Laurie Pieters-James is a a specialist Offender Profiler whose primary function is to assess, analyze & predict criminal behaviour. She has a strong background in psychology, criminology, intelligence and law and has been and advocate for cyber awareness and training. As the Chief Operation Officer at Cybareti Consulting Services, Laurie has been involved in the profiling, investigation, detection and prosecution of cyber crimes. We will explore the dark underbelly of cyber trafficking, discussing its alarming rise, devastating impacts, and potential solutions. Don't miss this opportunity to delve into a critical issue shaping our digital landscape.
Originally aired on: June 15, 2023
Laurie Pieters-James is a a specialist Offender Profiler whose primary function is to assess, analyze & predict criminal behaviour. She has a strong background in psychology, criminology, intelligence and law and has been and advocate for cyber awareness and training. As the Chief Operation Officer at Cybareti Consulting Services, Laurie has been involved in the profiling, investigation, detection and prosecution of cyber crimes. We will explore the dark underbelly of cyber trafficking, discussing its alarming rise, devastating impacts, and potential solutions. Don't miss this opportunity to delve into a critical issue shaping our digital landscape.
Originally aired on: June 15, 2023
00;00;29;29 - 00;00;45;01
Speaker
Hey everyone, it's Eugene and how are you doing today? Welcome to another episode of Forensics Talks. This is episode 85, and my guest today is Laurie Pieters-James, we're going to be talking about cyber trafficking and a lot of issues surrounding trafficking,
00;00;45;01 - 00;00;46;26
Speaker
So, we're going to get started here.
00;00;46;26 - 00;01;01;14
Speaker
My guest today is Laurie Pieters-James, and she is a specialist offender profiler whose primary function is to assess, analyze and predict criminal behavior. She has a strong background in psychology, criminology, intelligence and law.
00;01;01;14 - 00;01;18;01
Speaker
And she's been an advocate for cyber awareness and training as the chief offer operations officer at Cyber Ready Consulting Services. Laurie's been involved in the profiling, investigation, detection and prosecution of cyber crimes, and she also does train for police in cyber trafficking,
00;01;18;01 - 00;01;19;12
Speaker
discussing issues
00;01;19;12 - 00;01;21;14
Speaker
and of course, the large rise of
00;01;21;14 - 00;01;22;19
Speaker
cyber trafficking, most
00;01;22;19 - 00;01;26;20
Speaker
recently the devastating impacts and potential solutions.
00;01;26;22 - 00;01;29;14
Speaker
And so let me bring her in here.
00;01;29;14 - 00;01;31;02
Speaker
There she is. Hey, Larry, how are you?
00;01;31;02 - 00;01;34;13
Speaker
Hey, Eugene. Good to be here. Well, thank you yourself.
00;01;34;13 - 00;01;43;24
Speaker
Thank you so much. Thanks for being here all the way from South Africa. And I think you are near somewhere in between, I think Johannesburg and Pretoria or something like that, right?
00;01;43;24 - 00;01;45;29
Speaker
That's correct yeah, Centurion.
00;01;45;29 - 00;01;46;23
Speaker
Great. Great.
00;01;47;12 - 00;01;57;10
Speaker
So, Laurie, I want to start with you and how you got started and how you found your way into cyber consulting. So, can you tell me a little bit about your background?
00;01;57;10 - 00;02;16;22
Speaker
Yes, sure. So, I started off my career, strangely, in the South African Air Force and then moved into the Department of Transport as an air traffic controller and then back into the intelligence world. And then I studied law and criminology.
00;02;16;22 - 00;02;19;23
Speaker
Yeah. And then I found myself at a loss.
00;02;19;23 - 00;02;49;10
Speaker
And in Botswana, I got married and we moved to Botswana, whereas spent ten years and that was where my interest was piqued in, in cybercrime, because Botswana, with the death penalty, has a very low murder rate. So, there were no serial killers to hunt down, unfortunately. So, we had to change direction. And so, I moved into the financial crime and then the cyber world, and then we started to have some cyber conferences.
00;02;49;13 - 00;03;11;20
Speaker
Of course, was a big issue. People were really desperate for knowledge. And I built on the cyber from they started developing profiles of dog psychology, cyber criminals, sexual or non-sexual predators, cyber bullying and the management of cyber bullying cases, and then cyber stalking and harassment. And we've developed a whole bunch of tools around that.
00;03;11;20 - 00;03;16;00
Speaker
And then, as I said, I started collaborating and 2019.
00;03;16;00 - 00;03;22;22
Speaker
and there I changed the focus slightly away from cyber because I moved back to South Africa in 2020.
00;03;22;25 - 00;03;37;21
Speaker
So now we deal with all aspects of crime. But what's very interesting is that even your old-fashioned crimes, things like murder, like rape, your victim selection is now often done in the cyber world.
00;03;37;21 - 00;03;50;18
Speaker
the cyber is now impacting even on the common law crimes. And it's a very interesting field. It's a new field. It's a developing field that together with the cyber security aspects,
00;03;50;18 - 00;03;58;04
Speaker
while the rest of it is retrenching people, cybersecurity is employing people and it's growing.
00;03;58;04 - 00;04;08;28
Speaker
And we're looking at about 3.7 million jobs going to be opening up now between now and 2025. So, it really is an exciting and interesting field.
00;04;08;28 - 00;04;28;15
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. And I don't remember how we met exactly. I think it might have been through like LinkedIn or something online, but I do recall we had a really good conversation. I think the first time we spoke on the phone, and we were talking about, you know, things like the issues surrounding kids with like Facebook and social media and all kinds of stuff like that.
00;04;28;17 - 00;04;38;18
Speaker
And then so I think that's what got me interested in speaking to you and having you as a guest here. You brought up a lot of really interesting points. So, you've obviously been studying this topic for quite some time.
00;04;38;18 - 00;04;40;07
Speaker
Let me start by asking you.
00;04;40;07 - 00;04;44;00
Speaker
how would you define cyber trafficking, and you know, what?
00;04;44;02 - 00;04;45;19
Speaker
Are there different kinds?
00;04;45;19 - 00;04;59;15
Speaker
Yes, well, they are in the answer. Let's start with the definition of trafficking in persons, because that's what we actually looking at. We're looking at the cyber the aspect, the cyber aspect of trafficking in persons.
00;04;59;18 - 00;05;25;05
Speaker
So, what is trafficking in persons, really? Well, the first thing that you have to have been an act. So that would be the act would be any person who delivers recruits. It's transports, transfers, harbors, cells or exchanges or leases or receives a person anywhere in the world, really, because it is a global phenomenon. And then the means that you have to look at is how does it happen?
