‘Philippines tops world in online child sex abuse’

The Philippines has become the world’s largest known source of online child sexual exploitation, with endemic poverty helping drive a surge in abuse, a report said. Parents and relatives were responsible for facilitating the abuse in nearly all cases, according to the International Justice Mission aid group’s seven-year study. The combination of English fluency and high internet connectivity in the former US colony had helped make the country a “global hotspot” for child pornography, the report said. —