Transcripts For CSPAN3 Hearing On Human Trafficking 20151125

We were waiting until all the documents were circulated. This hearing will now come to order. Senator mccaskill and i have called this hearing to address the difficult but really important subject of sex trafficking. Over the past seven months the city has conducted a bipartisan investigation into how sex traffickers increasingly use the internet to advance their trade and evade detection. The name of this investigation is very straightforward. We want to understand how lawmakers, Law Enforcement, even private businesses can more effectively combat the serious crime that thrives online in this black market. As cochair of the Senate Caucus to end Human Trafficking and maybe more importantly is someone who represents the state has experienced some abhorrent sex trafficking networks, and maybe most importantly as a father, this is an issue i feel strongly about and have worked on over a number of years. I have spent time with those dedicated to fighting this crime and those victimized by it. For victims, the toll of sex trafficking is measured in childhoods stolen and has accounted for lots of dollars. Its a problem that i believe congress should pay more attention to. Precise data is hard to come by because this market exists in the shadows, but experts say there are as many as 27 million victims of Human Trafficking last year, including 4. 5 Million People trapped in Sexual Exploitation. In the United States, about eight of every ten suspected incidents of trafficking involve sex trafficking, 80 . Thats the sale of minors or for sale of adults for commercial sex. Sex traffickers prey on the vulnerable. The department of justice has reported that more than half of the sex trafficking victims are minors and the problem appears to be getting worse. Over the last five years the leading authority on Child Exploitation, the National Center for missing and exploited children that well hear from later today reported an 846 increase in reports of suspected child sex trafficking. The increase is, quote, directly correlated to the increased use of the internet to sell children for sex. Thats what this hearing is all about. Traffickers have found refuge in new customer websites that special in advertising socalled ordinary prostitution. And lawful escort businesses. A business called backpage. Com is the Market Leader in that industry. With the annual revenues in excess of 130 million last year, with a look and layout similar to craigslist. Com, backpage has a special niche. According to one industry analyst, in 2013 eight out of every ten dollars spent on commercial advertising goes to backpage. Eight out of ten dollars. Some of the advertising is legal. Much of it is illegal. A federal court in chicago noted that backpages Adult Services section overwhelmingly contains advertisement for prostitution including the prostitution of minors, end quote. The Public Record indicates backpage sits at the center of the online black market for sex trafficking. The National Center says that backpage is linked to 71 of all suspected child sex trafficking reports that it sees from the general public through cyber tips online. Think about that, 71 of all the suspected child sex trafficking reports that the center gets are related to backpage. According to a leading antitrafficking Organization Called shared Hope International, Service Providers working with sex trafficking victims have reported between 80 to 100 of their clients have been sold on backpage. Com, end quote. Its easy to see why the National Association of attorneys general described backpage as a hub of Human Trafficking, especially the trafficking of minors. Well hear more about that today. A recent study of press accounts reveals that scores of serious crimes are linked to backpage. Shared Hope International has more than 400 cases of children being trafficked using backpage across the state. On this record, psi saw a compelling need to better understand the Business Practices of backpage. Com. S especially the efforts it takes to limit the use of traffickers on their site. That seems very reasonable and thought it would be simple enough because backpage holds itself out as a critical ally against Human Trafficking. The company has stated it, quote, leads the industry in its review and screening of advertisements for illegal activity. A process it called moderation. Backpages top lawyer has described its moderation process as the key tool for disrupting and eventually ending Human Trafficking via the worldwide web. But backpage refused to turn over documents about this key moderation process that it touts as well as other aspects of its business. Specifically, the Company Refused to comply with a subpoe subpoena. July 7th says it have overbroad. Senator mccaskill and i agreed to withdraw the subpoena. We targeted a new subpoena to accommodate some of backpages concerns but the Company Refused to apply. Defiance of a congressional subpoena is rare and its serious. Backpage has tried to excuse its noncompliance based on a sweep of unconstitutional privilege. The companys argument is vague but summed up this way, backpage says the First Amendment to the constitution shields it from this investigation of advertising by sex traffickers because it also publishes some lawful advertisements that are protected speech. Its an interesting argument. It has no support in law or logic. In a detailed ruling on behalf of the subcommittee, senator mccaskill and i discussed why we think this is without merit. We also explained the great care that psi is taking this protection of personal interests here. And we have made that ruling publicly available today on psis website. And i encourage you to take a look at it. After overruling the backpage objections, we awarded the ceo to produce the documents we asked for by last thursday. November 12. That day came and went without no response. Then backpage informed psi that they would not comply. But at the same time backpage made a show of producing cherrypicked documents favorable to the Company Along with a 16,000 page of document that is the subcommittee does not need or is not seeking. We dont think backpages response to this subpoena has been in good faith. Its fine to have legal disagreements with us about constitutional privileges or the appropriateness of certain requests. We treat these objections very seriously. But backpage has done more than just raise illegal objection to producing certain documents. Just last week backpages lawyers told psi the company had not bothered to look for the documents responsive to by the up is. Had not bothered to look for the documents responsive to the subpoena. Which means backpage does not even know what all it is refusing to produce, much less why the documents should be protected by the First Amendment. Psi was disappointed by the compliance, noncompliance but are