STATEMENT: Ontario Provincial Strategy bust underscores to combat child sexual abuse and exploitation
For Immediate Release
Winnipeg, MB: The announcement of 80 arrests and hundreds of charges against sexual offenders in Ontario, reinforces the need for more to be done to combat child sexual abuse and exploitation. The Canadian Centre for Child Protection (Canadian Centre) would like to commend our police partners in the Ontario Provincial Strategy for their unwavering commitment to the protection of children and their excellent work in this investigation.
“This is an important day for children in Canada,” said Lianna McDonald, Executive Director of the Canadian Centre. “This is about sending the critical message that child sexual abuse and exploitation will not be tolerated.”
While the internet did not create the problem of child pornography – it has created unprecedented opportunities for offenders to access, possess, and distribute child sexual abuse material and actively participate in the market of child sexual abuse online.
Earlier this year the Canadian Centre released Child Sexual Abuse Images on the Internet: A Cybertip.ca Analysis, based on the review of close to 152,000 reports to Cybertip.ca, examining over 43,000 unique images and videos of child sexual abuse.
- nearly 80% of the images assessed by Cybertip.ca depicted very young, pre-pubescent children under 12 years of age – with the majority of those being under the age of 8
- over 3% involved babies or toddlers
- 50% of the images involved sexual abuse and extreme sexual assaults – most concerning of which, is the younger the child, the more likely analysts are to see a sexual assault being perpetrated against the child
- almost 70% of the images appeared to have been taken within a home setting.
Today’s announcement not only underscores the scope of the problem but also highlights the need for Canadians to get involved and use their eyes, ears and instincts to disrupt abuse and rescue the children who are currently being victimized.
Learn more about child sexual abuse or how you can take action to protect a child in your life at Cybertip.ca.