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  • Prevention
  • Detection
  • Victim Support
  • Holistic
Region
  • Europe (21)
  • Global (11)
  • United States (2)
  • United Kingdom (1)
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  • ISF (12)
  • Other Fund (12)
  • Horizon (5)
  • CERV (2)
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ALUNA – Child protection centred strategies to fight against sexual abuse and exploitation

Initiative

Child sexual abuse and exploitation are among the worst forms of violence against children and constitute serious crimes that know no borders. The continuous increase in child sexual abuse and exploitation, not least due to the Covid‐19 pandemic, highlight the importance of harmonised national legislation and international cooperation to prevent these offenses, protect the victims and prosecute the perpetrators. The fight against these crimes needs to be global and involve governments, law enforcement agencies, civil society, communities, and companies.

In this sense, the ALUNA project proposes an innovative, ambitious, interdisciplinary, international child-protection-centered approach to fight against CSA/CSE crimes. The project is the result of preliminary investigation and engagement through interviews with key stakeholders: active members from our LEAs and NGOs partners, who work with victims of these crimes. From each meeting the most important needs and gaps in the fight against CSA/CSE were collected and analysed, and from these was born ALUNA, a project with a trifold approach around Prevention, Investigation and Victim Assistance. The three pillars aim to establish a coordinated contribution with law enforcement agencies (LEAs) by developing an appropriate approach that is capable of addressing specific needs and providing protection to children.

The ALUNA project’s main objective is to use technology to improve the way in which help and support can be provided to victims of CSA/CSE. Moreover, ALUNA will establish new innovative strategies that in the short, medium, and long term will improve the way in which LEAs and civil society organisations (CSOs) carry out criminal investigations, assist rescued victims, and prevent the occurrence of these crimes.

The ALUNA consortium combines the expertise of psychologists, sociologists, lawyers, social workers, health workers, computer developers and experts in computer security and forensics, from all over the world with one goal: to fight against, and help victims, of child sexual abuse. The consortium consists of 16 partners from 10 different countries, including 3 Universities, one SME, 3 Research and Technology Organisations, 5 LEAs, and 4 NGOs.

OBJECTIVES

Prevention

● To provide a variety of preventive measures to reduce CSA/CSE crimes.
● To reduce the risk of (re-)offending by better understanding the behaviour of abusers and potential abusers.

Investigation

● To analyse possible involvement of organised crime groups implicated in CSA/CSE in other crimes.
● To develop new approaches to investigate CSA/CSE crimes.
● To address new threats of child abuse and coercion and extortion of victims that have escalated in the last years.
● To develop new protocols to facilitate collaboration and interoperability between investigators from any European country, and due to the importance of the subject, between LEA investigators around the world.

Victim Assistance

● To develop a set of holistic measures to ensure adequate CSA/CSE victims' protection and assistance.
● To develop new approaches to mitigate the impact on victims of CSA/CSE and to reduce re-victimisation in the short and long term.

For more information, please visit the website: aluna-isf.eu

ALUNA has received funding from the European Union’s Internal Security Fund under grant agreement No 101084929.

Timeline

06/2023 – 05/2025

Consortium

Coordinator

Universidad Complutense de Madrid

Partners

  1. University of Kent – United Kingdom
  2.  Vrije Universiteit Brussel – Belgium
  3. Kentro Meleton Asfaleias – Greece
  4. International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children –  Switzerland
  5. Idener Research & Development Agrupacion de Interes Economico – Spain
  6. Athina-Erevnitiko Kentro Kainotomias stis Technologies tis Pliroforias, ton Epikoinoinion kai tis Gnosis – Greece
  7. Associacao Portuguesa de Apoio a Vitima – Portugal
  8. Fundacion Renacer – Colombia
  9. Associacai Brasileira de Defesa da Muhler da Infancia e da Juventude – Brazil
  10. Hellenic Police – Greece
  11. Policia Rodoviaria Federal – Brazil
  12. Trilateral Research Limited – Ireland
  13. Policia Federal – Brazil
  14. Ministry of Public Security – Israel
  15. Ministerio del Interior – Spain

BEST-PRACTICES SPECIFICATIONS, REQUIREMENTS AND USE CASES DEFINITION

Providing an overview and status quo assessment of the mechanisms used by multiple stakeholders to prevent, investigate and mitigate CSA/CSE investigations gathering and presenting relevant best practices that could be integrated into a Common European Framework governing this field.

PRIVACY, ETHICAL DATA MANAGEMENT AND SOCIAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT

Ensuring that the developed platform and analytics tools comply with the European societal values, fundamental rights and applicable legislation including the privacy and protection of personal data.