00;05;25;08 - 00;05;54;11
Speaker
So it's either through things like and I mean, this isn't an extensive list, a threat of harm, the use of force or other forms of coercion, the use of the abuse of vulnerable people, fraud, deception, abduction, kidnaping, the abuse of power, the direct or the indirect giving or receiving of payments or benefits to obtain consent from a person or having control over a person with the person that's in authority over another person.
00;05;54;13 - 00;06;37;07
Speaker
And then also the indirect or direct giving or receiving of payments or compensation or reward or benefit or any other advantage. So that's how it's done. And then then the next important thing to look at is how and that that this is mainly for the purpose. What is the purpose of this? It's for the purpose of the exploitation of the person, be it online in person, through selling through bondage, through, through to sex trafficking, through labor of trafficking, through organ trafficking or any of these types of things.
00;06;37;09 - 00;06;46;23
Speaker
And when we put the cyber into it, it's actually committing these acts using I.T. or a computer.
00;06;46;23 - 00;06;57;03
Speaker
Okay. Yeah. Because normally when we think about trafficking, you're just sort of a stereotypical image that maybe many people have in their heads of, you know, somebody standing on the corner of the road and, you know, the pimp is close by or something.
00;06;57;03 - 00;07;15;05
Speaker
And you know that they're, they're selling, you know, young kids or something for prostitution or something like that. But now it's completely changed. And so how prevalent is cyber trafficking globally? It's a global problem. But how big of a problem is it?
00;07;15;05 - 00;07;37;10
Speaker
It is it is a global problem. You know, there is a trafficking ring in basically every single town in on the globe almost today. So, it's monumental in in value. Trafficking in persons is an industry worth approximately $150 billion.
00;07;37;12 - 00;07;57;04
Speaker
Whereas if you look at the entire airline industry, it's worth a profit of $22 billion. So that'll put it in a little bit of perspective for you. So, it is huge and it's growing, and you know, as long as there are perpetrators out there looking for these services, it's going to continue to grow.
00;07;57;04 - 00;07;58;27
Speaker
When it comes to
00;07;58;27 - 00;08;02;16
Speaker
things like the kinds of people that make up.
00;08;02;16 - 00;08;16;17
Speaker
because, you know, you said it's organized, right? So, it's organized. It's a form of organized crime. But what is the makeup of the cyber traffickers? Are they being they typically men? Are there women involved? Are they young males? What is the typical makeup?
00;08;16;17 - 00;08;35;18
Speaker
so, the typical make up of a good cyber trafficking organization, you generally have a woman somewhere near the top, interestingly enough, and these women have often been groomed and gone through the system as victims at some point.
00;08;35;21 - 00;09;10;01
Speaker
So, although the pimps and the muscle are male, usually the person that's there to keep the victims in line is often female and a person that's been previously trafficked because they really understand all the challenges. Then you have involved in these rings because it's organized crimes. You've got the money launderers, you've got the doctors, lawyers, people, people that make counterfeit documents, the transport networks, if they're transported.
00;09;10;03 - 00;09;32;24
Speaker
But with cyber trafficking, you don't need to transport the victim. You can traffic them from inside of their own homes, which we saw a big increase in in during COVID because kids were locked in their homes with their parents and the siblings, and they were trafficked online by their own parents who were looking for an income and days before incomes.
00;09;32;26 - 00;09;47;19
Speaker
So, yes, it's huge. It can happen to anyone, and anybody can be a trafficker. Are you will walk past traffic in street, and you won't know that it's a trafficker. And that's what makes them so dangerous.
00;09;47;19 - 00;09;53;00
Speaker
Yeah, I thought it was pretty interesting, though. You're saying, you know, like you have lawyers and doctors involved.
00;09;53;00 - 00;10;06;28
Speaker
These are people who should be helping and serving the community. But you're saying that they're involved, too, so doctors to make sure that I guess they keep the victims safe and keep them producing money or doing what they have to do?
00;10;06;28 - 00;10;19;27
Speaker
Well, you know, you have instances, especially with child sex abuse victims, where the doctor will be there to stitch the child up directly after they've been abused so that they can be put to work again as quickly as possible.
00;10;20;00 - 00;10;49;15
Speaker
Unfortunately, we also have things like the NGOs that are involved. There are police officers that in are involved now because I'm in South Africa and our police force is a problem. We've had a case where a victim ran to the police in Sunnyside, in Pretoria, and the police trafficked her back to the trafficker for sex. So, you know, anything goes depending on where you are and what the challenges are in the country.
00;10;49;15 - 00;11;11;10
Speaker
And South Africa faces a massive corruption problem. And they're in league with a lot of the organized criminals. So, one doesn't even want to put down the police because, please God, they are many, many fantastic police officers. Really trying to make a difference. But unfortunately, we do have the bad apples as well.
00;11;11;10 - 00;11;29;23
Speaker
Yeah. And I think that's everywhere, I guess, in terms of the laws like so when it when it comes to trafficking and cyber trafficking, like in specifically, I'm I don't know how well versed you are with laws around the world or if they're very similar everywhere.
00;11;29;23 - 00;11;35;12
Speaker
But in South Africa, for example, like what are some of the laws that pertain to cyber trafficking?
00;11;35;12 - 00;11;39;10
Speaker
Well, we have the Sexual Offenses Act that covers it.
00;11;39;13 - 00;12;03;19
Speaker
And then we've also got a specific law around human trafficking. So, we have a trafficking act and that deals with the act, the protection of the victims, what to do, the sentences and so on is very comprehensive. South Africa has some of the best legislation in the world around trafficking, and that's why we're able to prosecute it so effectively.
00;12;03;21 - 00;12;43;15
Speaker
And incidentally, and very interestingly, South Africa has the highest sentence in the world for trafficking. We had a case where a young girl was trafficked by her aunt and the two and her daughter, part of the family brought into the country under the guise of being educating her. She was then trafficked online, specifically by these two perpetrators. And eventually after the prosecution, we managed to secure 19 life sentences and 45 years.
00;12;43;18 - 00;13;11;06
Speaker
And that is the highest sentence globally, hand down and in a in a in a trafficking case. So South Africa's pretty good. Yeah. So, Africa's pretty good When we when we can get a conviction, we do. And we're also very you know; our hawks are on our getting there on the investigation side. They're really, we have some dedicated officers, and we work in league with Interpol, with UNODC.
00;13;11;06 - 00;13;33;20
Speaker
We've got a lot of help from us Homeland Security. The US Secret Service assists with the training of our hawks. So, there's a there's a giant effort to do something about the trafficking. At least, you know, we are also it's operating. We train with we train the law enforcement as well. So that that also gives them a little bit of a heads up.
