By Laura Chiang, Stephanie Miedema, Janet Saul, James Mercy, Andrew Brooks, Alexander Butchart, Gretchen Bachman, Jennifer Hegle, Daniela Ligiero, Joseph Logan, Greta Massetti

Violence against children is a pervasive global public health and human rights issue, with 1 billion children experiencing at least one form of violence annually. Extensive scientific literature shows childhood adversity, including sexual violence, to be directly and indirectly associated with a host of health and social consequences with a dose–response effect, consequential intergenerational impacts, and sizeable economic ramifications. There is a dearth of population data on the prevalence of childhood sexual violence as well as its antecedents and health and social outcomes, which has hampered violence prevention and child protection efforts globally and locally. Population data are critical, alongside administrative data systems and statistical definitions and classification schemes, for governments to adequately begin addressing violence against children. The absence of national prevalence data has resulted in limited information to guide national policies and prevention strategies, monitor trends, and evaluate prevention efforts. Globally, lack of data on the epidemiological patterns of violence against children has resulted in deficient prioritisation for preventing and responding to this critical problem. Violence Against Children and Youth Surveys (VACS) collect comprehensive data on violence and have been implemented in over 23 countries in Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Europe and Latin America since 2007. VACS have also been repeated in three countries: Zimbabwe (2011; 2017), Kenya (2010; 2019) and Eswatini (2007; 2022). VACS provide extensive data on the prevalence and contexts of all forms of violence, including sexual violence, therefore allowing for targeted prevention and response efforts. VACS further provide the global research community with data to examine the epidemiological patterns of childhood sexual violence across countries and regions. VACS data have raised awareness and improved understanding of childhood sexual violence in many countries worldwide, and thereby catalysed action. This article draws on VACS reports and empirical publications, to summarise and describe patterns in childhood sexual violence across countries that have completed VACS and shed light on the global prevalence of childhood sexual violence.

BMJ Paediatr Open, 2024. 3p.

By Christina Billhartz

In 1987, the U.S. Sentencing Commission created its first federal sentencing guideline for child pornography offenses. As Congress grappled with dynamic technological advances that changed the child pornography landscape, the Commission continually revised and amended these guidelines, creating the last significant amendment in 2009. For the past 12 years, these guidelines have been considered by federal court judges tasked with sentencing child pornography offenders, yet little has been done to determine whether or not these guidelines actually diminish the amount of children victimized by child pornography. While acknowledging that child pornography victimizes and harms children in countless ways and must be criminalized to account for these egregious harms, this Note argues that the sentencing guidelines fail to deter the production, distribution, and consumption of child pornography, and fail to fulfill congressional goals of protecting children from victimization. Rather, the guidelines have resulted in the mass incarceration of child pornography offenders and a system that punishes viewers of child pornography more severely than it does child rapists. If the government truly wants to protect children from being victimized through child pornography, then the sentencing guidelines, as written, cannot stand, and they must be replaced by a system that allows child pornography offenders to access rehabilitative resources both inside and outside of the federal prison system.

Arizona Law Review, 2021. 32p.

By Coen Teunissen and Sarah Napier

We analysed the chat logs of seven Australia-based men who had committed 145 child sexual abuse (CSA) live streaming offences, to examine the overlap between this offending, contact sexual offending and engagement with child sexual abuse material (CSAM).

Four CSA live streaming offenders attempted to travel to offend against victims in person, in that they discussed travelling or actually booked flights in order to meet these children. Offenders also requested or received images and videos of victims they had viewed over live stream, and recorded live streams to produce CSAM.

Travelling to offend against children, use of CSAM and CSA live streaming appear to be interrelated and should be considered by law enforcement as potential risk factors for one another. Further, detection and removal of new CSAM, and scanning of live streams for abusive content, should be a priority for all electronic service providers.

Trends & issues in crime and criminal justice no. 671. Canberra: Australian Institute of Criminology. 2023. 16p.