Ecuador surpassed 200,000 reports of suspected child sexual exploitation in 2020. That implies an increase of more than 100% over 2019 when 98,669 incidents related to child pornography or child sex trafficking were recorded. This data belongs to the U.S.-based National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), which obtains its data through CyberTipline.
CyberTipline is a centralized system for reporting online child exploitation. Through this mechanism, electronic service providers and the general public can report suspected online children grooming for sexual purposes; extra-familial child sexual abuse; child pornography; child sex tourism; child sex trafficking; sending unsolicited obscene materials to children; misleading domain names; and misleading digital words or images on the Internet.
According to CyberTipline records in 2020, 242,631 incidents were reported in Ecuador. NCMEC, however, clarifies that those numbers are generated for informational purposes only and do not indicate the level of child sexual abuse in a particular country. But those leads are useful for a nation’s authorities to begin investigations. NCMEC staff review each lead and work to find a possible location of the reported incident in order to make it available to the appropriate law enforcement agency.
In 2020, globally there were 21.7 million reports of suspected child sexual exploitation, of which 21.3 million came from Facebook. US-based e-service providers are required to report incidents of ‘apparent child pornography’ or ‘child sexual abuse material’.
Other networks that have reported such illicit content include Google, Amazon, Dropbox, Pinterest, Spanchat, Zoom, TikTok, Twitter, and even on video game platforms such as Roblox.
Most of these reports include geographic indicators related to the upload location of child sexual abuse material. But NCMEC cautions that country-specific numbers can be affected by the use of proxies and anonymizers. Last year, in South America, the largest number of alerts were geographically located in Colombia: 763,997. It was followed by Peru, Brazil and Ecuador. The figures for the 10 countries reviewed show a significant increase in the pandemic year. Some showed increases between three and six times the values recorded in 2019. Only Uruguay had no major variation.
CyberTipline clues in Ecuador cases
In Ecuador, the National Police has used the information gathered by CyberTipline to reach networks or individuals who commit child pornography. Lieutenant Colonel Gonzalo Garcia, head of the National CyberCrime Unit, explained that thanks to an agreement with the United States they have access to high-level software that allows them to constantly monitor social networks and receive alerts of videos or images that travel through the network with sexual content of children.
An analyst reviews this information and determines whether the IP address of such content corresponds to Ecuador. Afterwards, other investigative techniques are activated, including interviews, surveillance, follow-ups and a review of the suspects’ social networks, under the corresponding legal terms.
These investigations can take up to eight months because it involves a very technical work. Then, this data is judicialized so that the Prosecutor’s Office can initiate a preliminary investigation and thus reach the perpetrators. He informed that thanks to this technology, three organizations have been dismantled and seven people have been arrested for child pornography.
One of the main cases in which they have used this technology occurred in 2018. In an operation a janitor of a school in the west of Quito was arrested. Carlos Miguel I. S. tricked girls with candy to take them to the bedroom he had in the educational establishment. There he took off their uniforms and took pictures of their private parts. These images were shared with other pedophiles such as Víctor Elías G.R., a bricklayer who three years earlier was arrested for child pornography and rape. A minor was rescued. The janitor was sentenced to 15 years in prison for producing, sharing and storing this content. While the bricklayer was sentenced to 34 years in prison.
CyberTipline receives complaints from individuals and Internet service providers.
AN ANALYST REVIEWS THIS INFORMATION AND DETERMINES IF THE IP ADDRESS OF THESE CONTENTS CORRESPOND TO ECUADOR. OTHER INVESTIGATIVE TECHNIQUES ARE THEN ACTIVATED, INCLUDING INTERVIEWS AND SURVEILLANCE.
Among the most recent cases is last week’s international operation, which included Ecuador. José A. and a 15-year-old teenager face charges of downloading, possessing and transmitting child pornography. Their arrests took place last June 10, as part of the international operation «Luz de Infancia VIII», which was carried out in the United States, Panama, Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Ecuador.
José A. was arrested in Nangaritza, Zamora Chinchipe, and the teenager in Chordeleg, Azuay. Two cell phones and computers were seized. The accused allegedly downloaded and shared child pornography via WhatsApp and Facebook, among other networks. This information came through the NCMEC.
Also, on June 14, Luis Alfredo E. was called to trial for commercializing child pornography. According to investigations, the defendant downloaded, stored and reproduced pornographic material between December 2019 and June 2020.
Images of children and adolescents, between 6 and 16 years old, with sexual attitudes inappropriate for their age were found on his cell phone. He was arrested on February 5 in the parish of Conocoto, southeast of Quito.
The information about his illegal activities also came through the NCMEC. The agency warned that Luis Alfredo E. used Google services to store pornographic material. In Ecuador, the photographs found on the digital platform and on the defendant’s cell phone were examined by a forensic anthropologist.
Last June 3, Bryan José B. M. was arrested in Manta as a possible perpetrator of the crime of commercialization of pornography using children and adolescents. The police got to him because of information that Google sent to NCMEC. The report contained photographs and videos of a sexual nature with the use of minors. This material was extracted from the Google Photos service by the company and catalogued with priority level E, that is, as child pornography crimes, according to the Prosecutor’s Office. The IP addresses marked Ecuador.
These data then passed through the expertise of the Criminalistics Department in Ecuador. Another of the indications was the telephone registration, from where the pornographic material was uploaded, which was in the name of Bryan José B. M. This investigation lasted eight months.
In October last year, another case was discovered in Saquisili, Cotopaxi, thanks to NCMEC data. A teacher contacted his female students through Facebook and WhatsApp and by means of deceit asked them to send him intimate photos and videos. Afterwards, he insinuated them to have sexual contact.
INFORMATION ABOUT HIS ILLICIT ACTIVITIES ALSO CAME THROUGH THE NCMEC. THE AGENCY WARNED THAT LUIS ALFREDO E. USED GOOGLE SERVICES TO STORE THE PORNOGRAPHIC MATERIAL.
More individuals than networks engage in pornography
The police chief confirmed the growth of cybercrime in recent years. In 2019, his Unit had 828 delegations that came from the Prosecutor’s Office for investigation; in 2020, 682 delegations; and so far in 2021, up to June, it records 814 delegations. Among the crimes with the highest increase is fraudulent appropriation by electronic means.
Regarding pornography of minors, the Unit has received 37 complaints in 2021; in 2020 there were 35 complaints; and in 2019, 46. Another related crime is sexual contact with minors under 18 years of age by electronic means. Regarding this, in 2019 there were seven complaints; in 2020, seven; and in 2021, nine.
For Garcia, new modalities such as teleworking and teleducation that emerged in the pandemic have had an impact on this increase due to the greater use of the Internet.
In most cases, those arrested are more individuals than organizations. «They are pedophiles, who have psychological problems and who share this type of content with other groups of people, or also produce it». Regarding the victims, in many cases they are minors very close to the victimizers’ family nucleus. «Sometimes they are even their own children».
Garcia says that there is an overconfidence in the use of new media. According to new studies, now the group of millennials is being affected by these cyber crimes when before it was the elderly, who were more vulnerable because of their lack of knowledge of technology, explains the police chief.
He believes that parents and children should talk about the existence of this crime so that minors do not fall into these networks. The police advise parents to have the passwords of their children’s social network accounts. It is also important that they know their group of friends who are on these platforms.
The Cybercrime Unit recommends that minors should not be left alone with electronic devices, that they should not lock themselves in their rooms with them or stay up late at night. It is important that they have established schedules for the use of their social networks.
Translated by Manuel Novik