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Australia’s new Federal Police Commissioner Krissy Barrett says officers are set to crack down on men using online networks to exploit and radicalise vulnerable children, particularly young girls.
In her first speech at the National Press Club on Wednesday, Barrett will announce the creation of Taskforce Pompilid to combat the network’s crimes, which have “real world consequences”.
She warns that victims are being groomed online and then forced to perform serious acts of violence on themselves, siblings or pets.
“While these networks do not have a centralised hierarchy or a single ideology, they are prolific and are attracted to violent extremism, nihilism, sadism, Nazism and satanism,” Barret will say, according to reported excerpts from her speech.
“They are crimefluencers, and are motivated by anarchy and hurting others, with most of their victims pre-teen or teenage girls.”
Barret will say these crimes represent a “new and disturbing front in traditional gender-based violence”, with most networks run by young boys and men from Western, English-speaking backgrounds.
The AFP will work with Microsoft to interpret Gen Z and Alpha emojis and slang in encrypted group chats, in an effort to dismantle communications to children at risk of harm.
In addition, Barrett’s speech will highlight a nationwide focus on increasing co-operation with a Five Eyes Law Enforcement Group to combat offences that include murder, inciting suicide and harm online, violent sexual offences, possession of child abuse material and cybercrimes.
Three weeks ago, when Barrett was officially appointed the first woman to lead the AFP, she laid out her five-year term strategies, declaring her leadership would focus on supporting social cohesion in Australia.
Source: New AFP taskforce to crack down on networks targeting young girls