The rapid expansion of the Internet is being used to facilitate human trafficking, yet it also can be harnessed to monitor and combat this form of modern-day slavery.
This is the finding of a new report from the Center on Communication Leadership & Policy (CCLP) at USC Annenberg. The result of a year-long investigation by CCLP research director Mark Latonero, Ph.D., and his team, Human Trafficking Online: The Role of Social Networking Sites and Online Classifieds focuses on how technology and online tools can be used to prevent trafficking, protect victims and prosecute perpetrators.
"Data mining, mapping and advanced analytics can be developed to support law enforcement and other organizations in fighting human trafficking," says Latonero. “The report also describes how mobile phone applications, crowdsourcing and other new technologies might be used to help victims.”
Many of these innovations were examined with expertise provided by professor Eduard Hovy and colleagues at the Information Sciences Institute at USC’s Viterbi School of Engineering.