not deterred. The report reveals that backpage had practice of editing advertisements by deleting words and images before publication. This is important because changing the appearance of a published ad obviously does not change the advertised transaction. The staff report finds that in some cases the editing practices likely served to conceal evidence of the legality of the underlying transaction. That finding raises some very serious questions. We want to know more about the purpose and effect of these editing practices, which is why we issued a subpoena for documents to tell us whether and how backpages deletes, texts or images could alert Law Enforcement about a crime being advertised. When that failed, the subcommittee tried to take the testimony of two backpage employees and to charge them with moderation practices. But they refused to testify on the grounds it might incriminate them. Nevertheless, we continue to seek documents from backpage to allow us to understand this and other aspects of its screening process. In a moment senator mccaskill will describe other findings in greater detail. At the close of todays hearing, we will address the next steps the subcommittee plans to enforce the subpoena that backpage has violated. Im grateful to our Ranking Member, senator mccaskill and her staff for their shouldertoshoulder work on this bipartisan investigation and i would like to turn to her for her opening statement. Thank you, chairman portman for holding this hearing and thank you for the strong working relationship we have on this committee. Four months ago a 15yearold girl walked into cardinal glenn Childrens Hospital in st. Louis, missouri, and asked for help. Along with four other girls between the ages of 12 and 18, she had been sold for sex at truck stops across missouri, florida, texas and new mexico for almost two months. She was lucky to be alive. According to her police report, another girl traveling with her during those months had died in her arms. The 15yearold girl who walked into Cardinal Glennon like the majority of children who were sold for sex in the United States today was trafficked using backpage. Com. Throughout the subcommittees investigation, we have received information indicating that backpage has built a hugely successful business in part by posting advertisements of children and other victims of Human Trafficking on its website. And despite knowing that its website has hosted advertisements of children being sold for sex, backpage has apparently signaled to its moderators that those ads should remain on the site. In april, 2012, for example, backpage initially told its outside moderators they should, quote, fail, end quote, or remove as containing references to certain sex acts in words, including, quote, school girl, unquote, quote, teen, unquote, quote Human Trafficking, unquote, and quote yung, end quote. Two days later backpage reversed that policy. The employee responsible for moderation issued clarifications regarding the banned words. He instructed that moderators should no longer delete ads that contain young or misspellings of young. Those deletions were capturing too much volume, he explained. Because there were too many legitimate uses of the word to warrant a removal every time. Instead of deleting advertisements for services with young, the backpage employee instructed moderators to send the ads to him for additional review. We dont know how many, if any ads were removed following that additional review. We do know that backpage instructed its moderators to be very cautious about deleting ads. According to the manager of the moderators, quote, the definition of underage is anyone under the age of 18, but for the purposes of making reports, we err on the side of caution and try to report anyone that looks under the age of 21, end quote. Importantly, guidance from backpage emphasized in all capital letters, if in doubt about underage, the process should now be to accept the ad. If in doubt about underage, the process for now should be to accept the ad. And, quote, only delete if you are really very sure a person only delete if you are really very sure that a person is underage. Only delete if you really very sure a person is underage. That was all in all caps. The result of backpages guidance, of course, is the site contains numerous advertisements for sexual advertisements with children. The National Center for missing and exploited children are, for example, reports that 71 of the childs sex trafficking reports it receives involve ads posted on backpage. According to shared Hope International, Service Providers working with child sex trafficking victims reported between 80 and 100 of their clients had been bought and sold on backpage. Com. We have also learned that backpage has failed to preserve information that would help Law Enforcement and other entities locate victims and put pimps and traffickers in jail. Backpage also failed to implement other free widely available technologies that have helped Law Enforcement build cases against suspected sex traffickers. Moreover, backpage representatives and Third Party Consultants informed the subcommittee that backpage moderators edit and delete content in ads that may conceal evidence of illegal activity from Law Enforcement. The subcommittee has also found that backpages Business Model has been highly profitable. Based on information obtained by the subcommittee, backpage had net revenue of 135 million in 2014. And is expected to net more than 153 million this year. Nearly all of it profit. The companys fair market value taking into account its lack of marketability is approximately 430 million. As a former sex crimes prosecutor, i know that behind these cold financial statistics are survivors traumatized from abuse and degradation. And families suffering through years of terror and uncertainty concerning the fate of their loved ones. Today i hope to hear from our first witnesses about the impact of backpage on the efforts of Law Enforcement officials and advocacy groups to curb sex trafficking in the United States. Im confident that their testimony will make clear the importance of subcommittee efforts to press backpage for information on its operations and procedures. I also hope that we will at some future date finally have the opportunity to question backpage ceo carl ferrar, carlferrer, carl ferrer, who received a subpoena to appear before the subcommittee today but has refused to attend. I have many questions for him. I thank the witnesses for being here today and i look forward to their testimony. Thank you, senator mccaskill and thank you for your partnership in this investigation. Senator mccaskill mentioned the staff report without any objection in order to become part of the record. With this were going to turn to our first panel of witnesses and have an opportunity for members to ask questions. We are pleased to be joined by