Evaluation of the Expansion to the National Strategy for the Protection of Children from Sexual Exploitation on the Internet

Table of contents

Executive Summary

This report presents the results of the evaluation of the Expansion to the National Strategy for the Protection of Children from Sexual Exploitation on the Internet

What we examined

The purpose of the evaluation was to assess the extent to which the Expansion of the National Strategy for the Protection of Children from Sexual Exploitation on the Internet has achieved its expected outcomes and operated in an efficient manner. The scope included the 10 projects funded by the Expansion including four led by non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and six that focused on building local Internet Child Exploitation (ICE) unit capacity in police forces across Canada.

What we found

Recommendations

The Assistant Deputy Minister, Crime Prevention Branch, should:

  1. Increase the priority placed on GBA Plus research to inform the Strategy.
  2. Refine the Performance Measurement Framework to ensure that the data can be collected and accurately reflects the impacts of the Strategy.

Management Action Plan

Program Management accepts all recommendations and will implement an action plan.

Background

Online Child Sexual Exploitation (CSE) is one of the most serious public safety issues facing society. The Government of Canada launched the National Strategy for the Protection of Children from Sexual Exploitation on the Internet in 2004. The Strategy was subsequently renewed it in 2009. Led by Public Safety Canada (PS), the Strategy provides a comprehensive, coordinated approach to enhancing the protection of children on the Internet and pursuing those who use technology to prey on them.

National partners for the Strategy include: 

The Strategy is comprised of four pillars (see Annex A):

Of specific relevance to the scope of this evaluation, investments from Budget 2019 ($22.24 million) have enabled the Expansion of the National Strategy to better protect children online. This funding is supporting PS efforts to raise awareness of this serious crime, reduce the stigma associated with reporting it, increase Canada’s ability to pursue and prosecute offenders, and work with digital industry to find new ways to combat the sexual exploitation of children online.

At the time of the evaluation, a total of 10 projects (Annex B) had been funded by the Expansion including four led by non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and six that focused on building local Internet Child Exploitation (ICE) unit capacity in police forces across Canada.

Evaluation Purpose and Methodology

The purpose of the evaluation was to assess the extent to which the Expansion of the National Strategy for the Protection of Children from Sexual Exploitation on the Internet has achieved its expected outcomes and operated in an efficient manner. The scope of the evaluation includes the program activities undertaken by PS under the National Strategy with a focus on those activities funded as part of the 2019 expansion.

Interviews - Twenty-four informant interviews were conducted with individuals from PS, other government departments and representatives of funded projects.

Literature and Program Document Review - Relevant policies, procedures, evaluations, strategies, consultation files, corporate and accountability documents, communication documents, planning documents, Reports on Plans and Priorities, and program documents (i.e., terms of reference, records of discussion and record of decisions) produced by the National Strategy, research studies and other reports were reviewed.

Performance and Financial Data - Performance data that was compiled and available by August 2021 was reviewed. Planned and actual expenditures from 2017-18 to 2020-21 by Strategy Pillar were compared.

Limitations - At the time of the evaluation, not all projects funded by the Expansion had been implemented or completed. As well, performance measurement data is not available for all indicators. As a result, the evaluation was not able to address all of the intended outcomes.

Implementation of the Expansion

Finding:

Most project activities funded by the Expansion were implemented as planned, however some project activities were affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Ten projects were funded under the expansion of the National Strategy, These included four NGO-led projects and six projects with provincial partners/police agencies to provide funding to 30 Internet Child Exploitation (ICE) units in police agencies across Canada. A review of progress reports submitted by the projects showed that 80% of the 46 planned activities were either completed or in progress by May 2021, with a remaining eight completed since then.

The COVID-19 pandemic caused some planned activities to change, including moving programming to a virtual context and delaying hiring in some instances; however, most activities are well underway despite these setbacks. The remaining activity was not completed by the planned date (a training component within the Nova Scotia ICE project) because the signing of the contribution agreement was delayed.

Project funding recipients reported the following key impacts of COVID-19 on their work:

Virtual delivery of programming: Some awareness and education activities that were initially planned to be delivered in-person had to be modified and delivered virtually instead.

Worsening issue: Several key informants suggested that the problem of online CSE has become worse during COVID-19, as children spend more time online as a result of restrictions. There was an increase in reports to Cybertip.ca in the early months of the pandemic.

