Sex And Drugs And Websites

Some UK newspapers have recently made a stand against the adult services industry and now refuse to take adverts for escorts and massage parlours in their personal ads. While this sort of policy does show the press making a stand against people the people trafficking that can be associated with some of these operations it does very little to stamp out the real problem of organised crime making money out of the misery of the vulnerable.

Banning the advertising from the print media not going to be effective at removing the scourge of criminal gangs from our streets. Anyone can see that advertising in a newspaper is like a criminal sending a note to the police to say “Hello, we’re on this number, call us and we’ll tell you where we’re operating so you can come round and arrest us.” There is a far cheaper and more anonymous medium on which to advertise the services of your unfortunate employees/slaves. The Internet.

As if to prove that police in London raided at 26 addresses in Paddington and Surrey this morning. Part of operation Gib the raids involved 110 officers and aimed to rescue 60 foreign nationals who had been smuggled into the country to work as prostitutes for organised crime gangs. The criminals have been detained in connection with trafficking, controlling prostitution and money laundering.

The women are now in protective custody and being given access to medical and social care, and support from specialist police and non-police personnel.

The Web is not a good or bad thing, it is a tool and like any tool it can be abused and used for evil. People trafficking is pure evil and I for one hope that operation Gib (and other operations like it currently in progress around the country) every success.