00;13;33;20 - 00;13;41;03
Speaker
And we do it very reasonably to assist the community because it's in everybody's best interest to combat this crime.
00;13;41;03 - 00;13;51;05
Speaker
The fact that the laws are more aggressive, let's say, in South Africa, was it because it was a problem there more than other places?
00;13;51;05 - 00;14;21;07
Speaker
Look, South Africa, because of its strategic position and because that we have a number of large harbors, South Africa became a hub for trafficking. So, the victims would come down through South Africa, be trafficked through South Africa, held in South Africa, and loaded onto cargo ships in our harbors, and then traffic to places like China and the Middle East and so on, because South Africa has very good trade relations with countries like China.
00;14;21;07 - 00;14;51;25
Speaker
So, our ships aren't searched. And that opens the door to making us a corridor and a hub for trafficking. And it has been that way. So, countries like Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe, they're all landlocked. They have to get to harbor somehow. So, they'll either use Mozambique or they'll use South Africa. And South Africa is bigger. And as I said, you know, it's a country that's facing many corruption issues.
00;14;51;27 - 00;15;02;01
Speaker
So, there's the possibilities of bribing your way through it, or at least working with the powers that be to actually trafficked these victims, basically uninterrupted.
00;15;02;07 - 00;15;18;26
Speaker
Okay. Well, how do you like, for example, when I think about trafficking, especially with, like young children, I don't know why, but places in Asia pop into my mind. And it's just sort of maybe because of what I've seen on the media and even in the past week or two, what I've seen, you know, stories on YouTube and things like that,
00;15;18;26 - 00;15;25;14
Speaker
you'll see people that travel on these vacays, these so-called vacations, and they head up over to some Asian country,
00;15;25;14 - 00;15;27;23
Speaker
to do whatever they have to do.
00;15;27;28 - 00;15;31;06
Speaker
So are there certain places in the world were,
00;15;31;06 - 00;15;36;12
Speaker
you know, trafficking of young children is, you know, rampant? And then
00;15;36;12 - 00;15;43;25
Speaker
where in the world would you say is probably the biggest location or the largest country for cyber trafficking?
00;15;43;25 - 00;16;15;09
Speaker
well, America is the largest buyer of trafficked victims. So that would make them the have yes, they are markets in in in in the Middle East and the Far East. But these victims are often sold through on to American buyers or American buyers visit these countries in order to abuse these trafficked victims and they're sold online or auctioned online.
00;16;15;11 - 00;16;40;16
Speaker
It's very simple. It's very interesting when you look at the recruit and the sale. So, we see a couple of different categories here. So, they're either recruited online and sold online, they could be recruited in the real world and sold online or recruited online and sold in the real world or recruited online and sold both online and in the real world.
00;16;40;19 - 00;16;53;27
Speaker
So, it's very interesting. You always have to follow the buyer, follow the money, because the country bit where you have the most buyers is the country that will be the hub and that is the USA.
00;16;53;27 - 00;16;57;21
Speaker
what is what is a typical way that,
00;16;57;21 - 00;17;11;12
Speaker
a predator goes from a very innocuous post or a text message or something like that all the way to, you know, getting these, you know, children to perform sexual acts on camera.
00;17;11;12 - 00;17;15;23
Speaker
Like what? What how does that what's that process like?
00;17;15;23 - 00;17;27;12
Speaker
Well, okay, let's use one of our South African cases as a case study here. So, this was this was an interesting one. We had a chap named Ken BLOCK in South Africa.
00;17;27;14 - 00;17;57;15
Speaker
He was a youth pastor, so Mr. Lock in his position that he was in. He was also a very good photographer. He was a surfing photographer, so he would upload well, upload a, a page where he would capture data, which looked like Instagram. Then he would send this link to the kids that the girls in in the in the in the church.
00;17;57;18 - 00;18;24;29
Speaker
He would then tell the girls, please, would you go and vote for my photograph? They would land on this Instagram page that put in the logging details. And let me just think the link didn't work. So, they'd go. Meanwhile, he had now grabbed all their credentials from this page. He would then at night log in as one of the young girls and then solicit the boys to send him images, which they did.
00;18;24;29 - 00;18;47;01
Speaker
You know, boys, young boys don't think too well. And the more we try and teach them dancing images of your face and you as your private areas in the same so that they don't learn. But anyway, so they would do that and then he would ask for more material, and he would ask for more material. But this as the girl and these boys would oblige.
00;18;47;05 - 00;19;15;11
Speaker
And then finally the kids would realize this has gone too far. This is now becoming really lewd. And they were afraid. And he would tell them, then you cannot go to the police, because given what you've already posted, the peaceful arrest you. So, they were terrified. So, who did they go to the youth pastor for help. So, they went off to Mr. Locke in his capacity as the youth pastor, who then say to them, well, you know what?
00;19;15;11 - 00;19;46;15
Speaker
You don't really have a choice here. There's nothing. Nobody's going to help you. So please go. And even if you need to use my, my laptop, go up to my study and masturbate and do what you have to do. And then, you know, hopefully they'll go away. And then he would take the material and sell it and or trade it because these pedophilic, this pedophilia attendance, these people with these tendencies, they tend to trade materials.
00;19;46;17 - 00;20;19;12
Speaker
So when we do have an arrest of this nature where we have this type of perpetrator, which is a cyber trafficker, we often find that these cases are linked and we'll find the addresses and shared components of 45,000, maybe even more, up to 7000 IP addresses from people that have traded this material. So, it is it is interesting because this opens up the networks and this is all being done.
00;20;19;14 - 00;20;36;10
Speaker
People think that it's this is on the deep web. It's not this isn't deep or dark web. This is surface wave. This is this is not trading. There's no dark web involved here. I mean, once we move to the dark Web, it's a whole different ballgame again. But this is this is this really.
00;20;36;10 - 00;20;46;16
Speaker
hey, I was just going to ask you that. Like, you know, this is all done right on. You know, obviously, Instagram, he's logging into their Instagram accounts and he's doing this all like right on the surface. So, there's nothing.
00;20;46;16 - 00;20;50;28
Speaker
very hidden. And so, who you caught on in that case? Most
00;20;50;28 - 00;20;53;16
Speaker
trafficking is like most cybercrime.
00;20;53;16 - 00;21;01;05
Speaker
It starts with identity theft to because they hide behind what we call the veil of anonymity.
00;21;01;05 - 00;21;20;05
Speaker
And most of these perpetrators become quite skilled at hiding behind this veil of anonymity and actually hiding their identities as Mr. Locke. He didn't he didn't have to. He captured the data, the credentials of the girls, and then he exploited the boys.
