How cheap travel and technology has changed the profile of sexual predators
Globally, 1.2 million children are estimated to be victims of sex and labour trafficking
Children worldwide are more likely to be preyed upon by residents of their own homeland than foreign tourists seeking illicit sex, anti-trafficking experts said on Wednesday.
The typical picture of a sexual predator is no longer a white, wealthy middle-aged man from a western country but business travellers, migrant workers and local tourists in their own country or region, experts said at the International Summit on Child Protection in Travel and Tourism in Bogota.
Globally, 1.2 million children are estimated to be victims of sex and labour trafficking, according to the International Labour Organisation.
Child sex tourism has been fuelled by cheap travel, the internet and mobile technology such as messaging apps that give predators ways to find vulnerable children and share pornography while staying anonymous, experts said at the conference.
“The monster isn’t the same one known a few years ago. The profile has changed so much that we need to be much more alert,” Sandra Howard, Colombia’s deputy tourism minister.
As tourism grows, so does the risk and vulnerability of children to sexual predators, she said.
The monster isn’t the same one known a few years ago. The profile has changed