PREYING ON
A team of committed activists is campaigning to end the objectification and sexploitation of women and children and they have big social media giants, and pedophiles, in their sights
Amum-of-four logs onto her Instagram account and starts scrolling. The content – little girls in leotards, bikinis or crop tops, dancing, posing, prancing and pouting – is not what you’d expect a typical 47-year-old mother to be looking at. But Lyn Swanson Kennedy is a pedophile hunter. And this is where she finds them – on the feeds of young girls.
“It’s a pedophile’s playground and the parents are providing the free content and the tech companies are profiting from it,” Swanson Kennedy says.
In one post, a 12-year-old Australian girl is wearing a leotard and thrusting her groin towards the camera.
The girl’s followers tell her she’s pretty, she’s hot and a great dancer, along with rows of inappropriate and sexualised emojis.
Those comments are mainly from men – some of them have grey hair in their profiles – and most have private accounts or accounts with no posts.
It’s a stomach-churning read.
A photo of her taken several years ago, in a white leotard, lying on her back with her legs in the air, is one of the most shared pictures on pedophile forums, according to Swanson Kennedy, who frequents these dark corners of the internet in order to gather evidence.
Another Australian girl, billed as a model, has heavy make-up, painted nails and gold shorts in one photo. There are other photos of her lying around the pool in bikinis and swimsuits. She has not yet hit puberty but she replicates adult poses, her green eyes staring intensely down the camera lens.
There’s a link in her bio that directs people to a donation site if people want to “support” her modelling work.
On another account, a 10-year-old “influencer” and “gymnast” has a link in her bio that sends fans to an Amazon wishlist, where people can buy her and her mother gifts.
On the list is a white swimsuit with cutouts for an aged 10 child. One wonders if the person who buys it will expect to see this little girl wearing it on a future Instagram post. Also on the Amazon shopping list are $415 adult-sized Versace boots and skincare for puffy eyes.
On yet another parent-managed account an Australian girl asks her followers how attractive she is. She is 11.
Her look is popular among pedophiles. Swanson Kennedy has seen conversations between predators about whether a child-sex doll has been created using her image.
She says it’s easy to track the men commenting on the Instagram accounts of young girls to pedophile forums, where participants talk about who they’re following on social media and what they would like to do with them.
“They literally laugh at the parents who post the content and they laugh at the tech companies for allowing it because it gives them such ready access to everything that they are looking for,” Swanson Kennedy says.
The lives of some of these girls have been
TODAY, ONE (GIRL) IS CONNECTED TO 65,000 FOLLOWERS … SHE WAS A ONEYEAR-OLD WHEN WE FIRST FOUND HER NAME ON A PEDOPHILE FORUM
WE’RE TRYING TO HOLD THESE COMPANIES TO THEIR OWN ALLEGED MISSION STATEMENT VALUES, ABOUT SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY, ABOUT CARING FOR THE COMMUNITY
documented from birth.
“We watch these girls grow up, and today, one of them is connected to 65,000 followers,” Swanson Kennedy says.
“How many are predators? She was a oneyear-old when we first found her name on a pedophile forum.”
Predators often scroll back through the feeds to see what these girls looked like when they were even younger, and some set up fan sites for that particular age group.
Swanson Kennedy is part of a team of five women – and one man – who work for Collective Shout, an Australian group which is campaigning to end the objectification and sexploitation of women and children.
Former NSW premier Mike Baird’s wife Kerryn is its treasurer.
Founder Melinda Tankard Reist says that last year the group had 20 big wins, some of them global, including winning a fight to allow handball players to wear bike shorts rather than bikini bottoms.
Another was removing 23 suppliers of sex dolls based on the bodies of pre-pubescent girls from the Chinese online shopping platform Alibaba.
The company has since taken steps to block the sale of all sex dolls on its site to Australia.