00;21;20;07 - 00;21;45;10
Speaker
So that and that's fairly common. I one of the children actually made a report and then US Homeland Security did the digital forensics for this in cooperation with the South African police which was fantastic and that's what I say South Africa's really jacked and the relationships between these entities all are solid. And they do get assistance.
00;21;45;12 - 00;22;15;23
Speaker
And this is what these people don't understand. You know, when you traffic, it doesn't matter from where you traffic if you traffic from South Africa, if you traffic from Finland or you traffic from Asia, it doesn't matter. Once you upload those images onto American server, you can be prosecuted under American law. So, if you upload onto a Google server or a Facebook server or Instagram server, you're uploading onto an American server.
00;22;15;25 - 00;22;24;15
Speaker
And then it's very easy for law enforcement to get the subpoenas. And in fact, you can be extradited to stand trial in America.
00;22;24;15 - 00;22;36;29
Speaker
I was going to bring up a slide and it was something that you sent me, but I think it's an important point and it has to do with the actual value like that. There has to be some monetary benefit into all this because otherwise people wouldn't actually risk this.
00;22;36;29 - 00;23;00;22
Speaker
But the slide you sent me was asked it was actually with respect to Canada, which is obviously where I live, and looking at some of the values of, you know, what, you can sell somebody for a profit in a week or a month or a year. So, is this similar around the world or are there places where people get more or less money, it's more profitable or less profitable?
00;23;00;22 - 00;23;16;04
Speaker
I think it doesn't it's pretty standard, you know, depending on if you're in the poorest countries in Africa, it would probably be less. But for the US market, the Canadian market, that makes them maybe Mexico might be less.
00;23;16;06 - 00;23;47;03
Speaker
I think you have to look at the value of the currency. But for Canada that would be pretty accurate. And that's dealing in children, you know, from the ages of 12 to 25. The more outlandish or the more bizarre the sexual favors that are requested, the higher the rates will be. So, if you're dealing with very young children or you're looking for victims that are between the ages of two and four, for example, you'll pay more.
00;23;47;05 - 00;24;06;28
Speaker
The unfortunate thing is that these children have a very short shelf life. They rarely survive longer than two years working life. And then they are either sold into the labor trafficking markets, not the sex trafficking markets, because they're no longer suitable, or they simply murdered for organs.
00;24;06;28 - 00;24;21;08
Speaker
now what about the we talked about how much they make, but what about the transfer of money like. So where does that is that in like is there a role that crypto currencies play here or is it even not even that complicated?
00;24;21;08 - 00;24;27;08
Speaker
People are doing things over PayPal, credit cards or whatever. How is the transfer of money happening?
00;24;27;08 - 00;24;34;17
Speaker
it's not that complicated. So, it's either cash, which is laundered through cash, businesses and casinos and these sorts of things.
00;24;34;24 - 00;25;03;14
Speaker
Typical organized crime set up nothing different. So, either you know, or your general money laundering techniques will work when you're dealing with cash. Alternatively, I mean, this is organized crime, so they're either laundering the money through business. Basically, the entire crypto market. So, it's vast. If they're trading on the on the Dark web thing, generally it's Krypton.
00;25;03;14 - 00;25;20;17
Speaker
Question about obviously going through the pandemic. So was there a now I would say the pandemic is well over. Is it having there been a reduction in cyber trafficking? Was it just something that got, you know, it was because of the pandemic or is it still sort of at its all time high?
00;25;20;17 - 00;25;23;29
Speaker
notes and it's all time high.
00;25;23;29 - 00;25;31;21
Speaker
The thing is, although the pandemic is over, the financial effects of the pandemic are not over. They're not even nearly over.
00;25;31;21 - 00;25;49;22
Speaker
us. I think we will still be seeing the effects of the pandemic for at least another five years. And that's if we don't get driven into another pandemic. Looks like it must feel like a given. Yeah, given the changes of some of these people.
00;25;49;24 - 00;26;24;05
Speaker
But anyway, besides that, so we had a lot of problems with COVID because we had vulnerable societies literally with their freedom deprived, locked up in houses. Many, many, many people lost their jobs. They became desperate. The family, the family locked up in the house was a source of income. They would simply turn one bedroom into an area where they could perform sex acts on the children informants and start to traffic these kids that are from the actual home.
00;26;24;07 - 00;27;02;01
Speaker
Of course, another problem was that law enforcement was severely stressed and curtailed during that time. The funding dried up because companies were struggling so that the funding for the NGOs dried up. The NGOs also were no longer mobile. So, we had a lot of knock-on effects which were direct related to COVID. And that's not going away because once a criminal finds a really easy way of making money, they're not going to stop just because the circumstance stops.
00;27;02;03 - 00;27;23;26
Speaker
But now the kids can go to school, and they are allowed to I mean, with back to normality with reference to that. But there's nothing to stop them trafficking those children in the evenings or in the afternoons. And they've learned the methodologies, they've invested in the technology and the lighting and everything else. They're not going to throw it away.
00;27;23;28 - 00;27;26;09
Speaker
And they found a way to make money.
00;27;26;09 - 00;27;28;21
Speaker
Yeah. I want to ask you about another case.
00;27;28;21 - 00;27;35;24
Speaker
It's I guess it's the South African version of Jeffrey Epstein where North America has Jeffrey Epstein, and you had your own version of that.
00;27;35;24 - 00;27;40;22
Speaker
But it's just this other guy who I believe is in prison now. He's probably not coming out anytime soon.
00;27;40;22 - 00;27;46;17
Speaker
is Bernard Ackermann. AKERMAN Yeah. What can you tell me about him?
00;27;46;17 - 00;27;51;08
Speaker
very much well, very like Epstein also traded in kids.
00;27;51;08 - 00;28;01;05
Speaker
he actually had 740 cases brought against him. The trial has been completed. He has been found guilty on multiple counts.
00;28;01;05 - 00;28;05;27
Speaker
I'm not 100% sure if he's been sentenced, I'd have to check that.
00;28;05;27 - 00;28;08;16
Speaker
But he's facing multiple life sentences.
00;28;08;16 - 00;28;10;01
Speaker
He'll go to prison.
00;28;10;01 - 00;28;38;27
Speaker
again, you know, against the solicitation of very vulnerable victims. And this is what happens, unfortunately. You know, it's although anybody can be trafficked, let's just be very clear. It doesn't matter who you are or where you come from, what your risk factors are, anybody can be trafficked. But the problem is, is the vulnerable are targeted and they're easy to exploit because of desperation.
