Partnership to curb online child abuse

Johannesburg - With the support of the United Nations office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), MTN Group has joined the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF), Meta, the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children (ICMEC) and Child Helpline International in the Help Children be Children campaign and Child Safety Online Africa Portal to increase awareness of the impact of child sexual abuse and help prevent its spread.

From 2019 to 2020 the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) noted that the number of child sexual abuse images and videos uploaded from the African continent grew by 81% to almost 2,4 million.

Stakeholders said this campaign is aimed at raising awareness of the increase of Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM) and how it can be reported by the public. It will also help train law enforcement and child helplines, and engage policymakers and stakeholders through roundtables, to join the global fight against CSAM, they said.

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Global Programme on Cybercrime in Africa advisor, Carmen Corbin said building strong capacities in the criminal justice sectors to investigate and prosecute online child exploitation is one of the programme’s priorities.

“We are also aware that public awareness and prevention campaigns are the first line of defence that will make communities, families, and children able to avoid and report child sexual abuse material. We want a safer Internet for all children, a place where they can learn, play and develop their talents without being threatened by predators,” Corbin said.

Chief sustainability and corporate affairs officer at MTN Nompilo Morafo said: “Protecting children online is a challenge that needs global approach. As we lead digital solutions for Africa’s progress, we have a critical role to ensure that every African child is kept safe online. With our African values we need to join forces to create a safe online village for our children; one where they are free from fear, humiliation and abuse, where they can have a normal childhood.”

MTN funded the development of the Child Safety Online Africa Portal and awareness campaign in partnership with the IWF. The portal is aimed at eradicating the spread of child sexual abuse and provides internet users with a tool to report child sexual abuse material available online.

International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children CEO, Bob Cunningham said prevalence of child sexual abuse material (CSAM) is a growing threat around the world.

“Every time abusive images are viewed or shared, children are victimised. It is essential that CSAM is reported and local authorities have the tools and capacities to protect child victims. This campaign is a crucial step to reach parents, caregivers and communities to help prevent abuse,” he said.

Communications director of IWF, Emma Hardy said 49 portals have been launched all around the world.

“That includes 23 in Africa, providing a tool to report illegal imagery to millions. Through the portals, the IWF and its partners are working with governments, law enforcement and other organisations to enable every person to report child sexual abuse material online,” she said.

Images and videos of child sexual abuse show real children who have been victims. By reporting the abuse through the portal, photos and videos will be assessed by IWF’s ana- lysts and removed from the internet if confirmed to be child sexual abuse in nature.

Head of Safety at Meta for Europe, Middle East and Africa, David Miles said for more than a decade they have helped build the tools used to investigate this crime, rescue children and bring justice to victims.

“While we invest in industry-leading tools to prevent such abuse from happening, it is also important that we spread awareness through campaigns and partnerships like this, so that no child faces such abuse, offline or online,” he said.

Child Helpline International director Patrick Krens said: “To be more effective in combating online abuse of children we must invest more time, money and human resources in prevention, protection and prosecution. For all three areas, it is important to listen to what children say to us and each other. Every child has a voice and we believe that no child should be left unheard.”

While 23 African countries have already developed their portal or hotline, the Child Safety Online Africa Portal will be accessible where there is not yet a reporting mechanism.

Child abuse material can be reported through africachildsafety.com.

Proven success – the comPlete solution For students

“With nearly 30 years’ experience in Education, we know what it takes to raise the bar for students and vastly improve success rates.”

So says Miguel De Bras of Boston Lynwood. “While in school the student may have been lucky enough to have teachers and supervisors that are involved on a daily basis in their academic activities, this is not the case when learners pass matric and move on to higher education.

Most ‘varsities adopt a ‘sink-orswim’ attitude,’ says Miguel. “The larger residential universities do not have the time, space or manpower to look at each student as an individual and give what we at Boston like to call ‘real and real time personalised attention’ he adds. “We believe that it makes the strongest difference to student’s success, to this end we have developed and make use of a specially designed pro-active monitoring and mentoring educational system, designed to support learning.”

Miguel goes on to describe the system, known as MaaS (Mentoring as a Service) that has increased not only student success rate but also the ability of the campus to monitor students individually and to effectively assist them.

“Keeping students in the system, keeping them active and engaged, and helping them to persevere is our ultimate goal. Getting qualified graduates into their industries is the mark of Boston’s success,” he continues.

So how does Boston achieve this?

The Boston Higher Education department has devised an intricate system that operates in conjunction with the MaaS AI (artificial intelligence system). What does this mean for a student? It means that you have access to assistance with your coursework. It means you can get your queries answered by your assigned tutor, either in person, via email, telephonically or via skype. It means you only progress in your coursework as you master the work that has been completed. It means you can get topics explained and re-explained until you are satisfied.

“The MaaS system does not only rely on students to approach their tutors when they need them” says Miguel. “It is a proactive system, which will actively monitor every learner.” Tutors will get an alert if an assignment document has not been opened by a certain time pe-