the Government ban on CSAM content. School closures may also lead to an escalation of child trafficking cases. Many children have lost their subsidized or free school meals, which is posing a new burden on fragile family’s economies. Consequently, many children might be forced into child labour or child marriage. Research shows that child labour is often associated with poverty or economic crises and the COVID-19 pandemic will increase the risks of children to be exploited, as well as the number of children dropping out of schools to sustain families. The disruption of education services might leave children unattended and increase their vulnerability during day time to traffickers who might promise to provide them with education or work. Remote learning is not accessible to everyone, especially migrant children and children from poor households who do not own a laptop or do not have access to the Internet connection, which will increase the digital divide between healthier and poorer societies and exacerbate social inequalities. The school closure coupled with the lack of interaction with teachers, social workers and school friends will deprive children of their safe spaces and make them more vulnerable to become victims of criminal elements. The response to this risk needs to be comprehensive, combining efforts of state, civil society groups, private sector and social services. States should ensure that response plans to COVID-19 include gender sensitive and age appropriate measures to protect children from abuse and neglect. Child protection services should be considered an essential service which must be adequately resourced. Access to internet is a new human right and internet should be made affordable to all. Civil society groups and social services should keep supporting vulnerable children who are at risk of being drawn into criminal activities and exploitation by criminal gangs. The tech companies may take voluntary initiatives or state should inform guidelines to keep children safe online and guarantee free access to child helplines and safe educational platforms. Increased efforts should be made to raise awareness with the media, online platforms and parents on online sexual exploitation and abuse and ways to protect the most vulnerable from outreach and grooming by sex offenders. As piloted in the India Child Protection Fund study artificial intelligence tools can be used by responsible agencies to track CSAM related hosting, sharing viewership or downloads and to take deterrence actions. And finally, an ongoing government campaign to educate children and parents on the relevance and modus operandi of online child sexual abusers, and on how to report the crime will go a long way in reducing the vulnerabilities of children to sexual exploitation and trafficking. References: https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/E-9-2020-002542_EN.html https://www.icpf.org.in/ https://en.unesco.org/