00;28;38;29 - 00;29;06;25
Speaker
So, again, the recruitment of vulnerable victims and the sale of these victims online, again, these cases open up multiple avenues for investigation because of the sharing of the material. So, again, this case also opened up a huge amount of IP addresses that are currently under investigation, increasing the trafficking where investigators are looking at other members of the trafficking rings.
00;29;06;25 - 00;29;29;23
Speaker
Yeah, it's interesting. The I was reviewing the Amanda Todd case here and here in Canada. And, you know, she for those who don't know that, you know, basically a young woman, she's online and, you know, she ends up she ends up flashing, you know, for the camera and it's through. Yeah. And then through, you know, the just embarrassment and shaming.
00;29;29;23 - 00;29;53;15
Speaker
And this one particular individual, which wasn't in Canada, which was I believe he was in the Netherlands. In the Netherlands. Yeah. He was Dutch. Just kept after her no matter where she went. And yeah. But it, it was when I was looking and reviewing the story, you know, she wasn't completely nude or whatever. Yes. It was embarrassing or whatever.
00;29;53;15 - 00;30;05;26
Speaker
But that's not, I think what got her. It was the stress of continuously being harassed and followed. And yeah, like there was nowhere for her to Yeah. Nowhere for her to escape. So
00;30;05;26 - 00;30;09;19
Speaker
in that case it wasn't so much the act, it was the fact that she was vulnerable.
00;30;10;23 - 00;30;44;16
Speaker
Yes. And this was a cyberbullying case. But if you actually look at the facts of the case, that case could have been prosecuted as trafficking because she was targeted, recruited and terrorized. And exploited. And for the purposes of exploitation, that exploitation doesn't have to be monetary. It can be for sexual gratification. So, yes, that's a case that should have and could have been prosecuted as trafficking.
00;30;44;19 - 00;31;14;27
Speaker
And this is what we're doing in South Africa now. We're taking cases that would have been prosecuted as rape or would have been prosecuted as molestation or indecent assault or any of these types of cases. And we are prosecuting them as trafficking, because under South African law now the law is this time that if you own the trucking company that moves the victim, you can be prosecuted for trafficking.
00;31;15;00 - 00;31;42;02
Speaker
If you own a house where the victim is kept, you can be prosecuted for trafficking. You form part of the trafficking ring. And that's what we have to do. We have to prosecute all acts involved in the trafficking as trafficking and not as the common law. Common crimes. And if we do that, we can close it down fairly quickly.
00;31;42;02 - 00;31;53;06
Speaker
Yeah. You talk. So, I'm going to bring up a question here from Amber. She's asking how often you invited to discuss the profiles of the buyers of those being trafficked to labor or sex.
00;31;53;06 - 00;32;21;26
Speaker
fairly often it is. Look, we've got various profiles that we do look at. We look at the profiles of both actually the victim and the perpetrator. But, you know, there's some very specific personality trait traits that raise their heads over and over again. And one of these is the lack of empathy, complete lack of empathy that victim to that trafficker is not a person, it's a commodity.
00;32;21;28 - 00;32;47;20
Speaker
And so, they are seen as a commodity. They are treated as a commodity. They are exploited until they have no further use in the sex trafficking market as a commodity. And then a lot of these cases that are murdered and they organs are once again sold as a commodity. So, they have there's no humanity in these people. And that's something that you have to bear in mind.
00;32;47;22 - 00;33;25;25
Speaker
These people do not view their victims as human. They view them as things to be as a as a vessel to be met, for money to be made of them, which is very, very sad. But you're dealing with psychopathic type personalities in order to actually reach. One of the primary traits of psychopathy is a complete lack of empathy, and most people involved in the trafficking trade have that complete lack of empathy.
00;33;25;25 - 00;33;45;26
Speaker
Yeah, you just you know, you mentioned that, you know, they're using these victims. It's bad enough already, you know, for sex profit or whatever. But now, you know, when you said they're actually murdering them for organs like that's absolutely it's that's a pretty dark place to be at that.
00;33;45;26 - 00;34;09;24
Speaker
That's hard to imagine that people can go that far. But unfortunately, I think, yeah, that's just the reality of what we're faced with in some places. It's probably going to happen. And again, there's a market for that too, right? In terms of and I think there was a there's a graphic I'm going to look for here, but I believe you had something where it actually shows your body parts and what kind of money you can make on the body parts.
00;34;09;27 - 00;34;17;28
Speaker
I'm going to see if I can bring it up. Oh, yeah. Here's one here. I'll bring it up here. And I'm not sure where you got this graphic from, but what can you say? You know, this is.
00;34;17;28 - 00;34;47;29
Speaker
quite an old one. So, the values are a little bit higher than that now. But yeah, you can see that it's you with quite a bit of money. You know, heart now goes for very good money, you know, up to $150,000 for a heart and lungs similar. So yeah, once you start breaking down the human body I mean even today with organ transplants, even the skin is worth money.
00;34;48;01 - 00;35;14;11
Speaker
You know, they harvest the skin for skin transplants today. So, it's not just the that the actual organs anymore. I mean, the skin is an organ, obviously, but even that's worth money, so. And your hair is worth money for it to be made wigs out of. You know, everything has a price. Everything has a cost. And these people are only interested in that commodity market.
00;35;14;11 - 00;35;36;10
Speaker
I want to ask you about or start moving into the investigation of these types of crimes and the role that the police have play and the kinds of tools that they have as well. So do the police. I mean, nowadays I'm pretty sure that, you know, the police will often try to bait some of these people in the background.
00;35;36;13 - 00;35;51;27
Speaker
You know, they're also hiding there. The police are hiding their own identity and, you know, pretending that they're maybe young women or something like that. But what kinds of tools or what kinds of ways are there that the police are investigating and trying to fight this type of crime?
00;35;52;03 - 00;36;19;01
Speaker
So, like, often what happens with a police investigation, it will lead you to a specific website. And once that perpetrator has been identified and arrested and often, they will give up the credentials of that website and then the police will take over and operate that website for a number of months and identify everything that they can from that website before they shut it down.
00;36;19;04 - 00;36;43;06
Speaker
So, they will actually become the operators of the website. And that's where you get the best information that you can get. I mean, obviously they're also extremely powerful law enforcement forensics tools. They will take their, they'll take the devices. They'll make copies of the of forensic copies of the devices. It's very interesting when that happens.
00;36;43;08 - 00;37;11;17
Speaker
It was something I learned from some of the forensic scholars here. They never reuse a hard drive, so it cannot be used twice. So, every hard drive that's used for every dump is a brand-new hard drive. So, the police here go through absolute mountains of hard drives. And you know, the problem in South Africa and it's not a problem worldwide, is that they do lack resources.
