About

Vision: Children are free from exploitation
Mission: To drive a collaborative national response to counter the exploitation of children

The Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation was announced by the Prime Minister on 26 March 2018, as a measure of the 2018-19 Commonwealth Budget.

The Centre brings together a world-leading approach, incorporating key stakeholders and partners, and driving a collective effort to counter the global epidemic of child exploitation. It provides an integrated and collaborative capability to ensure cohesion by using the expertise of Federal, State and Territory, non-government agencies and private industry, and by allowing a cross-pollination of resources, knowledge and skillsets between stakeholders.

Our activities

The Centre is built on four pillars (4Ps) to Prevent, Prepare, Pursue and Protect children and vulnerable people against exploitation through a foundation of partnership.

The Centre will:

• bring law enforcement, government, NGOs, industry, academia and community together to prevent the exploitation of children and vulnerable people.
• drive initiatives to prepare future capabilities and technologies cohesively to counter exploitation and intervene earlier in the abuse of victims.
• be a hub to support Australia and foreign law enforcement agencies to pursue the recovery of victims from harm and to prosecute offenders.
• support initiatives to protect victims and law enforcement and further victimisation and harm.

The child exploitation threat

Australian law enforcement is seeing an exponential increase in reports of the exploitation of children. Australians are committing these crimes within our country, and increasingly are travelling offshore to offend.

No region is untouched and no country is immune from this crime.

In 2017 the AFP received almost 10,000 reports of child abuse material.  In 2018, the number of reports has already exceeded this amount.  Each report can contain hundreds, if not thousands of images per report.

The transnational and exploitative nature of child exploitation offences means these crimes can involve or overlap with other serious crimes against vulnerable people, including human trafficking, slavery and slavery-like practices such as forced marriage.