The Canadian Centre for Child Protection has released a new study that gauges the effectiveness of Manitoba’s mandatory reporting of child pornography legislation (under section 18 of the Child and Family Services Act), which was enacted in April 2009. Under this legislation, any individual within Manitoba who sees something they believe to be child pornography is required by law to report it to Cybertip.ca. The study, titled Mandatory Reporting of Child Pornography in Manitoba: 2010-2011 Annual Review, analyzes the second-year impact of the legislation.
Owned and operated by the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, Cybertip.ca is Canada’s national tipline for reporting the online sexual exploitation of children. The research in Mandatory Reporting of Child Pornography in Manitoba: 2010-2011 Annual Review includes an analysis of reports submitted by individuals within the province of Manitoba under the category of child pornography between April 1, 2010, and March 31, 2011, and compares it with data from previous years. The results of this second year reveal that the legislation continues to be an effective tool to identify child victims of sexual abuse as well as suspects in child sexual abuse cases: - Building momentum: During this second year since the enactment of the legislation, there was a 10% increase over the first year in the number of child pornography reports submitted by individuals in Manitoba.
- Overall increase in reporting: Over the past two years since proclamation of mandatory reporting in Manitoba, there has been a 57% increase in the number of incidents classified by Cybertip.ca analysts as child pornography compared to the two years prior to proclamation.
- Responding to reports: Since proclamation of the legislation a total of 35 reports containing information on an identified child victim and/or suspect in Manitoba have been forwarded to child welfare. This has resulted in 3 substantiated abuse cases and 1 arrest by the Winnipeg Police Service.