00;37;11;19 - 00;37;47;17
Speaker
But there are a number of really fabulous companies that will actually assist. So, with the South African police, where there is a problem, we do have a Soviet unit, but we don't have enough people to actually deal with the amount of crime that that that we deal that we have to deal with. So, we're now looking at initiatives on how we can sort of use the private sector to assist with this type of work.
00;37;47;19 - 00;38;10;15
Speaker
And they offer fantastic tools out there if somebody wants to get into it. I mean, there's a fabulous investigative tool out there called Maltego. A lot of the investigators use it. There's another one called Traffic Jam, which is used to hunt traffickers. It's an AI tool. And of course, I'm going to be playing more, more role if anybody wants to research that.
00;38;10;15 - 00;38;50;07
Speaker
I have sent you some links, which we're more than happy to share. And then, you know, because I am a criminologist, so I'm not a techie, I must be quite frank with you. I'm working inside the company, but I'm not a techie. So, we work very closely with a fantastic company, which Richard Gill runs and an American named Alissa Gober Check, and they have a company called CyberKnife Watch that does our operational I'll send for us.
00;38;50;09 - 00;39;15;28
Speaker
So, they will search and look very carefully at everything. So, we work closely with them and there are other organizations that do this. We used to do a lot of work with Deliver Fund, but we found that unless size is it is very, very good at her job. So they are, you know, if you do have a problem, if you are stalked online or anything like that, you can contact us.
00;39;15;28 - 00;39;40;24
Speaker
It's over 80 and we're more than happy to share details with saw the north watch and have that script for you. And there are millions of tools I have given you a list as well which we can add as a link there. There are many, many, many tools that you can use if you are interested in this field and also enlisted us.
00;39;40;24 - 00;40;11;05
Speaker
And we do a lot of training together and Alissa does a lot of training as well on actually how to operate these tools and to upskill and empower people to use them. I mean, there's a tool for everything at the moment, literally everything. There are emails, scrapers, Facebook, login credentials, scrapers, Twitter scrapers, maltego scribes, everything, the cell phone trackers, you know, and that's not even talking about what law enforcement can actually do.
00;40;11;05 - 00;40;34;18
Speaker
I mean, Interpol has huge databases. The UNODC has huge databases. So, the forensic aspects of the resources that that if governments and these organizations work together, we could you know, there's huge scope for closing down these operations.
00;40;34;18 - 00;40;47;26
Speaker
Yeah, I've got another question here, and I'm going to I'm going to bring it up here. But what are the challenges faced by child trafficking profilers in their efforts to dismantle networks in the global child sex trade? And what can individuals or communities do to support these efforts?
00;40;47;26 - 00;41;00;14
Speaker
Well, there's a lot that we can do. So, one of the biggest problems not only for providers but for law enforcement is lack of resources for training.
00;41;00;16 - 00;41;28;19
Speaker
So that's a huge problem. So, anybody that's prepared to help with resources or donate for training purposes to upskill the police, that's always necessary. The NGOs struggle with things like housing the victims that they take that they actually take off the streets. These people have to be cared for, housed, assisted statements have to be taken trials.
00;41;28;20 - 00;41;57;16
Speaker
The visas have to be obtained when they have to take a deposit. And then there's a whole repatriation program. Providers like me. I think the main challenges that we face, all the psychological challenges because we see a lot, you know, you have to be very strong. Fortunately, I didn't have that problem. I'm very, very good at compartmentalizing. But maybe that's because of the serial crime as big as a profile.
00;41;57;17 - 00;42;33;25
Speaker
We specifically train that. But also, again, access to training, upskilling, working, evolving. The relationships can be tricky because a lot of the profilers are not employed by the police, the criminologists. And so, it's building those relationships and getting law enforcement to trust you, because, of course, that's if you're if your law enforcement doesn't trust you and doesn't want to work with you, it's very difficult to even offer to assist because you've pushed sideways.
00;42;33;25 - 00;43;07;26
Speaker
And in South Africa, criminology faces a lot of challenges because it actually isn't a professionalized occupation. It doesn't have professional status, it's not a social work and it's not under law. So, there are challenges there as well. But I'd say your everyday challenges are just staying abreast of the technology, making sure that you because unfortunately we wake up today, we have this technology, the perpetrators wake up and they dream up another four things that they can do and use.
00;43;07;29 - 00;43;47;20
Speaker
So, it's keeping track of the trends, really monitoring what is going on, staying appraised, staying strong, you know, looking after yourself physically and mentally so that you actually get up each day able to do the job and knowing that you can. And, you know, just I think every day has it has different challenges. But the biggest the biggest challenge that we do see is having to wade through hours and hours and hours and hours of video tape where children are being abused and the impact that that has on people can be quite severe.
00;43;48;07 - 00;44;07;29
Speaker
Yeah. You brought up another point about the fact that there's no using there's like no whatever. So, for example, where do where does somebody go if they want to turn this into a career, if they want to study this, if they want to learn about this particular area, what's, what's the best avenue.
00;44;08;20 - 00;44;29;13
Speaker
So, you can there is a certification. You actually go to university, and you get a degree and an honest and a masters. But what they've done, what they don't have in South Africa, is a professional body. So, if you're a medical doctor, you can register with the Health Professionals Council. If you're a lawyer, you registered with the ball.
00;44;29;15 - 00;44;54;03
Speaker
But as far as criminologists go, there's no body to register with, mainly because of in-fighting with the universities. They can't even decide on what qualifications you need. So, you and I mean, I have 20, 30 applications every week of people saying, can you I come and do an interview with Chip with you? You cannot job Shadow You can.
00;44;54;05 - 00;45;20;20
Speaker
But even that is difficult because, again, it's those trust relationships. You can't bring a young kid that's from university nine to a job shadowing with the same sort of victim and expect victim to open up to you. You know, sometimes it's difficult to do. But sobriety, we do everything that we can to assist with upskilling and to assist the police, to assist the NGOs.
00;45;20;20 - 00;45;36;09
Speaker
Anybody that reaches out to us, we do these types of webinars, you know, but they challenge, and it's been for a long time. And I mean, this has been going on for 15 years and it's the academics that can't get their act together any.
00;45;36;09 - 00;46;03;13
Speaker
really interesting. Yeah, I mean, I know that in the traditional sense, most of the universities and schools that I know of are doing the traditional forensics or, you know, which is, you know, the DNA and the anthropology and the biology and the chemistry and, you know, maybe a little bit of some of the physical sciences, but very few of them are doing things on the in the crimes let's call them side.
