Reader’s Digest International — August 2017

August• 2017 | 73

READER’S DIGEST

a towel as a makeshift screen in front
of which another would take off her
clothes and ‘perform’ for the camera.
While some children made contact
on their own, others were sold by
pimps through so-called ‘cyber sex
dens’ and still others were offered
up for sale by their own parents.
Hans consulted with the team back
in The Hague and then ordered an in-
tensive six-month investigation of the

phenomenon. He was horrified by its
findings. Tens of thousands of children
in the Philippines were suffering on-
line abuse, found to be just as mentally
damaging as physical sexual abuse.
Police were doing little to curb the
abuse. Only six men had ever been
sentenced for the crime – and an esti-
mated 750,000 individuals were online
at any given moment, looking to prey
on children.
Determined to get the word out,
Hans invited two Dutch journalists to
the Philippines to witness what was
happening. One, a seasoned reporter
named Elsbeth Stoker, wrote a feature

for the Dutch daily newspaperde

Volkskrant. It was published on May

29, 2012, under the headline, ‘All the

men were naked and playing with

themselves’.

THAT SAME MAY MORNINGMark

Woerde was enjoying his coffee and

flipping through the newspaper

when the article by Stoker caught

his attention. As the co-founder and

strategy director of the Amsterdam-

based advertising agency Lemz, Mark

believed that advertising experts like

himself should be a force for good.

He was always on the look-out for

new projects. As he read the article,

his mind was flooded with ideas. He

looked up the number for Terre des

Hommes and picked up the phone.

Six months later, three men sat

close together in the boardroom at

Terre des Hommes headquarters in

The Hague. Joining Mark and Hans

was Albert-Jaap van Santbrink, CEO

of Terre des Hommes.

Now Mark presented his perspec-

tive: the problem of online child sex

tourism was one of supply and de-

mand, and it was clear that the de-

mand side needed to be addressed.

He had a plan: they would create a

virtual girl and use her to infiltrate

chat rooms and catch predators in

the crime of soliciting sexual perfor-

mance. Once she had caught enough

to illustrate the scope of the problem,

they would reveal their findings to

the public.

AN ESTIMATED

750,000 INDIVIDUALS

WERE ONLINE AT

ANY GIVEN MOMENT,

LOOKING TO PREY

ON CHILDREN