Presentation 1:
'Characteristics of financial transactions of live stream offenders'
Live streaming of child sexual abuse (CSA) is a technologically and financially enabled crime, in which individuals make financial payments to watch, and often direct, the abuse of children across online video streaming platforms. Due to its nature, little tangible evidence of this offence exists beyond a financial transaction and locally stored metadata from the live streaming session.
This research analyses the financial transactions of individuals who paid money to known facilitators of live streaming CSA in the Philippines. Using a machine learning approach, we analyse these financial transactions alongside the demographic characteristics and criminal histories of offenders, to understand whether there are any typologies present among these offenders, or whether they are all similar.
We then focus on the financial transactions used to procure live streaming of CSA to determine the key characteristics that could be used to differentiate them from other types of financial transactions, and in particular, the characteristics of individuals who will go on to procure a high volume of live streaming sessions (more than 20).
The findings of this research offer insights into the characteristics, offence histories, and presence of typologies among individuals who live streaming CSA. This research also offers insight into the types of financial transactions used to procure live streaming of CSA, the degree to which they vary, and indicators of risk that an individual may go on to procure a large number of live streaming sessions.
Australian Institute of Criminology
Dr Heather Wolbers
Presentation 2:
'Opportunities for detection and prevention of undetected child sex abuse offenders'
Use of the internet by child sexual offenders (CSOs) poses an ongoing and significant problem for technology companies, government and law enforcement. Online engagement among CSOs is not only for the production, use and sharing of Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM), but also for information sharing, and discussion on offending. Pivotally, while recent progress in detection and prevention methods have been promising, a proportion of both online and offline offending goes undetected, and as a result, most of what we know about CSOs is based on detected cases of child sexual abuse, or CSAM offending.
To help inform opportunities for detection and prevention, it is important to study CSO interactions and behaviours before they are detected. Our study aims to build our understanding of undetected CSOs, by examining threads and posts by self-identified CSOs on a Darknet forum. These forum threads featured information on engagement with child abuse material, methods used to avoid detection during online or offline offending, and the methods used to avoid or restrict themselves from offending.
A qualitative analysis provided important insight into CSOs prior to their detection, including the self-identified drivers and deterrents of further offending, help-seeking and attempts to self-limit offending, and approaches to avoiding detection. These findings offer insight into offenders prior to their detection, and offer an alternate perspective on opportunities to detect and prevent offending.
Australian Institute of Criminology
Dr Heather Wolbers