yiota souras. She is Senior Vice President of the center for exploited children. For over 30 years she has provided valuable services to Law Enforcement and the criminal Justice Community with the limit of limiting Child Exploitation and reuniting families. They have recovered over 200,000 missing children including assisting with the rescue of a missing child in cleveland, ohio, just earlier this month. We appreciate what you do. Im also honored to have with us today the founder, john walsh, who is with us in the room this morning. Who has been a good at visor to me and to the subcommittee. Were also pleased to be joined by darwin roberts. Darwin is a Deputy Attorney general with the Washington State Attorney Generals Office where he supervises the criminal Justice Division among other units. And he also is the lead office for the Human Trafficking issues. He is trying to combat child trafficking. The polaris project gave washington the highest ranking for its antitrafficking efforts last year from 2005 to 2013, mr. Roberts also served as the assistant u. S. Attorney. I appreciate you both being here this morning and we look forward to your testimony. Without objection, well make part of the record the written testimony submitted by brant cook, the director of the Ohio Attorney general for crimes against childrens initiative. Ohio is also at the forefront of the issue under the leadership of former senator mike dewine. And well try to make part of the record the testimony of the chief District Attorney for manhattan who has also been juc engaged in this issue in the subcommittee. At this time, please stand and raise your right hand. Do you swear that the testimony youre about to give before this subcommittee will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you god . I do. I do. Let the record reflect the witnesses answer in the affirmative. All your written testimony will be printed in the record in its entirety. Try to limit the oral testimony to five minutes. Miss souras, well hear from you first. Thank you. Chairman portman, Ranking Member mccaskill and Ranking Members of the committee, im pleased to be here for the National Center for missing and exploited children. Thank you for your efforts to exploit the crime of child sex trafficking and potential solutions to combat this horrible crime. Im joined today by the cofounder, john walsh, and the incoming ceo john clark, former director of the u. S. Marshals, who are here with me to underscore the support for the committees work and our dedication to preventing child sex trafficking and assisting survivors and their families. Were here to talk about the online lucrative sale of americas children for sex. Which in our experience occurs most prominently on the website backpage. Com. Every year in the United States thousands of children are sold for sex and repeatedly raped. Child sex trafficking victims are boys, transgender children and girls. We see victims as young as 11 years old with an average age of 15. Many of these children are moved constantly from city to city, sold for sex up to ten times a day and tattooed by their traffickers, literally branded for life. Child sex trafficking is the rape of a child in exchange for something of value. Buying, selling or facilitating the sale of a child for sex is always illegal. Child sex trafficking is not prostitution and it has no relation to legal sexual activities between consenting adults. When we talk about child sex trafficking, we are talking about illegal activity not protected by the First Amendment. Technology has fundamentally changed how children are trafficked. Today an adult can shop from their home, office or hotel room, even on a cell phone to buy a child for sex. There are advertising websites, notably backpage, that are Online Marketplaces to buy and sell sexual experiences. Some may be legal but most are not. We operate the hotline for Child Exploitation. Since 1998 we received over 45,000 reports relating to suspected child sex trafficking. A majority of these reports involve ads posted on backpage. In our experience, child sex trafficking often begins with a missing child. So far this year more than 1800 missing child cases reporting have involved possible child sex trafficking. Because there are so many child sex trafficking ads on backpage, our staff searched backpage first when a missing child is at risk for being trafficked. At nickmick we work with Online Companies to make sure their websites arent misused to harm children. We met with backpage at their request after they started voluntarily reporting some ads to us in 2010. During this time backpage publicly represented it wanted to do Everything Possible to stop Child Sexual Exploitation on its website. At our last meeting in 2013, backpage was frustrated with nikmik for not promoting efforts to curb sex trafficking. We have not met with backpage again because they are more interested in publicly trying to claim a partnership with nikmik on the issues rather than the sale of children on their websites. During our meetings with backpage, we represented steps they could take to reduce the possibility of children sold for sex on their website. Backpage declined to adopt most of these recommended measures. Here are just two examples, backpage does not consistently remove ads reported to nikmik. Even when the Family Member of the child is reporting it begging for asis the answer. Heres a report and what what mom and dad wrote to backpage. Your website has ads featuring our 16yearold daughter posing as an escort. Shes being pimped out by her old boyfriend and she is underage. I have emailed the ad multiple times using your website but have gotten no response. For gods sake, shes only 16. We raise this issue repeatedly during our meetings with backpage but were never told why some remain live on the site after being reported. Backpage also has more stringent rules to post an ad to sell a pet or motorcycle or boat. For these ads you are required to support at verified phone number. Even if back page says their site is used for repeated service, they have not taken down these ads. They have reported some of the adds to nickmick but not take up any measures to prevent sex trafficking that they have created. Theres no reason to believe suspected child sex trafficking ads on backpage have decreased. However, backpages number of reports this year has slunk to less than half the number of reports nms 2013. The same year we had our last meeting and the same year mickmick filed a brief in support of childhood victims against the lawsuit against backpage. Before it closed, i would like to acknowledge the tremendous efforts, many here in the room today, and the attorneys working on civil chjgzcases in massachusetts and washington to end the devastating Online Business of selling children for sex on websites like backpage. Mr. Chairman and other members, i thank you for the