LOS ANGELES — The Association of Sites Advocating Child Protection (ASACP) has reported a surge in the use of its CP Reporting Tipline during the COVID-19 crisis. The group has also recently thwarted a "brute-force" hacking attempt on its database.
ASACP’s Executive Director Tim Henning said that over the past 30 days, since lockdown orders took effect in many countries, a range of international tiplines have experienced a drastically increased volume of reports from those regions, including a 25 percent increase in reporting volume to ASACP’s Tipline since mid-March.
The ASACP Tipline has received and processed well over 1 million reports since its inception in 1996 and is widely lauded for its work with international law enforcement agencies combatting child exploitation.
"Minors are spending much more time online due to lockdowns and restrictions in many countries around the world,” Henning explained. “They are spending more time online for school and e-learning programs, and entertainment, and this extra exposure increases their vulnerability to predators and malicious content.”
Henning advised parents to remain vigilant and to take advantage of free parental filtering tools for browsers and apps as well as device and ISP-level filtering.
"Parents can take simple steps to ensure that their children remain as safe as possible in their daily digital lives," he said, "especially in this unique time when the digital aspect of their lives dominates their days."
The association has also observed an increase in cyberattacks worldwide as hackers take advantage of the pandemic.
“ASACP experiences cyberattacks regularly, both to our websites and database systems, and has experienced an increase in these hacking attempts over the past 30 days,” Henning revealed. “Recently, we had an attack on our database systems that lasted for two days before being brought under control, with more than 15,000 brute-force login attempts conducted during these two days.”
“As an organization dedicated to protecting the use of technology, ASACP has never experienced a successful breach in its two-dozen years of operation,” Henning concluded. “There are a lot of bad actors that would love to end our mission of keeping minors out of and away from adult entertainment, but thanks to the ongoing support of our sponsors, we can dedicate the resources required to keep our systems running — and the world’s children safer.”
Find ASACP online and on Twitter and direct inquiries to tim@asacp.org.