Beware of cyber groomers, warn police

KUALA LUMPUR: They would chat up young girls on social media websites on the pretext of befriending them.

Soon, the conversation will turn intimate, luring the unsuspecting girls into removing their clothes.

Once they fall into the “trap”, they will be asked to perform lewd acts such as exposing their private parts and masturbating.

Police have termed those committing these types of cyber crime as “cyber groomers”.

Bukit Aman Sexual, Women and Child Investigation Division (D11) assistant principal director Asst Comm Ong Chin Lan said the cyber groomers would look for girls on social media websites such as Kik Messenger, ooVoo, Omegle and Facebook.

“The cyber groomers will initiate the lewd act by masturbating and exposing their private parts to the girls. It’s a case of show me yours and I’ll show you mine,” she said, adding that the cyber groomers would also record the acts of the girls.

ACP Ong said if the victim refused another round of cyber sex, the cyber groomer would threaten to upload the recording.

In one of the cases she investiga­ted here, ACP Ong said an American cyber groomer was arrested and charged in a US court after being found in possession of hundreds of child pornographic material.

“Based on information from our international counterparts, one of his victims was a Malaysian. We provided the child with counselling after the incident,” she told The Star.

ACP Ong said “damage would have been done” as the cyber groo­mer would have created unhealthy sexual fantasies for the child.

She said police were working on cases involving 38 persons – believed to be residing in Malaysia – suspected of downloading and uploading child porn.

The Child Cyber Sexual Crime investigation unit was set up last November under the Bukit Aman Sexual, Women and Child Inves­tigation Division (D11) to protect young victims of abuse.

The Star reported that from 2010 to 2015, 343 Internet-related rapes were reported. More than half of the victims were 15 and below, with nine aged between 10 and 12.

About 130 police reports were received between January and September 2015 alone.

Last December, ACP Ong said most of the victims were young students and that cyber groomers were targeting more of them.

D11 and Welfare Department officials said they did not have specific statistics available for paedophilia in the country.

Statistics provided by the Welfare Department showed that the number of child abuse cases reported had increased to 4,453 in 2015 from 4,295 in 2014 and 4,119 in 2013.