COVID-19 also impacted the work of the PS CSE Team. Challenges include:

Establishing ICE unit project agreements with provinces and territories: The pandemic presented challenges and delays when engaging with Provincial/Territorial partners because their staff were  engaged in responding to the pandemic. This has possibly resulted in fewer agreements with Provincial/Territorial partners (i.e., six instead of possibly eight or nine).

Engaging with digital industry: Engagement with companies in the digital industry has proven to be more time consuming and difficult than initially anticipated. In part, this is because the pandemic has resulted in the cancelling of industry symposiums and reduced the opportunities to conduct one-on-one engagements with industry representatives.

Pillar 1 – Prevention and Awareness

Finding:

Awareness building activities have had a positive impact, with visits to Cybertip.ca increasing although the number of public reports has decreased over the past three years.

Pillar 1 of the National Strategy seeks to raise awareness among the Canadian public, at-risk groups, victims and survivors of CSE and how to report it, as well as to increase prevention efforts among individuals with a sexual interest in children. 

Activities funded by the Expansion of the National Strategy to raise awareness among the general public include those undertaken by the PS CSE Team and by funded projects led by NGOs.

In 2021, PS facilitated four educational workshops with Justice Canada that included 778 participants across a range of sectors. As well, a public awareness campaign was developed that ran on digital media and aimed to reduce the stigma associated with reporting CSE.

The two key performance indicators used to determine the impact of these awareness-raising campaigns are the number of visits to Cybertip.ca, Canada’s national tipline for reporting online sexual abuse and exploitation of children, and the number of CSE reports made by the public to Cybertip.ca.

The number of visits to Cybertip.ca has more than doubled in the last three years. While the number of public reports of CSE to Cybertip.ca has decreased over the same time, there has been an increase in the percentage that have been referred to law enforcement, from 5% in 2019-20 to 7% in 2020-21. This may suggest that the public is providing more valuable information.

One of the NGO projects funded by the Expansion of the National Strategy is “Keeping Kids Safe Online” delivered by PLEA Community Services Society of British Columbia (BC). The project consists of developing and delivering preventative and educational workshops in order to prevent and raise awareness of online CSE.

PLEA project representatives reported that they exceeded their deliverables by reaching over 19,000 youth through more than 400 workshops, including 200 workshops between April 2021-October 2021. The project also reached nearly 1000 adult participants in 60 presentations.

PLEA project representatives found through post-workshop surveys that 85% of participants in grades 4 to 7 said that the workshop taught them how to stay safe online while 84% of participants in grades 8 to 12 had more knowledge about information to keep them safe online or what not to share. Additionally 98% of participants said the workshop increased their knowledge and understanding of youth sexual exploitation.

Another education and awareness based NGO project funded by the Expansion of the National Strategy is “Preventing Online Sexual Exploitation Together” delivered by White Ribbon. The organization engaged with an external evaluator and found that 100% of participants responded positively when asked about the extent to which they enjoyed the workshop and the extent to which they had learned from the workshop.

Our participants now know what they can do to report online sexual exploitation, what it looks like, the signs that someone is sexually exploited ... We are confident that everyone who has participated in the workshops has increased their awareness.

The National Strategy funded the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) to deliver programming aimed at individuals with a sexual interest in children in order to prevent CSE from occurring.

One component of the CAMH project is an anonymous national phone line that provides prevention support to those at risk of offending, called “Talking for Change”. In addition to it being available for anyone to call and receive prevention support, it is the only Canadian prevention support resource for those at risk of offending that is listed on the Facebook and Instagram help centers. This resource is presented when somebody searches for child sexual exploitation materials. According to key informants, a help center message was presented globally up to 60,000 times a week in 2021.

Key informants noted that that it will take some time to achieve tangible outcomes related to self-reported behaviour changes because awareness of the project must first occur and then individuals with a sexual interest in children must agree to participate in CAMH programming.  As a result, it may not be possible to achieve significant progress within the short-time frame of the project (i.e., approximately 18 months of funding).

Pillar 2 - Pursuit, Disruption and Prosecution

Finding:

The Strategy has supported 30 ICE units in police agencies across Canada to develop additional capacity and access technology and training. Since funding increases in 2019, these units have laid more charges.

Pillar 2 of the National Strategy focuses on ensuring that criminal justice professionals have the awareness, knowledge, tools and resources to investigate and prosecute offenders. Accordingly, the Expansion of the National Strategy provided funding to ICE units based in police agencies across Canada. As of April 1, 2021, six funding agreements were signed with provincial government/police agencies reaching 30 ICE units nationally.

