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| Interpol Headquarters in Lyon, France [FILE PHOTO: Massimiliano Mariani] |
Lyon/Rome: INTERPOL has launched the Victim Identification Laboratory,
a global mobile investigative tool to assist in identifying and rescuing the
victims of child sexual abuse, following an agreement with Canada.
The laboratory is a mobile application which can be deployed
at conferences, training courses and other law enforcement-related gatherings,
enabling investigators to share appropriately sanitized child sexual abuse
images from ongoing and unsolved investigations with the widest possible
audience.
A duplicate of the System for Advancing Victim
identification Efforts (SAVE) developed by the National Child Exploitation
Coordination Centre of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), the software
and hardware for the laboratory has been donated to INTERPOL by Canada.
Signing the agreement on the sidelines of the INTERPOL
General Assembly in Rome, RCMP Commissioner Bob Paulson said: “I am proud to
present the RCMP-developed Canadian Police Centre for Missing and Exploited
Children’s Victim Identification Laboratory to our international policing
partners here at the INTERPOL General Assembly.
“The work accomplished by our technical staff at CPCMEC
showcases the RCMP’s lead role in combating child exploitation on the global
stage and assists officers in making breakthroughs in identifying victims and
protecting the most vulnerable members of our society: our children,” added
Commissioner Paulson.
The lab will be run by INTERPOL’s Crimes Against Children
(CAC) team, which encourages member countries to take a victim-centred approach
to child abuse investigations.
“Canada’s generosity in making this tool available to
INTERPOL and the global law enforcement community will have a significant
impact,” said Secretary General Ronald K. Noble, who signed the agreement on
behalf of the world police body.
“INTERPOL’s International Child Sexual Exploitation database
has already assisted in the rescue of thousands of children around the world,
and this new mobile Victim Identification Laboratory will be a valuable asset
to investigators in solving these horrific crimes,” concluded the INTERPOL
Chief.
“Every single child sexual abuse image is not just a photo
available on the Internet, it is evidence of the permanent serious physical and
emotional harm suffered by an innocent boy or girl, which is why it is vital
for victims to be identified as quickly as possible,” said Mick Moran,
Assistant Director of INTERPOL’s Trafficking in Human Beings unit which
encompasses the CAC team.
Child sexual abuse material from unsolved international
cases in INTERPOL’s ICSE database is uploaded to the lab, with editing tools
that enable viewers to manipulate the image to focus on different areas.
Viewers can leave comments on the images and elements that
could potentially help investigators identify the location where the material
was produced, or to identify objects in the images such as a child’s toy, a
building, a piece of furniture which may be unrecognizable to the investigator,
but could be a landmark or a well-known item to someone from another country or
region of the world.