STRATEGIES AND TOOLS TO STRENGTHEN THE INVESTIGATION AND PROSECUTIONS PROCESSES AND ENHANCE MULTI-STAKEHOLDER COOPERATION

Using the latest state-of-the-art to develop a set of tools to reinforce the LEAs research filter for CSAM/CSEM and provide complementary functionalities based on audio analysis.

MULTI-SECTORAL AND MULTI-DISCIPLINARY CHILD-PROTECTION STRATEGIES TO STRENGTHEN PREVENTION AND VICTIM ASSISTANCE PROGRAMS

Developing a toolkit for the comprehensive care of victims of CSA/CSE:

- Anti-grooming mobile app,

- Trauma bonding analysis in CSA/CSE crimes,

- Characterization of the dynamics of CSA/CSE associated with migration contexts,

- Strengthening of specialized units for the investigation of cases of online CSAM,

- Strengthening of hotlines for reporting CSA,

- Analysis of obstacles in dealing with CSA/CSE experiences during the criminal proceedings,

- Creation of an inter-institutional plan of training and training modules focus on detecting CSAM, handling digital evidence, maintaining the chain of custody and adhering to legal standards.

Region

Europe

Target groups

General Public and other stakeholders.

Website

https://sparksinthedark.net

Social media

Contact

Phone: +34 695 19 68 93
Email: javierv@ucm.es

Funding information

ALUNA has received funding from the European Union’s Internal Security Fund under grant agreement No 101084929.

Key activities

BEST-PRACTICES SPECIFICATIONS, REQUIREMENTS AND USE CASES DEFINITION

Providing an overview and status quo assessment of the mechanisms used by multiple stakeholders to prevent, investigate and mitigate CSA/CSE investigations gathering and presenting relevant best practices that could be integrated into a Common European Framework governing this field.

PRIVACY, ETHICAL DATA MANAGEMENT AND SOCIAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT

Ensuring that the developed platform and analytics tools comply with the European societal values, fundamental rights and applicable legislation including the privacy and protection of personal data.

STRATEGIES AND TOOLS TO STRENGTHEN THE INVESTIGATION AND PROSECUTIONS PROCESSES AND ENHANCE MULTI-STAKEHOLDER COOPERATION

Using the latest state-of-the-art to develop a set of tools to reinforce the LEAs research filter for CSAM/CSEM and provide complementary functionalities based on audio analysis.

MULTI-SECTORAL AND MULTI-DISCIPLINARY CHILD-PROTECTION STRATEGIES TO STRENGTHEN PREVENTION AND VICTIM ASSISTANCE PROGRAMS

Developing a toolkit for the comprehensive care of victims of CSA/CSE:

- Anti-grooming mobile app,

- Trauma bonding analysis in CSA/CSE crimes,

- Characterization of the dynamics of CSA/CSE associated with migration contexts,

- Strengthening of specialized units for the investigation of cases of online CSAM,

- Strengthening of hotlines for reporting CSA,

- Analysis of obstacles in dealing with CSA/CSE experiences during the criminal proceedings,

- Creation of an inter-institutional plan of training and training modules focus on detecting CSAM, handling digital evidence, maintaining the chain of custody and adhering to legal standards.

Related Organisations

Initiative overview

Region

  • Europe

Website

https://www.aluna-isf.eu/

Social media

Contact

Phone: +34 695 19 68 93
Email: javierv@ucm.es

Coordinator

Universidad Complutense de Madrid

Partners

  1. University of Kent – United Kingdom
  2.  Vrije Universiteit Brussel – Belgium
  3. Kentro Meleton Asfaleias – Greece
  4. International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children –  Switzerland
  5. Idener Research & Development Agrupacion de Interes Economico – Spain
  6. Athina-Erevnitiko Kentro Kainotomias stis Technologies tis Pliroforias, ton Epikoinoinion kai tis Gnosis – Greece
  7. Associacao Portuguesa de Apoio a Vitima – Portugal
  8. Fundacion Renacer – Colombia
  9. Associacai Brasileira de Defesa da Muhler da Infancia e da Juventude – Brazil
  10. Hellenic Police – Greece
  11. Policia Rodoviaria Federal – Brazil
  12. Trilateral Research Limited – Ireland
  13. Policia Federal – Brazil
  14. Ministry of Public Security – Israel
  15. Ministerio del Interior – Spain

Articles, Reports and Events associated with the Initiative

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This initiative does not have any Key Findings yet. Stay tuned!

Information

Funded by the European Union
Website
https://www.aluna-isf.eu/
Coordinator
Universidad Complutense de Madrid
Contact

Phone: +34 695 19 68 93
Email: javierv@ucm.es

Recent Publications

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