Proceedings [PDF] - Measurement and Analysis of P2P Activity ...

More documents

Recommendations

Info

International Conference Advances in the Analysis of Online Paedophile Activity Paris, France; 2-3 June, 2009 Internet and mobile phones. In reality it would be extremely difficult to police and evidence grooming behaviour in the "real world". It is therefore unsurprising that few cases have been brought to court on this basis under the Protection of Children and Prevention of Sexual Offences (Scotland) Act 2005 and the Sexual Offences (England and Wales) Act 2003. Several other countries are beginning to follow the UK lead in legislating against grooming behaviour. For example, sexual grooming was added to the legislation in Norway in 2007. Research suggests that sex offenders are likely to experience some form of abuse in childhood and have diffciulty in building and maintaining adult relationships (Smallbone and Dadds,1998; Ward and Keenan1999). It would seem that new information technologies have afforded some sex offenders the opportunity to maintain anonymity and it is probable that online relationships are more managable and easily maintained than offline relationships. Beech (2009) suggests that online sexual relationships can become particularly significant for individuals who have difficulty in building actual sexual relationships: ’Along with its ability to provide a level of perceived pseudo-sexual intimacy with children, the Internet also would appear to provide a social outlet for individuals who have difficulties initiating, and maintaining, relationships with other adults’ (Beech, 2009, p8). What do we know about online grooming offenders use of the Internet and the role the Internet plays in their fantasy and offending behaviour Laulik et al suggest that online sex offenders lack assertiveness and empathy in relationships, and demonstrate low levels of self-esteem (Laulik, Allam, & Sheridan, 2007), whilst Middleton et al (2006) note that such offenders are inadequate, have low self-esteem, and show little victim empathy (Middleton et al., 2006). . Recent research conducted by Hernandez (2009) with 150 convicted, incarcerated online offenders (indecent image collectors) in an attempt to explore the link between image collection and contact abuse,suggests that by the end of the treatment programme 131 (85%) of this group admitted that they had perpetrated a contact offence, the number of victims involved in this offending was 1,777 an average of 13.56 victims per 44
International Conference Advances in the Analysis of Online Paedophile Activity Paris, France; 2-3 June, 2009 offender (SD= 30.11), polygraph testing was employed to validate the offenders self reports, but the validity of this method of validation has been questioned. Seto (2009) suggests however on the basis of his research with over 300 child pornography offenders that this group is unlikely to be convicted for contact sexual offences. 4% of 301 child pornography offenders were convicted for sexual abuse contact offences over a 3.9 year period. This study is however based upon reconviction data and not offender self report. Preliminary findings from ongoing doctoral research employing documantary analaysis of online grooming offender case files and conducted with a Police High Technology Crime Unit in the UK (Martellozzo, 2009) suggests that: 1. The majority of sex offenders in the study began to satisfy their fantasies of abusing children by simply exploring cyberspace. In doing so they quickly discovered sites that would satisfy their imagination to the point of actively engaging in erotic dialogues with children and other offenders and downloading pornography. 2. The majority of groomers sent undercover police officers some type of adult pornography or child abuse images during the grooming process. Almost two-thirds of the subjects exposed themselves to the undercover officer via photograph or web-cam. However, some suspects used images as a grooming tool, most stated that they used them principally for sexual gratification. 3. Existing literature demonstrates that sex offenders have a tendency to deny responsibility for their offending and to attribute blame to either the victim or to circumstances (Gudjonnssen, 1988). Martellozzo’s (2009) research with online offenders demonstrates that they tended to minimise their intention to sexually abuse a child. Several subjects claimed the communication was just ’fantasy’ and that they thought they were talking to an adult. However a significant proportion of subjects who met the undercover police officers thinking they were meeting a 12 year old girl. Of these subjects only one declared his intention to abuse the child. The others were in denial even when found in possession of condoms and other child abuse items.Respondents 45
Page 3: International Conference Advances i
Page 7 and 8: International Conference Advances i
Page 30 and 31: ÎÐØÒÈ¾ÈÖÚÒÓÖÑØÓÒ Ì
Page 78 and 79: 26/05/2009 International Conference
Page 95:
International Conference Advances i
Page 98 and 99:
Page 101:
show all

Proceedings [PDF] - Measurement and Analysis of P2P Activity ...

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?