00;46;03;13 - 00;46;17;20
Speaker
So, it's almost like you have to come from a computer background as opposed to more of a forensics background. So, I have to I'll have to do some research into that and see if there's anything, for example, in Canada right now, I'm not aware of any programs that focus specifically on that.
00;46;17;20 - 00;46;25;01
Speaker
Yes, and neither am I. And that's why we are really trying sorry. And we are having the lighting just changed.
00;46;25;01 - 00;46;58;11
Speaker
I do apologize. We are we have a little issue in South Africa. It's called loadshedding, where we don't have electricity for a couple of hours at a time, which is a real, real challenge. So that's another challenge to South African profile is face is no power. But you also you know, that's another challenge in this country, for example, even with trafficking, because when all the electricity doesn't work, then so many more opportunities open up to criminals.
00;46;58;13 - 00;47;31;16
Speaker
So, yeah, so to get back to what we were saying is the training. So that's what cyber does. We focus very much on the training and the upskilling of we start at primary school level and we do cyberbullying courses and we teach children how to approach online predation, how to reach out for help, how to how to put the WhatsApp settings, security settings app, how to how to set the Facebook settings.
00;47;31;19 - 00;48;23;14
Speaker
And then we move through to the cyber stalking aspects and the predation aspects. And then we as I said, we train the police in these types of, of, of crimes. Well, so we very, very focused on, on, on awareness, but also on actually providing hard skills to the people that we train. We maybe even do things like we work with an Israeli law lawyer who's one of the top crypto lawyers and we will teach the police how to track the NFT on the blockchain, how to track Bitcoin on the blockchain, because with as with anything else, following the money in these types of crimes causes organized crimes and syndicates, you have to follow
00;48;23;14 - 00;48;45;05
Speaker
the money to tie up the syndicate. So, these are skills that are just in short supply, but we really focus its operation on building these skills and we do a lot of pro-bono work. I do a lot of pro bono work for the courts because for me it's this I'm passionate about it. It's like this has to stop.
00;48;45;05 - 00;49;15;19
Speaker
We've got to protect our kids. And, you know, people think that it's that it's just girls. It's not me, boy, boy, children. Now represent 30% of the victims, 30% of children trafficked at the moment of boys, and they trafficked into sex trafficking. You know, it's a lot of the public doesn't realize that it's everybody is vulnerable. And unfortunately, people not trusting.
00;49;15;22 - 00;49;23;07
Speaker
You know, people don't want to believe the worst of other people. And by the time they do, it's too late. They're trapped and they can't get off.
00;49;23;07 - 00;49;36;04
Speaker
Yeah, well, education, I think, is a big part of it, as you said, because and I think in a previous conversation that we had, you mentioned also, you know, sometimes victims, they don't know where to go or they fear the authorities.
00;49;36;04 - 00;49;41;21
Speaker
They don't know they don't either because of shame or, you know, they're afraid of being embarrassed or something. But
00;49;41;21 - 00;50;04;11
Speaker
Well, it's more than that because they all remember that they often find themselves in a different country of origin from their own. They are possible self confiscated. They're actually then illegally in the country because they have no documentation in South Africa, especially, we've had a lot of xenophobic attacks.
00;50;04;11 - 00;50;29;03
Speaker
And, you know, we go through these xenophobic periods and where foreigners are targeted and unfortunately the police are not always kind, especially the police at station level. You know, once you move up the rank and you start to move into the specialized units, it's different. But at station level and on the ground, it's horrific for these people.
00;50;29;21 - 00;51;00;23
Speaker
Let me ask you about something that I think is important and we better I want to bring it up on screen here, but it had to do with the advertising of, you know, or trying to tell the difference between what is a I'll say, a legal ad online and something which is suspicious. And I have these graphics here that you provided me and I'm not sure if you want to do them in any particular order, but maybe you can explain some of the differences of what to look for sometimes online in these ads.
00;51;01;05 - 00;52;05;11
Speaker
Yeah. So, when a prostitute, a general prostitute advertises her services online, you'll see something like this ad that we have on screen now. Now they a prostitute working for herself can set limits so she can say I'm available from 8 to 5. I don't do BDSM. I am willing to do this and this and this. So they set limits that often that the images that they put on or classy they're you know that all their selfies a lot of the time because they're taken by them because it's all it's all willing where they're trafficked victim you won't see that you will see degrading images more than then you'll see these types of
00;52;05;11 - 00;52;34;05
Speaker
glossy type images and there's a lot of things that you'll look for in a trafficked victim. I'm quite happy to make these graphics available as well. So, we can actually put I'll send you a word document which we can link in. But the things that you can look for in a trafficked victim or keywords such as new in town, because what they do is check victims is they move them from town to town to town to town.
00;52;34;05 - 00;53;04;01
Speaker
So, they'll only stay in a certain area for a short time because once they've been used by that time, tell them, then bored with them. So, they move them, and they'll move. A new set of goals in the new in town is quite common thing that you'll see. You'll also see sometimes new girl. You'll also see any age accepted, you'll see any and no limits on what they'll offer.
00;53;04;01 - 00;53;32;21
Speaker
You'll see things like no law enforcement, you'll see fresh. The word fresh comes up quite often. Snow Bunny tunes like that here for a short time again which pushes that that you know that the girl they need to get in quickly because the goal will be moved in a short time if you look at the image that you've got there.
00;53;32;23 - 00;54;04;16
Speaker
She didn't actually have that image with me at the moment. But if you look at the next image, the image of the actual trafficked victim, you will see that you can pick either of those two. So, for example, there you'll see that the imagery is much more graphic. It's bordered bordering on vulgar type imagery. It's the image is taken usually by a third party and not by the victim themselves.
00;54;04;19 - 00;54;31;06
Speaker
There's the edit will say the subject is independent, but the phone number will be attributed to many victims and not just one. You'll also see that the images and the verbiage is present and the description or the categories that they prepared to enter into are much greater. You'll see in this one, for example, they only speak Russian and Ukrainian.
00;54;31;13 - 00;55;03;00
Speaker
Now, of course, with the war, we've seen a massive increase in Ukrainian victims because they're vulnerable at the moment of that and that you'll see that that victim is advertised in Poland. But she speaks Russian and Ukrainian and very little German. So that's that would be something to look for. They're also will advertise the sexual services in other destination countries, such as, for example, she'll be in Germany in a few months.
00;55;03;02 - 00;55;32;29
Speaker
If you look at them, they also have often had physical marks on the body because often they are beaten up. They're also often look malnourished. They look very stressed. They usually say these victims are available 24 seven and that that are willing to travel. The subject is usually advised to as a calling only and often they'll blow the victim as face.