chance to share this information regarding second trafficking and backpage and am happy to answer your questions. Thank you. And now i would like to hear from you, mr. Roberts. Thank you. Im appearing on behalf of bob ferguson who appreciates the invitation and regrets he was not able to come here in person. Im proud to be here representing Washington State, which has been recognized as a leader among the states in fighting Human Trafficking at the state level. We were the first state to make it a crime to commit Human Trafficking at the state level and, of course, our state definition of Human Trafficking matches the federal in that the use of force, fraud or coercers for commercial sex ads is Human Trafficking. And the commercial sexual abuse of a minor is any use of a minor in a commercial sex act. Because minors are recognized as not being able to consent legally to engage in any sort of sex act with an adult. While we appreciate the chairmans credit to the Attorney Generals Office for the work we have done, i would be remiss if i didnt emphasize we have an entire community of folks doing really good work in Washington State. And if it werent for everyone, all of our partners in Law Enforcement, the Nonprofit Community and other government agencies, we wouldnt be close to where we are today. Washington has had the experience of becoming involved in litigation with backpage. Com in the course of our efforts to prevent the use of the internet for Human Trafficking and the commercial Sexual Exploitation of children. In 2012 a law was passed to criminally punish anyone using the internet who knowingly publishes, displays, disseminates any commercial ad for a sex act to take place in the state of washington,age that includes the depiction of a minor. Backpage. Com led a channel to this law before it could be implemented the. The Attorney Generals Office attempted to defend the law in court but the u. S. District court in seattle ruled that the law would be adjoined on the grounds that it was unconstitutionally vague under the First Amendment and also likely preempted by the Communications Decency act. Simultaneously with this ruling by the district court, a lawsuit was filed in Washington Superior Court in pierce county, tacoma, alleging that backpage, in fact, had done more than just be a site that hosted the posting of ads as they claimed in order to invoke their immunity under the Communications Decency act. In that case, several minors who allege they were prostituted using backpage. Com sued that alleging backpage had essentially, by several means including making themselves a Market Leader, in other words, the goto site for online prostitution ads, by using terms like escorts, euphemisms widely recognized as being telling consumers that prostitution is the kind of service that they could purchase on this website. And by using what the plaintiffs termed sham efforts at self policing to allegedly try to keep ads for underaged individuals off the site. That by doing this, backpage. Com had moved beyond the mirror facilitation or posting of the ads. And, in fact, was materially contributing to the use of its site to sell minors for sex. Our Attorney Generals Office filed an amicus brief when the cases went to the Washington Supreme Court. And on the posture of the backpages initial motion to dismiss, we argue that, in fact, the plaintiff should be allowed to conduct discovery to determine if backpage was the materially contributing as the plaintiffs allege. The Washington Supreme Court this fall ruled in favor of the plaintiffs and that case is now proceeding to discovery. We are aware in the course of this litigation and others, backpage. Com has repeatedly asserted that Law Enforcement is best helped if backpage remains open as a website for the posting of Adult Services and works with Law Enforcement as they put it to try to prevent minors from being trafficked using their site. These commitments sound positive as stated by backpage but the Washington State Attorney Generals Office and others is not at all certain whether these commitments are at all sufficient to do the kind of work necessary to prevent individuals from being trafficked on the site. During this entire period as backpage has said this, there have been repeated numerous instances of children being trafficked on backpage as just cited. So the question for the Attorney Generals Office is, what is backpage doing . What are their goals . How effective are their techniques . Are they doing everything they can . Is there more they could be doing . What are the costs relative to the significant revenues that the subcommittee cited they are making off these adds . For all of those reasons, the Washington State Attorney Generals Office hopes that backpage will respond to the subpoena and shed more light on how exactly it claims to be working to prevent the sex trafficking of minors. Thank you. Id be happy to answer any questions as well. Thank you, mr. Roberts. Appreciate both of your testimony. Well go as many rounds as necessary to get to the questions answered. Id like to start by agreeing that technology has changed the way children can be trafficked. You can see in in our report, miss souras, well start with you. I have deep concern with editing advertisements, and we have had in our report, as youll see, evidence of that. Let me ask you first, how prevalent are advertisements for Sexual Exploitations for minors on backpage. Com in your experience . Mr. Chairman, as i testify, backpage is the first place that ncmec searches when we have a missing child case where theres suspicious of a child trafficked. Thats because even though the child may have a trafficking ad on another site, they will always have another trafficking ad on backpage if they are being trafficked. So between that and then the numbers of reports that we received, as i mentioned, over 45,000 with a predominant number of those from the public or otherwise reported on backpage ads, it is clear to us that backpage is the primary marketplace online for these ads. You said over 70 of all suspected sex trafficking reports it receives, that you receive on your Cyber Tipline are related to backpage. From the public, thats correct. Amazing. On the subject of underaged victims, i want to turn your attention to one of the many emails our investigation uncovered. This is from a company that backpage used to outsource screening their advertisements. Backpage calls it moderation. In the email, they instruct moderators for editing the ads including how to handle ads for victims underage, they instruct moderators and i have this here, you can find it in the appendix to the report on page 122. Page 122 of the appendix the report. The email instructs moderators if they are in doubt about underage, the process should be to accept the ad. The process should be to accept the ad if youre in doubt. It also cautions you should