Key informants representing the ICE units funded indicated that they have successfully increased their capacity to investigate these crimes and to lay charges against perpetrators by: increasing the number of officers involved with the ICE units; providing access to new technologies (e.g., technology that allows officers to access data stored on locked devices such as cell phones); and obtaining training on these technologies and other topics (e.g., transition materials for onboarding new officers into the units as turnover can be high).

Data provided by the C3P shows a 37% increase in the number of Cybertip.ca tips forwarded to law enforcement from 934 in 2019-20 to 1,278 in 2020-21.

While ICE units report an increase in cases investigated as a result of contribution funding from the Strategy, they are also experiencing an increase in the number of new cases. This explains why, despite the increase in capacity afforded by Strategy funding, ICE unit backlogs have not decreased in most instances. In 2020-21, only three out the 30 ICE units receiving funding experienced a reduction in backlogs.  Key informants indicate that the correct perspective to take when considering the impact of the National Strategy on backlogs is not to assess whether they have been reduced but instead to compare the current backlog with the backlog that would have occurred without Strategy funding.

Complete data on the number of charges laid annually was not available, however some ICE units reported an increase in arrests made. In one instance, they reported an increase from 83 arrests to 185 arrests. This was attributed to an increase in funding that allowed for an increase in trained investigators with the appropriate tools.

If we compare the situation before with the situation now, our impact is much higher than it was before. We have money for overtime. We have better tools that are more developed, and the partners of the municipal police forces have been able to join us in this fight.

Pillar 3 - Protection

Finding:

Since its launch in 2017, Project Arachnid has detected approximately 42 million suspect images and issued nearly 11 million removal notices to content providers, thus helping protect victims from further abuse and harm. However, there has been a decrease in the speed with which images are removed by service providers.

Pillar 3 of the National Strategy focuses on protecting victims from further abuse and providing support services. PS provides financial support to Project Arachnid, operated by the C3P. Project Arachnid is an innovative tool to combat the proliferation of CSAM on the Internet.

Project Arachnid uncovers CSAM by crawling through websites reported to Cybertip.ca, as well as those identified directly into Shield by Project Arachnid, a tool for service providers. If CSAM is detected, a notice is sent to the hosting provider requesting its removal. The providers can be based in any country around the world.

Project Arachnid is capable of processing tens of thousands of images per second. By curbing the public availability of CSAM, Project Arachnid helps break the cycle of abuse for survivors, and addresses the very real fear someone they know may come across an image of their abuse on the internet.

There has been a significant increase (94%) in the number of unique suspect images, from a monthly average of 670 000 in 2018-2019, to approximately 1.3 million monthly in 2021-22.

With the funding related to the expansion of the Strategy, efforts were made to increase the number of hotlines and Child Protection organizations around the globe contributing to classifying images within Arachnid. This has increased from five to 11 organizations. Over the same time period, there has been an increase to 1000 companies worldwide receiving notices through Project Arachnid.

A key measure of the ability to protect victims is the length of time it takes for Internet service providers and other companies (collectively referred to as the ‘digital industry’) to remove CSAM content when notified that they are hosting the material. The 2017-18 baseline for the indicator is that 28% of companies sent notices to remove material did so within one day. However, in 2020-21, just 25% of companies removed material within one day of receiving notices.

While the median removal time is 24 hours, the slowest 10% of those who received notices in 2020-21 took 42 days to remove the content.  The removal of post-pubescent (15, 16, and 17 year-old) CSAM is slower with the slowest 10% taking up to 56 days. It is unclear the reasons for the delays.

Under the Act Respecting the Mandatory Reporting of Internet Child Pornography by Persons who Provide an Internet Service (2011), all persons who provide an Internet service are required to report any instance of Internet child pornography to C3P.  There has been a decrease in the number of reports received from 78 in 2017- 2018 to 16 in 2020-2021.  This may be the result of the success of Project Arachnid and Shield, which allows industry to quickly detect known CASM and facilitates its removal. Shield by Project Arachnid can send reports directly to C3P, and may have reduced the number of industry driven reports. 

Pillar 4 - Partnerships, Research and Strategic Support

Finding:

Coordination and collaboration between stakeholders and international partners is an important aspect of addressing online CSE, to this end PS has worked with partners and supported funded projects to connect with stakeholders.

