WHO WE ARE
STOP THE TRAFFIK is the leading capability in trafficking prevention, using data sharing and intelligence analysis to stop trafficking before it has begun. Trafficking operates on a worldwide landscape, and preventing it demands a global, systemic approach. We work with international NGO’s, governments and organisations to achieve this mission. With wide-reaching collaboration, we can effectively disrupt the systems that prop up the lucrative business that is human trafficking. By building trusting partnerships, we succeed in pushing a mutual agenda to create a world in which people are not bought or sold.
As we know, exploitation is the backbone of the errant economy. We dismantle this by undermining traffickers’ ability to recruit vulnerable people and move profits unimpeded. Our holistic approach is two-pronged. One arm focuses on business and financial service consultancy, while the other launches geo-targeted campaigns informing at risk groups how to stop the signs of trafficking, where to report it, and signposting towards legitimate recruitment pathways. With this unique methodology, we are changing the high profit, low-risk environment of trafficking and squeezing the criminal business to zero profit.
THE SCALE OF THE PROBLEM
It is estimated that 40.3 million people, a quarter of which are children, are held in modern slavery worldwide. With approximately $250 billion made in annual profit, more than a third of which in developed countries, Modern Slavery and Human Trafficking (MSHT) is an intercontinental phenomenon with roots far closer to home than we would like to think. In 2017, we created The Traffik Analysis Hub, the largest database facilitating cross-sector sharing of information about trafficking to date. Through the hub, we are bringing real transparency, building the richest picture of how this global business is working. Through analysis and interrogation of this data picture we can turn insights into action in order to undermine the ability of traffickers to recruit, move money, and maintain/increase demand.
As we stand on the edge of a new year, we are facing global challenges which have the potential to encourage exploitation. The climate crisis is forcing people to flee their homes and socioeconomic security is crumbling alongside established democracies. When home is not a safe place anymore, and there is a vacuum of opportunities, there is trafficking. Additionally, the use of technology to automate many manual jobs is undermining the opportunities of employment requiring resources to retrain or accelerating the need to migrate. And of course, we are struggling in the midst of a pandemic where the world’s inequalities are further exposed and vulnerability to a virus is so often linked to the need to make choices and take risks that bring danger ever closer.
SHINE A LIGHT
Yet with all these challenges we face there are opportunities.
Where global systems are fragile or failing there is the endless possibility of renewal and the ability to reimagine our world.
STOP THE TRAFFIK believes that we must shine a light in dark places to drive transparency and uncover the true picture of the traffickers trade. We can then tackle our work practices from supply chains to recruitment of labour, from AML to KYC, from our investments to company policies and disrupt and undermine the traffickers business model increasing their risks and reducing their profits. Technology offers the potential to predict and prevent by enabling us to collect information, analyse, understand, and share what we know with everyone who turn insight into action to stop the traffic.
WHAT THE FINANCIAL SERVICES SECTOR CAN DO
Companies who handle, move, and manage money are uniquely situated to make trafficking a high-risk crime. Modern slavery mitigation should be recognised as prevention of proceeds of crime, becoming a fundamental feature of every financial service organisation and its strategies.
STOP THE TRAFFIK and the Traffik Analysis Hub supply financial institutions of evitery description with red flags that help them identify trafficking related transactions and activity. For example, we have partnered with Santander since 2019, participating in trainings, workshops and conferences. In 2020, we created an awareness raising e-learning training package for Line 1 and High-Risk customer facing roles, including branch staff, contact centre staff and business relationship managers. 91% of in scope staff members had completed the training at the end of Q1 2021, with feedback that the training had helped staff to spot the signs of human trafficking. Now, we are also risk mapping Santander’s non-financial supply chains.
Neil Giles, CEO of the TA Hub and former Deputy Director of the Serious Organised Crime Agency, stated that “two of the most comprehensive global investigations that I’ve ever been associated with emerged as a result of us giving a financial institution detail of a suspected trafficker. They were able to open up a multiplicity of transactions in 16 different countries, resulting in several prosecutions in various jurisdictions and importantly, completely undermined an aspect of sexual exploitation in several European cities.” We must continue building partnerships with financial institutions because it’s the smartest way to undermine the trafficking economy.
If you work in the financial sector, you have the opportunity to impact change. Find out more about our bespoke solutions here.
A MESSAGE FROM RUTH DEARNLEY OBE, CEO OF STOP THE TRAFFIK
“Everyone has a part to play in the prevention of human trafficking. Yet traffickers only traffick human beings to make money. Every organisation whose business it is to move money, make money or manage money is at the forefront in the fight to raise the risks for traffickers. Those risks must become high enough as to undermine the viability of their work and force this global criminal business to stop trading. We need a world where good business wins. We believe that it is only by collaborating together that we can achieve this goal and we are delighted to be in partnership with AMLi to work together to make this future hope a reality. “
Check out the video message from STOP THE TRAFFIK on the charity partnership with AML Intelligence
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