only delete ads if they are certain the person is under age. It seems to be theres a bias there, but let me ask you, does it sound like instructions a company would give if it was concerned about everything it could do to keep kids off the internet . No. Absolutely not. If a Company Really has a sincere interest in trying to deter and remove Child Sexual Exploitation including child sex trafficking content from its website, then it will undertake a number of preventive measures early on and it also will deal with ads such as ads that likely will be picturing children or minors. It will not allow that content up and will report that content as well. It will not take i will just glancing at this scene, this is similar to what backpage told us regarding their process for children that quote unquote might appear to be young. As we talked about backpages editing the ads before they publish them, one of the obvious concerns i see here is when you edit an ad and change the wording, you are not changing the underlying transaction. You dont change the potential for the underlying crime being committed. I have a few questions for you. To start, were you aware that backpage moderators edited ads in this manner . We had previous conversations with backpage requiring the editing of ads pertaining to photographs. We do not recall any discussions about the moderators actually editing text of the ads. We have been told by backpage when an ad came in often with multiple photographs, if there was a photograph they deemed to be a violation of their terms of service, containing nudity, for instance, or graphic sexual activity, that ad would be pulled and the ad would move forward into the posting process. So lets assume that the evidence we have uncovered is accurate and there is this kind of editing, what concern does that practice give you . Its incredibly troubling, mr. Chairman, as you noted on a number of grounds. One is that it definitely obfiscates the illegal intent of that ad. If somebody is posting an ad and saying, this is a 15yearold or providing other information, that is a minor who is being sold for a sex act. And backpage merely strips the age component out or whatever the other indices is of going public. It could very much create concerns about, is backpage still in its publisher category or now shifting into the coming creator of the ads as well. My time is coming to an end. But i also think it makes it harder for you to find the kids, harder to rescue children. When you dont have the full ad, when you have the edited version rather than the complete ad, including the original add that exists prior to editing that could help you, it makes it more difficult to rescue the kids, is that accurate . Thats absolutely correct. If we were able to receive all the photographs and texts, the additional information, whether it is a photo that might include the face of the child, which could obviously benefit the identification of that child or other information such as a phone number or an email address that is in the original ad that may have been stripped by the backpage moderator, that information is crucial for Law Enforcement to rescue that child and also to pursue the individual that is selling that child for sex. Thank you. Senator mccaskill. Can you explain, miss sores, if you have, and it defies logic, can you explain your testimony that theres more stringent posting rules for selling a motorcycle than selling a 12yearold . I have no explanation for that, senator. It is what we were told. When we met with backpage, its the reality of how you go about posting an ad currently. During our meetings between 2010 and 2013 with backpage, we asked constantly for some form of know your customer, at least know who the individual is in that ad. Knowing the high incidents of child sex trafficking adds on that website, we pointed out the fact they were able to do this on other ad sections, such as pets and motor vehicles. And we did ask why they could not incorporate that element into the escort ads as well and never received a satisfactory answer. What was their answer . What excuse did they have . They often would say they would look into it and discuss it at the next meeting. It would be reraised at the next meeting and be as if it was the first time we were raising the issue, there was never a satisfactory response. So the sex ads are the only place they dont require verification. I have not looked at all the other ad categories. We have done, obviously, a lot of deep research on the escort as themselves and noted variations between ads, but there are many categories of items for sale. Apartments for rent, jobs, et cetera. So i cant answer that with specificity. Have you all done the math and maybe the staff is busy working on this, what percentage of the ads on backpage are sexrelated versus the other kinds of advertisement that they pretend they are interested in . We have not. I know other groups have done research on the ads on backpage. Ncmec when we receive an exploitation report, we go to backpage for that report. Similarly, when we have a child missing case where the child is trafficked, we go to backpage for that child. It appears that they are engaging in of course we are trying to find out, thats what this is about, we are trying to find out the facts, but it appears that this is a very important part of their Business Model. Because i dont think anyone could say this isnt high risk, so if youre engaging in high risk activity its usually because it has a great deal of impact on the bottom line. Let me ask you, mr. Roberts, as i said, this hearing is not about reaching conclusions about backpage, about what they have or havent done, instead its about affirming the legitimacy of this investigation. And the legitimacy of the questions that were asking and that we demand answers to. As the United States senate. In fact, in your brief that you filed with the Supreme Court of washington, both in your brief s and the ncmec amicus brief, you explain the same information that were seeking. You stress the records of backpages ad screeners and protocols for recreating an ad and rejecting ads offering children and flagging and banning repeat offenders. Can you explain why its so critical for the antitrafficking efforts of backpage to produce this kind of material . And why our efforts to get this material is so essential and why we should spare no procedural effort to get at these facts . Absolutely, senator. And thank you, again, for making this effort. Without understanding whats going on, we cant understand whether theyre putting in sufficient effort to solve the problem. And again, because backpage continually invokes their own efforts to block children from being advertised on their site as the reason they should be allowed to continue operating freely in this area, even as they litigate vigorously to protect themselves from laws and lawsuits that might hold them accountable, that attempt to hold them accountable for having trafficked children on their website. They invoke these protections. So we need to know precisely what the protections are, what are they doing . How significant are they relative to the overall volume of backpages business . I think its important for regulators and members of the public to assess how much is backpage putting into compliance. I mean, if this is a tremendously profitable business for them, whats an appropriate amount for them to spend trying to keep children from being sold for sex . Theyre claiming protection under the law while refusing to give the people who represent the law the facts that would, in fact, support their claim. Right. They are basically saying, you should trust us. We are not gonna give you any information. Has backpage ever produced the documents the National Association of attorneys general requested of them in 2011 and 2012 . Has that information ever been produced . I dont believe so, senator. