More than a dozen international law enforcement organizations worked together under U.S. leadership to identify and locate victims of child sexual exploitation in a just-completed operation that officials say is likely the most successful of its kind.
In the three-week “surge” known as Operation Renewed Hope, which began July 17, investigators combing through sexually graphic internet material involving children, much of it on the dark web and some of it decades old, made probable identifications of 311 child victims and confirmed the rescue of several victims from active abuse.
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Homeland Security Investigations, part of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, took the lead in the operation, which included representatives from the Justice Department, the FBI, the U.S. Marshals, Interpol and Europol, as well as 13 law enforcement agencies from Australia, Canada and countries in Europe and South America.
In many of the cases in which victims have been identified, HSI officials told NBC News, the material had existed for many years, but investigators were previously unable to identify the child victims or the adult abusers. Thanks to new facial recognition and artificial intelligence technology, there are now fresh leads in these formerly cold cases.