Is Your Child Being Stalked? [Illustration by Shinod AP]
A recent report in the Newsweek magazine says that the Internet houses an underground network of paedophile rings where children are lured into sexual meetings, and abused for the production and distribution of child pornography.
The report enlists a number of recent exposes which illustrate how global these networks are. The Moscow police busted the Wonderland internet ring a couple of years ago and found around a million pornographic images of children. Similarly, the police in Italy has recently started proceedings against 1,700 Italians for purchasing pornography. Also, in the United States, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has opened up 700 cases dealing with online paedophilia.
Fifteeen or twenty years ago, law-enforcement agencies in the United States believed paedophiles were a lonely and hunted breed. But now, things have changed. The Internet provides the right kind of space for the chid abuser. It provides anonymity and has helped build online communities of child abusers besides providing direct access to children in a way that was previously impossible.
Paedophiles do not have to prowl in the seedier sections of the city anymore. They can make friends with children online and lure them into meetings outside.
So if your child spends a lot of time on Internet, it’s time you monitored the sites he visits.