One of the key messages from the 2018 public consultations on the National Strategy was the importance of coordination and collaboration. As part of the leadership role within the Strategy, PS chairs the Interdepartmental Working Group on CSE. The Working Group includes departments and agencies that are partners of the Strategy as well as other relevant departments/agencies. The quarterly meetings focus on presentations from subject matter experts, as well as status updates on the progress of various activities.

An example of collaboration are the webinars that were organized by PS and Justice Canada in 2021. These webinars featured panel discussions about CSE in Canada and the programs that aim to address it.

Funded projects also provided examples of partnerships that have enhanced their work. C3P has increased the number of international child protection offices they are engaging with from five to eleven. As mentioned previously, the CAMH anonymous phone line is listed on the Facebook and Instagram help centers. Collaboration with digital industry is seen as crucial in addressing online CSE and is an area of increasing importance for PS.

C3P has published research on CSE that is publicly available and referenced by stakeholders. The research projects planned by PS have been delayed, but when available will be shared with the Interdepartmental Working Group and implicated stakeholders.

Gender Based Analysis Plus (GBA Plus)

Finding:

While funded projects included considerations related to GBA Plus, additional research is required to enhance understanding of vulnerable groups and at-risk populations of CSE.

Analyses by the C3P has found that the majority (at least 80%) of online CSAM depict young girls. With regard to perpetrators of this crime, C3P began recording information about adults visible in the online CSAM they analyzed in 2009. From 2009 to 2015, they reviewed 13,395 images or videos that included adults and found 83% of the adults were male.

Project recipients reported a variety of ways in which they considered how activities and outputs may differently impact certain segments of the population, including focusing on language barriers, cultural safety, remoteness and extent of Internet access.

The CSE Team identified a need to enhance their understanding of vulnerable groups and at-risk populations of CSE through a GBA Plus lens and develop a consolidated GBA Plus strategy regarding CSE.

Resource Use and Efficiency

Finding:

Project funds have generally been expended as planned, with some modifications as a result of COVID-19.

Key informants reported that program funds are being expended in an efficient manner. Project recipients indicated that the project funding process was flexible and accommodating in instances where modifications were needed. This included adjustments to project timing and implementation methods as a result of COVID-19 measures, such as moving activities online. Some concerns were raised about the sustainability of funded projects and the efficiency of short-term funding cycles.

With the expansion of the National Strategy, there was an increase in internal resources for PS, from two full-time equivalents (FTEs) in 2017-18 to five in 2020-21. Approximately 90% of the total budget from the expansion was dedicated to the funded projects. As seen, there has been an increase in contribution funding from 2017-18 to 2020-21.

Figure 1: Contributions amounts for the fiscal years

Figure 1: Contributions amounts for the fiscal years
Image Description

In 2017-18, $2.8M was spent.

In 2018-19, $2.7M was spent

In 2019-20, $3.4M was spent

In 2020-21, $6.9M was spent

Performance Measurement Processes

Finding:

While a Performance Measurement Framework exists, there are opportunities to refine the measures and indicators to more accurately assess the outcomes achieved by the Strategy.

While a Performance Measurement Framework exists, the process of collecting and inputting performance data was not done in a consistent manner. As well, not all of the existing indicators had clear explanations of how the data would be obtained or what target values were anticipated.

In certain instances, program performance against a specific indicator appeared to decline however rationales for the decline and its reasonableness were not readily available. For example, there were decreases in the “number of reports by general public through cybertip.ca”, and the “number of reports by digital industry service providers based on Federal Mandatory Reporting requirements” while there were increases in “number of Cybertip reports forwarded to law enforcement/Child welfare in Canada”. Further research is needed to identify appropriate measures that reflect the work of the Strategy.

Lessons Learned and Unintended Consequences

Lessons have been learned about the benefits and limitations of providing programming through digital as opposed to in-person methods. These learnings were a consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic. Some NGOs indicated that they were able to reach audiences in more remote locations using a virtual approach. One drawback of a digital versus an in-person approach mentioned by one NGO is that online delivery of programming does not provide children an opportunity to make disclosures to them.

The positive unintended consequence of the Strategy noted most frequently by project recipients was increased networking and collaboration opportunities as a result of the projects undertaken. Key informants stated that given the horrible nature of crimes involving sexual exploitation of children via the Internet, it can be difficult to initiate conversations but the Strategy and the projects funded have brought stakeholders together.

Conclusions

Overall, the Expansion of the National Strategy has contributed to protecting children from online sexual exploitation. The funding of ICE units in 30 police agencies across Canada has increased capacity to complete investigations successfully and increased the likelihood of successful prosecutions. However, the number of CSE crimes is increasing which means that in most jurisdictions, backlogs of CSE cases have not been reduced.