The lingerie store Honey Birdette has also been a target of Collective Shout, which argues that many of its super-sized adverts displayed in shopping centres are “porn-themed, degrading and exploitative”.
But in what looks very much like a David and Goliath battle, the group’s biggest target is Meta – the social media behemoth – responsible for Facebook and Instagram.
Tankard Reist says while Swanson Kennedy is doing an incredible job at the coalface and has reported thousands of predators to the relevant authorities, it is like a game of whack-a-mole.
As soon as one account is pulled, another pops up.
She says what needs to happen is for social media companies to step up and take responsibility for its own content.
“We’ve been calling on Instagram to remove all pre-13 accounts, to stop allowing these types of comments on children’s content and to remove, block and report the predators who engage with children and their content to authorities,” Tankard Reist says.
“We’ve pointed out that there’s a whole new understanding and recognition now of the importance of corporate social responsibility, and that corporations should act in the best interest of the community, well at least not harm the community.
“And so we’re trying to hold these companies to their own alleged mission statement values, about social responsibility, about caring for the community, about caring for the environment.”
Both Tankard Reist and Swanson Kennedy question why it’s down to a small non-profit organisation of mainly part-timers to report these accounts to Instagram executives. “That’s wrong,” Swanson Kennedy says.
“If it requires reporting and vigilance on our part it means that they are not doing their part.”
Last month the duo appeared before a federal government inquiry into social media and online safety where they revealed disturbing evidence that photos of young children were being scraped off Instagram and turned into “deep fake” porn images that are then being shared online.
The inquiry also heard allegations there are products on social media sites that directly connect pre-pubescent girls to predators, where they are then exposed to men performing live sex acts.
Among those who gave evidence at the inquiry were groups representing people with eating disorders, with mental health issues, those fighting against bullying, as well as experts looking at how to tackle the issues caused by social media.
“We’ve heard some heartbreaking stories, some very strong voices of people who have been incredibly brave to speak out,” Liberal MP Lucy Wicks, chair of the committee, says.
“Ultimately all Australians have the right to be as safe online as they do when they are out on the street. Big tech has certainly got some questions to answer.”
Meta says it is taking the issue seriously and has introduced a number of proactive measures including photo-matching technology which removes known child exploitative material, and new technology which proactively detects child nudity when it’s uploaded.
It also reports content to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in the US, and removes the account in question.
“We work with NCMEC, law enforcement and safety partners including Collective Shout to help victims in Australia and across the world,” Meta’s spokesman says.
“We also updated our child safety policies to clarify that we will remove Facebook profiles, pages, groups and Instagram accounts that are dedicated to sharing otherwise innocent images of children with captions, hashtags or comments containing inappropriate signs of affection or commentary about the children depicted in the image.
“Under this new policy, while the images alone may not break our rules, the accompanying text can help us better determine whether the content is sexualising children and if the associated profile, page, group or account should be removed.”
Digital marketing strategist Meg Coffey says only legislation will force big tech to be more responsible. But she believes parents also need to protect their children.
Success stories – children who are now worth millions after posting content on sites such as YouTube – have highlighted how being famous on social media can make serious money.
“There are no rules on Instagram against beautifying your child, or monetising your child,” Coffey says.
The child influencer scene on Instagram is like “beauty pageants on steroids”.
“These mini influencers can become mini businesses,” she says. “Once they have built a bit of a following they start to get free clothes and toys sent to them.”
She said the “show mums” need to know whatever they think is happening on social media “it’s 10 times worse”.
Her advice to parents is to not post photos of their children on social media at all.
Having seen the underbelly of Instagram, Coffey says she’s begged her own sister not to share family images on Instagram, even on a private account.
She agrees with the social media companies that what we see online is a reflection of society.
“I think we are finding out about humanity through social media and if we thought people were nice and good, we are finding out they are not so nice and good,” Coffey says.
“It used to be hard for men to get photos and videos of little girls, but now all they have to do is go on Instagram.”