In brief
Australian Federal Police report a concerning rise in cases where girls are manipulated by online crime gangs to engage in violent behavior, often for the amusement of their abusers. With three arrests made in Australia and a taskforce on the move, police stress the urgent need for intervention to protect vulnerable youth from this alarming trend.
Australian girls are being hunted by online crime networks and coerced into acts of violence - against themselves, their siblings or pets - in a 'twisted type of gamification', police have warned.
A new Australian taskforce has been set up to help tackle this 'new and disturbing front in traditional gender-based violence', Australian Federal Police (AFP) Commissioner Krissy Barrett said in a speech on Wednesday.
Three people have already been arrested in Australia, and another nine people around the world.
The specific acts being coerced have not been detailed, but Ms Barrett stated that the alleged perpetrators are motivated by a desire to incite harm 'for fun.'
Aged in their late teens or early 20s, these 'crimefluencers' primarily recruit pre-teen or teenage girls through popular gaming platforms like Roblox and messaging apps such as Discord and Telegram. They typically promote ideologies including nihilism, sadism, Nazism, and satanism, specifically targeting girls with low self-esteem and mental health struggles.
'These groups operate similarly to multiplayer online gaming culture, hunting, stalking, and drawing in victims from various platforms,' said Ms Barrett, emphasizing that the nature of their motivations is not financial or sexual but stems from a need for amusement and online popularity.
Almost 60 alleged offenders have been identified in Australia, with the AFP collaborating with other Five Eyes nations—US, UK, New Zealand, and Canada—to address these groups.
In response to this rising threat, tech companies are assisting police in creating an AI tool designed to recognize codewords and emojis calculatedly used to discuss online exploitation.
This alarming situation was highlighted as Australia is preparing to implement a groundbreaking social media ban for those under 16, aimed at reducing online harm, although gaming and messaging platforms will be exempt from this regulation when it comes into force in December.
