The ChildX Award 2024 goes to Spine

The Dutch organisation Spine receives the ChildX 2024 Award  for its groundbreaking work to protect children from sexual exploitation. 

During ChildX annual conference on 12 November, the Dutch organisation Spine was awarded the prestigious ChildX Award for its outstanding method to protect children from sexual exploitation. During the conference, Sebastiaan Landers and Johannes Djikstra from Spine delivered the keynote speech explaining in detail how they work to protect children in a digital age. 

In a time when digital platforms can serve both as means for exploitation and as lifelines for those at risk, Spine leads the way in proactively working to protect children online. Their groundbreaking digital outreach program leverages technology, social services, and open-source intelligence to discreetly and immediately provide support to children.

– What sets Spine apart is their holistic approach and their unwavering commitment to safeguarding children in the online space. By utilising cutting-edge digital tools, their outreach methods can detect, connect with, and offer assistance to children in need, establishing a critical line of defence against exploiters. Their proactive work sets an example of how technology and human compassion can combine to address a challenging, underreported crime with speed and efficacy.” says Elise Thoen, Director of Policy and Programs at ChildX.

During their visit to Sweden, Spine has also met with various important stakeholders to share their work and methods, including the Swedish National Rapporteur, Janna Davidson, The Swedish Police Authority, The Swedish Cluster of Organizations Against Sexual Violence and the Swedish Salvation Army. 

– We are honoured to receive this award! It’s a great recognition of our work,’ says Sebastiaan Landers, head of Spine, ‘If we want to protect children from being exploited, we need to go online and proactively find them. If we don’t, they may remain unseen. Our program has shown that Online Outreach is an effective tool to do just that. Besides the honour, this gives us the opportunity to share our findings, our methods and learn about the many organisations that fight trafficking and help victims in Sweden.

The ChildX Award was created to support, encourage, and foster systemic change. This Award not only celebrates organisations excelling in this critical field, but also highlights and promotes new, innovative methods being developed to address this complex and evolving challenge. 

Through this Award, we recognize not only Spine’s impactful work but we also seek to raise awareness about the digital exploitation crisis, and to encourage further innovation in this field. The organisation is awarded a prize of SEK 100,000 to scale up and disseminate its methods.

Read more about Spine’s methods on their website.