Commentary
Kids love social media—and frighteningly, so do sexual predators. One in nine young people have been approached online by one of these 500,000 dangerous criminals who are on these platforms daily. Digital social platforms enable the two to interact, while the child often believes they’re connecting with a peer, resulting in devastating consequences for millions of children who end up sexually exploited and featured in child sexual abuse material (CSAM).
While the term child pornography is still commonly used by the public, it’s more accurate to call it what it is: child sexual abuse. Commercial sexual abuse material, or CSAM, is any visual, textual, and audible depictions or production of explicit or inferred child sexual assault and exploitation. Searching for, viewing, creating, and sharing this content is illegal and places minors in extreme danger. Reports of CSAM online have increased an alarming 15,000 percent over the last 15 years….