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Senator mccain. Thank you, mr. Chairman. And i want to thank all members for the involvement in this really distasteful issue, but one of transcendent important. I would like to thank the senator for her significant involvement in this unsavory unpleasant aspect of america that seems to have grown over time with the ability to use technology. And mr. Chairman, i have been a member of this subcommittee for many years. I have never known of a witness to refuse a subpoena. And im sure that you will take the necessary action to ensure that that is not done with impunity and i applaud you for your actions. This is all about money, isnt it, mr. Roberts . 80 of their revenue for back page can be directly derived from their commercial sex advertising . We are talking about money, arent we . It appears so, senator. And we this is the most egregious example of that but goes on with other websites around the country, this just happens to be the most egregious. In fact, two federal courts have reached the conclusion that they are in violation of law. What do we need to do about the whole situation, which is, to some degree, the result of increased technology and means of communication . What do we need to do . Its a very complicated question, sir. I can tell you about some of the efforts that are taking place. The king county prosecuting Attorneys Office, which is the prosecuting attorney for seattle, the Largest Office in the state of washington, is doing some real cuttingedge work in this area. What about the u. S. Attorney general . I its been a couple of years since i was with the Justice Department, sir. I know that, at least in Washington State, the department of but we but we dont know of any federal active engagement, do you . Xd im sorry do you know of any . No, sir, i dont. So you dont know of any priority with the attorney general of the United States . Im not aware of any at this time. You know, mr. Chairman, maybe one of the results of this hearing could be to increase the priority of this issue with since it is a national issue. Please proceed, mr. Roberts. Senator, i was just going to mention that the our local prosecuting Attorneys Office is working on a project that seeks to inhibit the online demand for persons seeking sex, particularly with minors, by placing targeted advertisements online, in the same way that backpage apparently seeks to become the first search result when someone searches for an Adult Servicestype ad online. The prosecuting Attorneys Office is placing ads that ask people, do you really want to be buying sex, and try to expose them to some of the negative effects that take place when they participate in the commercial sex economy. Describing that, women often arent there willingly, that theres a great deal of exploitation, violence, harm, trauma that comes from these efforts. And thats been supported, in part, by grants from private sources and we believe its got some potential to hopefully make some impact. So, the fact that this has such a devastating effect is the hook really that we should lead to every attempt being made to stop this evil. Yes, sir. I thank you, mr. Chairman, and i hope that maybe which could, all of us in this committee maybe send a message to the United States attorney general that we need some priority on this issue. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank the witness. Thank you, senator, mccain and good point. Senator heitkamp. Thank you, mr. Chairman and Ranking Member for this very important hearing and in the halls of congress, we frequently represent some of and talk about some of the most powerful people in america what we are going to do with the large banks, what we are going to do, and today, we are talking about the most Vulnerable People in america, small children, basically being exploited, being captured, and being sold as sex slaves. What could be more horrific than that . And we are told by an organization like backpage. Com that they are doing everything, they are trying as hard as they can to prevent this horrible thing from happening to children. I think today we are saying you need to try harder and if you were truly trying to as hard as what you could, if you truly cared, you would be in this room with us, talking about how we could, in fact, attack this problem. They are not in this room because they arent in this fight with the rest of us. They arent here to protect children. They are here to make money, as senator mccain talked about, and i want to just kind of tell you what we are seeing in north dakota, because a lot of people think that this is something thats removed, its a city issue, its something that big cities experience, but in north dakota, this issue has hit us and it has hit us hard, because backpage. Com allows it to be invisible. Invisible. There is nobody walking the street corners. Its invisible. And so just yesterday, to give you a sense of where we are, just yesterday, 69 new ads for escorts, and i put that in quote, posted on back page in north dakota alone. 