Strategy elements that predate the Expansion, such as Cybertip.ca and Project Arachnid, continue to achieve positive results. Since its launch in 2017, Project Arachnid has detected approximately 42 million suspect images and issued nearly 10 million removal notices to content providers.

The projects funded by the Expansion have increased the knowledge and awareness of Canadians about CSE crimes and how to report them. The number of visits to Cybertip.ca has more than doubled in the last three years.  However, the number of public reports of CSE to Cybertip.ca has decreased. Key informants speculate that this decrease is due to the effectiveness of Project Arachnid in having content removed from the Internet.

Coordination and collaboration between stakeholders and international partners is an important aspect of addressing online CSE. PS has worked with partners and supported funded projects to connect with others.

Published research shows that online CSE is highly gendered among victims (females) and perpetrators (males). A need was identified to enhance the understanding of vulnerable groups and at-risk populations of CSE through a GBA Plus lens and develop a consolidated GBA Plus strategy.

The Strategy is supported by a Performance Measurement Framework. However, as of August 2021, aspects of the Performance Measurement Framework for the Strategy are under development and several indicators are without established data collection methodologies, baseline/target values, or outcome data.  

Recommendations

The Assistant Deputy Minister, Crime Prevention Branch, should:

  1. Increase the priority placed on GBA Plus research to inform the Strategy.
  2. Refine the Performance Measurement Framework to ensure that the data can be collected and accurately reflects the impacts of the Strategy.

Management Action Plan

Management Action Plan
Recommendation Action Planned Planned Completion Date

Increase the priority placed on Gender-based Analysis Plus (GBA Plus) research to inform the Strategy.

Actively seek alternate data sources (research, special studies, input from partners) to identify GBA Plus considerations of online child sexual exploitation (CSE), particularly in respect of vulnerable groups and at-risk populations.

March 31, 2023

Refine the Performance Measurement Framework to ensure that the data can be collected and accurately reflects the impacts of the Strategy.

Finalize the CSE Strategy performance measurement framework (PMF) and reporting requirements.

December 31, 2022

Annex A: Logic Model

Annex A: Logic Model
Strategic Outcome Children are protected from online sexual exploitation

Intermediate Outcome

Canadians, including, at-risk groups, victims and survivors of CSE, and individuals with a sexual interest in children adopt behaviours that help prevent online CSE and report it without fear of stigma

Criminal justice professionals investigate and prosecute offenders with consistent outcomes

Victims are protected from further victimization {and are supported by trauma-informed services}

Internal and external stakeholders work together, using an evidence-based approach, to combat online CSE

Immediate Outcome

The public, at-risk groups, victims and survivors are aware of signs of online of CSE and know how to report it

Individuals with a sexual interest in children have access to prevention support

Criminal Justice Professionals have the knowledge to investigate and prosecute offenders

Criminal justice professionals have access to resources and tools to investigate and prosecute offenders

Law enforcement are aware of suspected offences that need to be investigated

Law enforcement have access to resources and tools to identify victims

Victims and survivors have access to trauma-informed services

ISPs are aware of the need to remove CSAM

Stakeholders have access to information and research on online CSE

Internal and external stakeholders are aware of the importance of multi-sector collaboration combating online CSE

Target Population

Canadian public,
At-risk groups,
Victims,
Survivors,
Individuals with a sexual interest in children

Criminal Justice Professionals

Victims and survivors,

Service Providers

PS, RCMP, JUS, C3P, Stakeholders

Activities / Outputs

Raising awareness and increasing prevention efforts

Identifying, apprehending, and prosecuting offenders

Protecting victims from further abuse and providing support services

Developing policy, supporting research, engaging with stakeholders

Pillar

1: Prevention and Awareness

2: Pursuit, Disruption and Prosecution

3: Protection

4: Partnerships, Research and Strategic Support

Inputs

Budget allotment, FTEs, Government priorities, Grants & contributions

Annex B: Project Descriptions

The following proponents and projects comprise the 10 CSE projects that are within the scope of this evaluation and the Expansion of the National Strategy. They include those led by NGOs and by police agencies/provincial governments.

ICE unit projects:

Funding for the following project proponents is devoted to ICE units and is intended to increase the capacity of the units to more effectively investigate ICE cases through activities such as hiring investigators or civilian staff, training, purchasing/leasing equipment, tools and/or software.

NGO-led projects:

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