New Group Aimed at Handling Online Grooming, Sexual Abuse of Women to Join Govt’s Alliances for Action Groups

By
Ashley Seek
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Sexual abuse is a terrible thing to go through.

Despite the string of recent cases, each case is never easier or less heartbreaking to read about.

And with online platforms taking the main stage in society, another type of sexual misconduct has also been used by abusers.

Online grooming.

As such, a new group has risen up in order to tackle these pressing issues.

New Group Aimed at Handling Online Grooming, Sexual Abuse of Women to Join Govt’s Alliances for Action Groups

This announcement was made on Monday (8 Mar), by Ms Sim Ann, Senior Minister of State for Communications and Information (MCCY), TODAYonline reported.

(Fun fact, 8 March was also International Women’s Day. So for our lovely female readers, check out some sweet deals that are bound to make you feel like a queen).

Two engagement sessions regarding the startup of this group were held on 22 Feb and the aforementioned one in March.

Over 60 people from various backgrounds were reported to have attended the sessions.

The group joins the larger “Alliances for Action” (AfA) coalition, aimed to help Singapore recover post-COVID-19.

Focuses of the New Group

During the sessions, Ms Sim talked about the three main issues the group would zoom in on.

The first was online businesses and services which encouraged women to take part in illegal sexual activity or drugs.

The next involved uploading intimate images and footage without consent.

The third point was one-to-one interaction over social media, which could involve instances of grooming or harassment.

Participants also provided potential solutions during both conversations.

They include improving public education by putting together resources to support potential victims of online harm.

Ms Sim said the government is also open to other ideas and solutions as it’s still rather early.

What she hopes to see is more discussion where people can create more ideas together.

“We are looking for projects that are ‘actionable’ and where we can see representatives from the public, people and private sectors working together.”

Other Key Alliances

Of course, this is only one group out of many others.

Back in Nov 2020, the AfA announced that there will be seven key areas they would be working on:

  • Resuming travel and meetings, incentives, conferencing exhibitions (MICE) events
  • Growing e-commerce
  • Digitalising supply chains
  • Building a more environmentally sustainable country
  • Reaching learners through educational technology (eductech)
  • Digitalising the built environment
  • Raising productivity through robotics

Six key members were also added to the task force in November 2020.

And through a series of conversations, the government managed to obtain close to 17,000 survey results on Singaporeans’ experiences during COVID-19 last year.

This was subsequently reported by MCCY on 9 Feb.

Following that, Mr Desmond Lee, Minister for National Development (MND) and Minister-in-charge of Social Services Integration announced four new groups in the AfA.

They would work on the following:

  • Work-life harmony
  • Developing a national framework and blueprint for corporate purposes and social impact
  • Enhancing online learning opportunities
  • Supply smart devices to needy beneficiaries

If you want to learn about the AfA, you can check them out over here. For more information on previous updates on the AfA, click here and here.

Feature Image: Creativa Images / Shutterstock.com

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Ashley Seek
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