WASHINGTON — Kids and teens are more connected than ever and as more of them join social media, there’s a growing push to keep them safe online.
This comes as the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) tipline receives 100,000 reports of suspected child sexual exploitation every day.
NCMEC Chief Legal Officer, Yiota Souras said the organization relies on tech companies for vital information about these incidents, but time isn’t always on their side.
“They obviously have a lot of information about that report about perhaps the child who has been victimized as the offender what the activity was. Right now they can only maintain that content for 90 days,” said Souras.
A bipartisan proposal called the REPORT Act would extend this timeframe to one year. Additionally, after arresting a suspected offender, this bill would allow police to send seized content electronically to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
“This will incredibly help the efforts to identify victims, make sure we can figure out where they are, and that law enforcement can recover them and provide them with resources,” she said.
The bill also aims to give those tech companies more ways to report potentially dangerous content, involving children.
In 2022, Meta, Instagram, Google, WhatsApp and the virtual chatroom site, Omegle, which closed last year, accounted for more than 90 percent of reports to the tipline.
Currently, this reporting process is voluntary. The bill would also require social media platforms to report crimes involving federal trafficking and enticement of children.
“Making that a mandatory reporting requirement will not only help us provide services to all of these children, but it also will enable those reports to go to law enforcement,” said Souras.
On its website, TikTok said it has a “zero-tolerance approach to content that violates our youth safety policies, especially online child sexual exploitation and abuse.” The social media platform said it use multiple systems and technologies to identify explicit content.
Additionally, Facebook and Instagram are part of Take It Down, which is a new platform designed to proactively prevent intimate images of young people from spreading online.
The REPORT Act passed in the Senate with bipartisan support last year and there’s a similar bill up for discussion in the House.
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