Member IAWJ, ARGENTINA
Natalia Marcela Molina is a Judge specializing in cyber-crimes against minors of the City of Buenos Aires, Argentina. She has certifications in criminal law and organized crimes. She is a Member of the International Association of Women Judges and Second Vice President of the Women Judges Association in Argentina. Judge Molina is a Professor at Universidad de San Isidro and Universidad de Ciencias Empresariales in Online Crimes, focusing on gender issues and sexual slavery. Natalia Marcela Molina discussed the dramatically increasing child sexual abuse content in the social media. She underlined that many states do not have laws ensuring justice for victims and preventing the child cyber crime abuse the minors. Molina also called the international community to take a strong joint action to collaborate with the governments in raising awareness to combat the children sexual abuse content.
As a consequence of the COVID Pandemic, online education and communication has increased drastically, which has led to the earlier exposure of our children to digital environments and their threats. The production and distribution of child sexual abuse content and online harassment is a crime in many countries, and is growing as we speak.
Both of these crimes take place in the digital environment, more specifically in social media. It is important to mention that, in all cases, they are committed offline and recorded to later on be uploaded on the internet. The Convention on the Protection of Children against Sexual Exploitation and Sexual Abuse has underlined the need to protect children using internet. Once the images or videos are online, they automatically become a part of an enormous child sexual abuse network that not only exposes the pain of these victims to millions, but puts at risk, once again, their physical and psychic integrity.
During this COVID-19 pandemic year, these types of crimes have increased strongly in Argentina, and the number keeps growing every minute that goes by. But what is truly frightening, is that there are no boundaries for these crimes and that, even today, there are many countries that still do not have any laws to prevent or punish these terrible acts on children. Latin America is known to lead in this campaign, the most advanced region in the implementation of these new measures, has not learnt how to face these challenges. The call is to have internet abuse of children incorporated as part of the agenda in all countries, especially in those who have not yet implemented laws to ensure justice for victims and prevent this from happening, over and over again. It is absolutely necessary that these countries reconsider their position and adapt their legislation to guarantee the human rights of children that are abused under the eyes of the world. Cybercrime, organized or not, has no boundaries and expands fast; which is why we need a world that is united, with international collaboration and fluent communication on this topic. The international community`s joint efforts will not only help prevent this horrible act, but will also put pressure on your governments to modify their legislations, to ensure justice to all victims.
There are thousands of people online distributing or consuming child sexual abuse content, and their victims keep getting younger and younger. What is required is to do the following:
• To start working on campaigns that inform and prevent online sexual harassment of minors at all levels.
• Call the attention of respective governments, to teach not only kids about the matter, but also their parents, so that they can share this knowledge with their children and prevent them from being exposed to this type of danger.
• Work actively on digital education, the concept of “privacy” and the prevention of cyber abuse.
• A kid alone in his room, playing with his laptop and without the correct digital education, is no longer safe. Information is freedom, privacy is freedom.
• Work on prevention by inspiring all countries to acknowledge this problem and work on their legislation, in order to minimize this issue.
• Expose this crime and encourage victims to report these acts. This is really important.
• Let us help them lose their fear. (LETS HELP DEMLOS DER FIER)
• Use excellent professionals willing to help out, for example, the National Centre for Missing Exploited Children (NCMEC) who has been doing a magnificent job There is something I want to make very clear:
• Child sexual abuse content IS NOT “Child Pornography”.
• Child pornography does not exist, as sexual activities are a part of the adult world and they are supposed to take place with consent from all parties.
Child sexual abuse content is nothing like that. It is about the suffering and hurting of minors, and addressing it the wrong way continues to harm the integrity of children over and over again. Kids are the most valuable part of society and it is our job to do everything in our power to ensure a safer and better world for all of them. The suffering and hurting of minors and addressing it the wrong way continues to harm the integrity of children over and over again. It’s important that companies which provide internet services are obliged to inform and report these acts, as it is equally important to teach our children about online environments. They might have been born with these technologies but that does not mean they were told how to use them.