00;55;33;04 - 00;56;01;21
Speaker
So, the face won't be visible because they have to do that because there's reverse image search tools that will search for Patrick Tam's facial features. And then also, you know, they may advertise medically risky services like anal, you know, and all the angels. And the beauty is that service and things like that. So, these are things that you can look for as members of the public.
00;56;01;21 - 00;56;35;05
Speaker
So, if you see these types of advertised advertisements where the victim is being degraded, that's a very good indicator. And then, Eugene, I don't know if you've got the other slide there. There are some interesting things there that we can just quickly have a look at, and that's the emoji indicators, which is another very interesting one, because a lot of the traffic victims and the online ads have certain emojis that are used to portray certain products.
00;56;35;07 - 00;57;02;07
Speaker
We wouldn't say, well, even are they're referred to as products. So, there you would use like a pink flower, a pink heart for a young boy or a man or a child or a young girl. If they move on the move, they'll put an airplane. If they're under a pump or a traffic control, they'll have the crown. If you've got you know, there's a whole bunch there that you can actually see.
00;57;02;09 - 00;57;43;16
Speaker
There are symbols for two goals facial, a snow bunny, a penis, oral sex. So that's often just depicted with the of magic. But the trafficker, the johns, the actual buyer are very well aware of these indicators. So they are as I said, I'm more than happy to put this in a word document and make it available and we can add it into the links because this is something where the public can actually a really, really assist a lot because, I mean, you guys are on the web a lot and you may be exposed to something like this.
00;57;43;18 - 00;58;10;26
Speaker
And if you are, I'm sure we're going to we're going to share some great details and you're welcome to get hold of us. If you noticed this type of advert, we could point law enforcement to it very, very quickly and we can track. So please do keep a lookout for these types of advertisements.
00;58;10;28 - 00;58;49;08
Speaker
And this is surface web. This is not Dark web. This is surface where Twitter is. It is a monster telegram. It's all over the telegram groups tell the telegram is basically trafficking world. So is Twitter. Twitter has a huge amount of human trafficking on it. Facebook, Instagram, Tinder disaster for recruitment. Yeah, so basically all the social media sites are vehicles for these types of efforts.
00;58;49;08 - 00;58;58;08
Speaker
Okay. Let me ask you, what's next for you in terms in this area? Are there are there any areas in particular that you're pursuing much deeper?
00;58;58;08 - 00;59;02;24
Speaker
than maybe some other areas? Or like what's next for you?
00;59;04;02 - 00;59;37;13
Speaker
So, we will continue to I will continue to fight the fighters visit again, I'll continue to work with the youth and upskilling them on the on the cyber trafficking. Of course, I will continue with my expert witness testimony and the other criminal work that I do. I will help law enforcement the best I can. I also do a lot of commercial work where we assist people that are victims of sextortion and these types of crimes, which I will continue to do.
00;59;37;16 - 01;00;00;03
Speaker
I am on a little mission at the moment. However, because I'm trying to upskill myself in the US so that I don't have to be as reliable on the techies as I am at the moment. So, I'm doing my best to become a semi techie. I think I just totally take a few years that I'm working on that and also just I upskill permanently.
01;00;00;03 - 01;00;22;23
Speaker
So, I'm always doing courses in psychology and trying to do two or three courses every month just to upskill and learn something new every day because. I think for all of us, as long as one day is wasted, we move forward with our life. And I think knowledge is power and I'm on a quest to have more and more knowledge.
01;00;22;23 - 01;00;37;07
Speaker
Yes, definitely. Well, I want to send out the this is the link to your website. It's cyber radio.com. And there's a contact page there. So, you could go there and there's an email address, I guess, where people can reach out to you.
01;00;37;09 - 01;00;40;12
Speaker
Would it be okay if I showed your LinkedIn account as well?
01;00;40;19 - 01;00;45;22
Speaker
Yes, absolutely. My LinkedIn's the company's LinkedIn space.
01;00;45;22 - 01;00;58;18
Speaker
Yep, Yeah, there it is. So you can also reach out I guess there is then people can message you or get a hold of you if they want to talk to you about a case or if they want to talk about training and that sort of thing, they can always, Yeah, yeah.
01;00;58;19 - 01;01;01;08
Speaker
Reach you somehow, you're available.
01;01;01;08 - 01;01;18;25
Speaker
Yes, absolutely. And as I said, if they need technical assistance, we're more than happy to post them along to that. Alyssa and she does an awesome job on the tech side. So now just make contact with me and we'll make sure that you end up with somebody that can actually assist.
01;01;18;25 - 01;01;19;02
Speaker
me.
01;01;19;05 - 01;01;21;22
Speaker
Excellent. Well, look, I want to thank you very much.
01;01;21;22 - 01;01;45;01
Speaker
for this informative talk. It's not something that I've really addressed before, and there's a lot going on the cyber side. I was there's a lot recently that looking online about the growth of not just cyber trafficking but just cyber crimes in general, they're just going off the charts because everyone is online these days and the criminals are getting smarter and smarter about, you know, how they are getting you.
01;01;45;03 - 01;02;05;12
Speaker
And I can't stand it because I can't get you know, I don't know about you, but, you know, junk emails and calls and texts and now they just there's just so much everyone's getting bombarded with garbage. And you know that if you just one day inadvertently click on the wrong link or something, you know, it's going to mess you up for a long time, you know,
01;02;05;12 - 01;02;06;04
Speaker
while we work.
01;02;06;04 - 01;02;31;14
Speaker
We work with that. So, if people have problems and they're worried about the general cyber security, we have developed some checklists. So, if you do get hold of me, we could send you the checklist that you can actually do the tests, get a score, see, you're vulnerable and we at least need to start to fix things. You know, we've developed checklists around business risk, around digital risk, reputation risk.
01;02;31;17 - 01;02;42;08
Speaker
So basically, everything to do with protecting yourself online. So, yeah, just get a hold of us and we'll help. And if we can't help, we'll find somebody who can.
01;02;42;08 - 01;02;49;21
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. Well, Laurie, thank you so much. Really appreciate it. Do me a favor. Hang back for a second because I want to come back and just chat with you for a little bit.
01;02;49;21 - 01;03;02;02
Speaker
But yeah, I really appreciate your time. And I think in the future we'll have you back me with Alyssa and talking more about the technical tools and other things around, just cybercrimes.
01;03;02;02 - 01;03;14;05
Speaker
Thank you for having me. And to everybody that popped in and listen to the chat, thank you for all your time and patience and I hope the topic was at least informative and maybe we saved a life today.
01;03;14;05 - 01;03;15;05
Speaker
Let's.
01;03;15;05 - 01;03;16;18
Speaker
Let's hope so. Thank you.