69. And i want to tell you a story. Earlier this year, 14yearold las vegas runaway was rescued from traffickers in minot. After her mother saw emails in her inbox, email inbox basically advertising her, answering an ad that had been posted on backpage. Com. Last summer, right across from fargo, north dakota, and moorehead, minnesota, the local Law Enforcement officials responded to a posting on backpage. Com and found a 13yearold runaway from minneapolis who had been trafficked for sex. Now, are we to assume that these are the only minors whoever appeared in north dakota on backpage. Com . Well, you would have to be quite naive and foolish to assume thats the facts. And you would be quite foolish and naive to believe we have a partner in solving this at backpage. Com. We dont have a partner there, we have somebody who is, i believe, not participating in solving this problem, but, in fact, capitalizing and becoming filthy rich. And i use the word filthy honestly. Filthy rich on backpage. Com. So, one of the issues that i want to explore in the time that i have left is basically the issue of meta data, because we have talked a little bit about, you know, scrubbing the ads, rewriting the ads, but its my understanding that meta data is also being scrubbed off these ads, which then eliminates some opportunity for actually tracing back to the source where these ads are, and this is a question for either one of you to explain how meta data is being treated on backpage. Com as it relates to escort advertising. Senator, your understanding is correct. When there is a backpage ad reported, there is not meta data in back of that ad. A meta data, like an ip address or other types of electronic Data Information is incredibly relevant and important as far as identifying a location, geographic location and other types of information that maybe pertinent to connecting the individual who took that photograph with the actual photograph and the location of that individual. Without that information, it is often very difficult for ncmec, certainly for Law Enforcement, to start to connect that child to that photo. Do you see meta data being removed from an advertisement for motor board, for a car or anything else on back page . Do they take the meta data off those ads . We dont see those ad photos in the same way, so that would be a difficult question for me to answer. In response to the is that thors question, id just add, meta data is important. I think we understand how important it is. Would there be any legit malt purpose for removing metadata from the advertisement . Commercial purpose . It is storage intensive, so there is an investment that might be required of servers. And storage is so expensive these days, right . Getting cheaper. Yeah. Its very cheap. And so im lets not pretend that this is about storage. Quite honestly. I know im out of time. I want to give a shoutout to a great partner who has been put her reputation and has been a great partner to the National Center for missing and exploited people and thats senator mccains wife, cindy mccain, who has been absolutely a champion and i think has done more to raise the issue of back page than almost anyone else in this country. And so, she is a great partner to have and a fierce champion for children in this country. And even though she is not at this dais, definitely here with us today as we address this issue. Thank you, senator, she was here in the form of her husband and when i asked senator mccain whether he could come by today, he immediately said, of course im going to come, because of cindy. And she has been great at raising awareness for this issue. I have spoken with her at conferences and she is she has spent a lot of time and effort as well as internationally here in this country for issue. Senator langford. Thanks for your work. Thanks for what youre doing. As a dad of two daughters this is important to me, as well as it is important to everyone else on this dais as it is important to the nation. This is an issue that has to be confronted. This is a dark spot in our country that we have to be both be able to shine a light on and to deal with in the days ahead. So i appreciate what youre doing because i can only imagine its very difficult, hard work. So just from us to you, thank you, for what youre doing for a lot of families around the country. What is the cost of one of these ads on a back page . How much is a child worth nowadays to run on an ad . Senator, back page rigorously calibrates its ads according to the geographic location. So in some large cities, like manhattan in new york, an ad can go for upwards of 18 or more, boston, miami, et cetera, in a smaller town, they will calibrate lower to satisfy the customer there to a few dollars. So, a child ad could be a few dollars or it could be 18 or 20. To purchase the ad, right. To the purchase the ad. To put this up to be able to get the Service Online . Thats correct. So, back page obviously not the first thats dealt with this. Other locations have. Other websites have. Give me an example of other websites and how they dealt with this and responded once they learned child sex trafficking is happening on their site. How have other entities responded . Most entities deal with this issue, as we know, most everything can go on the internet. Correct. So everyone is subjected to this threat, however, what a responsible corporate entity does is it takes tremendous preventative measures so it has real moderation. It has real review. So, give me an example of that. What does real moderation look like, what have other sites done to say we want to make sure this doesnt happen here so they are going to do this. What are they doing . They often use hashing technologies or other types of technologies, such as photo dna, which is a microsoft product. And it enables someone to take basically a digital fingerprint of an image so that they as they get new ads can screen new photographs, if they get a hit of an ad they snow a trafficked child, it immediately comes out, doesnt get posted. It reduce the moderation costs as well, much faster, more efficient. They also have welltrained moderation staffs. The sort of instructions being provided to the moderators that the chairman went over are not the type of instructions that again responsible companies with professional moderators utilize. How expensive is that software . Is that millions of dollars to be able to purchase a Software Like that . No, its not. So, give me a ballpark figure. Hashing technology generally is a very low cost to no cost. Theres some costs to implement, of course, into a companys systems. The photo dna product is provided at no cost. Okay. Senator in your response to the relative cost, you might be interested to know, our local Law Enforcement has been known for placing sting ads on sites including back page that appear to be advertisements for young persons. Who could be bought for sex n response to the ads that might cost 18 or so, Law Enforcement sees literally hundreds of potential responses within a few hours of it being posted, which will give you the impression why it is so lucrative for the traffickers. Knowing that and Washington State, you have been at it for a while, how do you measure success, how do you achieve progress because we are seeing this . What metrics are you looking for . Well, its difficult to measure in part because we dont have great statistics as to whats going on. Thats one of the things we as a state have been manufacture emphasizing, we need to better study what the scope of the trafficking problem is. Our indication from about 2008 locally is we believe we have something in the neighborhood of 300 to 500 minors being trafficked for sex on an annual basis in