National Association to Protect Children-Education Fund, Inc.

The advent of the Internet brought about an explosion in the trafficking of child pornography. Child pornography videos and images today are not “just pictures.” They are crime scene recordings; evidence of brutal rape, torture, and abuse of children, often infants or toddlers. An estimated 1 in 3 child pornography possessors is a hands-on offender, with local victims. Yet, just when America has the ability to protect children on a massive scale for the first time in history, most of these young victims wait for a rescue that might never come. Nationwide, less than 1% of known cases are even being investigated, due to sheer lack of resources and public demand for action.
However, we are changing this. The same technology used by child predators to produce and share their pornography can also be used to stop them and rescue their victims. Law enforcement has now identified hundreds of thousands of child pornography traffickers in the U.S. Moreover, investigators can now sift through hundreds of thousands of leads to predict with high degrees of success the locations of child victims waiting for help by analyzing child pornography content and trafficking patterns.
The Child Rescue Program is the heart of the National Association to Protect Children. The program focuses on rescuing children from abuse by developing, deploying, and measuring advanced technology that locates predators and victims. We have forged unique relationships with law enforcement agencies across the U.S., bringing them together with top technology innovators to discover better ways to find and rescue children. The Child Rescue Program is also tracking successful rescues of children and arrests of predators. Through a national media campaign, we are educating the public on the issues of child abuse, neglect, and exploitation.
To ensure the success of the Child Rescue Program, we have set multiple goals and objectives.

Facilitate the development of advanced technology to detect criminals who are sexually exploiting children and rescue their victims. This will be done through partnerships with Oak Ridge National Lab, private industry, and federal, state and local law enforcement agencies. Key objectives include: new hardware and software for detecting child pornography on-scene, mini-supercomputers capable of clearing year-long forensic backlogs, advanced facial recognition software, and data analytic tools.

Deploy successfully tested child rescue technologies to law enforcement agencies, increasing the number of children rescued from sexual abuse and exploitation. Key objectives include: pilot test sites established within law enforcement agencies, documentation of technology in use, law enforcement feedback and participation in research, and multi-disciplinary first-responder teams formed to identify victims.

Demonstrate success of program by tracking child rescues and publicize results. Key objectives include: data on number of rescues and arrests, relationship of victim to perpetrator (e.g., family member, trusted adult, or stranger), and role of technology in making rescue possible. We will also publish successes on a national level, incorporating quarterly and annual statistics from law enforcement.