ONLINE SAFETY TIPS to Protect Children from Human Traffickers

Here are some important ONLINE SAFETY TIPS to protect your children from human traffickers online. In this video, District Attorney Summer Stephan shares some important tips:

When it comes to children, parents have to be extra careful because the average age of a victim of human trafficking is 15 years old, but sadly we have seen victims as young as 12 years old in hotel rooms being prostituted. Kids are easily susceptible to attention online and even boys can be victims of human trafficking. Often times, traffickers and predators find them in gaming rooms and develop a relationship where they pose as a similarly aged boy or girl.

📌 Talk to your kids about the safety of the internet.

📌Make sure that their phone is not with them at night, that they’re using it in a public/shared space in your home.

📌 Make sure that they don’t have a second account that is hidden from you.

📌 Use the protective/parental controls that are available in different apps to control the content your child can see.

📌 It’s OK to say “no” to providing a phone that does anything more than just call you, a limited number, or siblings, cousins or parents. You have the right to set those parental controls until there is a full understanding of the safety risks that social media and the ability to be contacted by the entire world online.

⚠️Communication is very important⚠️

Continue to talk to your kids about safety and make sure that they know that you will be able to help them make their phone safe if they ever receive anything that scares them or asks them to do something that is out of their comfort level.

📌SAVE and 📣SHARE this information with everyone you know.

🚨If you are in immediate danger, contact 911.

☎️For immediate assistance, call the National Human Trafficking Hotline at 1-888-373-7888. You can reach the Hotline 24 hours a day, 7 days a week in more than 200 languages. All calls are confidential and answered live by highly trained Anti-Trafficking Hotline Advocates.

DA Weekly News Update with DA Summer Stephan 01-18-24

In this week’s DA news, District Attorney Summer Stephan talks about the local Martin Luther King, Jr. Day events, a sensitive criminal case that was sentenced and the DA’s continued efforts to raise awareness about the dangers of illegal Fentanyl.

Human Trafficking Red Flags

Here are some things you can do to protect yourself from human traffickers, especially online. In this video, District Attorney Summer Stephan shares some red flags to watch out for to prevent human trafficking.

📌SAVE and 📣SHARE this information with everyone you know.

🚨If you are in immediate danger, contact 911.

☎️For immediate assistance, call the National Human Trafficking Hotline at 1-888-373-7888. You can reach the Hotline 24 hours a day, 7 days a week in more than 200 languages. All calls are confidential and answered live by highly trained Anti-Trafficking Hotline Advocates.

5 Things to Know about Human Trafficking

District Attorney Summer Stephan shares 5 Things You Should Know About Human Trafficking:

– Human trafficking is all around us and it comes in the form of sex trafficking and labor trafficking. In Sex Trafficking, the traffickers commonly recruit their victims through “boyfriending,” which involves the predator showing interest in the victim, in person or online. He showers her with attention and gifts and makes her feel special until she falls in love and yearns for the fantasy life, he mapped out for her – but instead forces the victim into prostitution.

– In Labor Trafficking, victims are often immigrants that are promised jobs that are not real, that turn out to be 24/7-type labor with little or no pay.

– Traffickers are everywhere, they don’t look like a certain person, they don’t have a profile. Victims and traffickers come from every neighborhood, gender, race, and socio-economic level and it is a county-wide problem.

– Remember that social media is a place where traffickers recruit victims both for sex and labor trafficking. Each one of us has a role to play to protect victims from human trafficking.

📌SAVE and 📣SHARE this information with everyone you know.

🚨If you are in immediate danger, contact 911.

☎️For immediate assistance, call the National Human Trafficking Hotline at 1-888-373-7888. You can reach the Hotline 24 hours a day, 7 days a week in more than 200 languages. All calls are confidential and answered live by highly trained Anti-Trafficking Hotline Advocates.

DA Weekly News Update with DA Summer Stephan 01-04-24

In this week’s DA news, District Attorney Summer Stephan talks about Human Trafficking Awareness Month, warning signs to look out for and important resources to prevent human trafficking.

DA Testifies Before Congressional Committee

This week, District Attorney Summer Stephan testified before the House Sub-Committee on Counterterrorism, Law Enforcement and Intelligence, where she discussed the scope of the problem in the U.S., the solutions being pursued by law enforcement. More details in the video below. You can watch the DA’s complete testimony, here.

DA Weekly News Update with DA Summer Stephan 12-07-23

In this week’s DA news, District Attorney Summer Stephan talks about two cases involving gang violence.

DA Investigators Join Shop With A Cop

This past weekend, 15 DA Investigators spent a day with 15 elementary school students at SeaWorld and went shopping at Target as part of the annual Shop with a Cop event for the holidays. Watch how the fun day unfolded in this video.

DA Weekly News Update with DA Summer Stephan 11-30-23

In this week’s DA News, District Attorney Summer Stephan talks about the sentencing in a Cold Case Homicide from 1990 and an important task force that has been formed to prevent educational fraud in charter schools and the education system.

A Thanksgiving Dinner for those in Need

This week, just a few days before Thanksgiving, the DA’s CARE Center hosted a turkey giveaway event in partnership with the San Diego Police Department to provide a complete Thanksgiving dinner to families in need. Watch more in the video. Find out more about the DA’s CARE Center, here.