the greater seattle area. If we could improve upon those numbers the next time we took a survey, we know we are making progress. In the meantime, we just have to intercept as many child victims as Law Enforcement has the resources to do. So youre bailing water at this point on a ship thats taking on a lot of water and youre bailing and basically staying afloat, that becomes the key. So, youre i assume, as you mentioned before, you had a lot of partners working on this, nonprofits, churches, other agencies. The question from senator mccain about the u. S. Attorney and the department of justice, i would hope that they are stepping in full force on this as well, though it sounded like it was unknown what role they are playing at this point. We can ask them and obviously, they can tell us what they are doing in this, but are there partners that are missing . Industry obviously has to be one of the partners, asking back page, that should up a responsible Corporate Citizen to take on something that is clearly illegal away from their Business Model. What partners are you missing . Industry is improving quite a bit, sir. Theres been efforts in the Hospitality Industry to train Staff Members on recognition of trafficking situations. We definitely would like to see better responses from organizations like backpage. In the seattle area, a very strong presence led by the local u. S. Attorneys office and there has been Grant Funding by the department of justice for that effort. The Washington Coalition against trafficking and the Washington Antitrafficking Response Network both have significant federal funding and significant participation from federal Law Enforcement, including the fbi and Homeland Security investigations. So, we feel that the federal government and the Justice Department are a valuable partner in the state of washington. Good. As they should be in this area especially. Thank you, mr. Chairman, i yield back. Senator. Thank you, chairman. I wanted to ask ms. Souras, about the Communications Decency act and as i understand it, backpage is trying to hide behind this act and i want to understand, as i look at as we as we im very glad, by the way, that chairman and Ranking Member are doing this investigation cause i think its incredibly important, but i want to understand how under that particular act, backpage can rely on that act to shield itself from the activities that, in my view, seem to be very clearly facilitating trafficking in children and other illegal activities. So your honprre a lawyer. I wanted to get your thoughts on this. Thank you, senator. Youre correct. Backpage has really used the cda as a flag, as a shield against the current lawsuits and threats of prosecution that may have arisen from time to time. Their basic argument under the cda is they are a mere publish publisher, they are a Bulletin Board someone might up in the supermarket. They are not responsible for the note cards that people put on that Bulletin Board selling certain items. That seems very unrealistic when we are thinking that the item for sale here is a human being and potentially a child. But that is a basic component under the language of the cda which is a fairly old statute, was created really to engender growth and encourage growth of the internet and serves a tremendously important purpose in that regard, but did seek to protect internet providers from lets say rampant defamation suits and things of that sort, because there was so much public content going on to some of these sites. So backpage takes advantage of that and says we are a mere publisher, we just provide the mechanism, we are not responsible for what people put on. Thats why some of this information that i understand is coming out of the committees investigation regarding the editing you of ads is crucial and i think will be an area that many attorneys and prosecutors will be focusing on after this hearing. In other words, information that they, themselves, maybe editing ads, therefore, quite aware of the content of the fact that what they are posting is involving the illegal solicitation and horrific solicitation of children and other illegal activities, other trafficking activities that are against the law. Absolutely, and crossing that boundary between the mere publisher and participation in that ad through their editing. So you mentioned the cda and they are using it as a shield. Obviously, we have talked today, as i understand your testimony, that that other providers arent certainly arent using the cda in the way backpage is and making sure there arent these horrific illegal ads on their sites, is that true . Thats correct. There is a huge contrast there. Do you think we as a committee as we look this issue need to revisit or look at the cda and how it is being used in light of the current state of the internet, given that it is an older statute and given that we have this backpage using this statute in a way obviously, posting these ads of trafficking of children, which is just appalling. I know there has been tremendous discussion on the hill, in the senate and the house, regarding the cda, especially with a focus on antitrafficking measures. Ncmec has been very involved in speaking with a number of members and their staffs regarding regarding the cda and how is it that it could be, lets say brought up to date a little bit or altered a bit that that unique sites like backpage who are not going to undertake the usual corporate protections, you know, could not see that as, you know, defense for them. Im a strong proponent of obviously all the internet and the entrepreneurship and great things we have seen from it, but i cant believe that when the cda was enacted that the lawmakers who passed it could have envisioned a website like backpage and really they are using this as a shield for the disgusting types of illegal activity being posted there. So, i hope that we will look at that issue as well as a committee to make sure that they cant use this statute in an improper way as a shield. Thank you. We will take another round of questions. I know there are members here who still have questions, i certainly do. You are not getting the cooperation that you certainly sought, which is unfortunately what the experience has been of this subcommittee and lack of cooperation. You did testify that over the course of three years, you worked with backpage regarding child sex trafficking on its website and provided them with a number of specific recommendations of how they could utilize their available technology, but do it in a way that would reduce Child Sexual Exploitation. I think you have mentioned a couple of those today but i would like you to tell us specifically what recommendations did you make that backpage chose not to adopt . Certainly the most egregious one is the one i mentioned, which is that they do not remove an ad even after they have reported it for child sex trafficking