Australian girls are being hunted by online crime networks and coerced into acts of violence – against themselves, their siblings or pets – in a “twisted type of gamification”, police have warned.
A new taskforce has been set up to help global authorities tackle this “new and disturbing front in traditional gender-based violence”, Australian Federal Police (AFP) Commissioner Krissy Barrett will say in a speech on Wednesday.
Three people have already been arrested in Australia, and another nine people around the world.
It is unclear what the acts being committed by targets are, but Ms Barrett says the alleged perpetrators hold violent extremist views and want to hurt people “for fun”.
Aged in their late teens or early 20s and largely from Western backgrounds, they recruit pre-teen or teenage girls through gaming platforms such as Roblox or messaging apps such as Discord and Telegram.
The boys and men – whom Ms Barrett calls “crimefluencers” – subscribe to a variety of ideologies, including including nihilism, sadism, Nazism and satanism.
“These groups have a similar culture to multiplayer, online gaming culture, and hunt, stalk and draw in victims from a range of online platforms,” she will say in the speech, also adding that they may not fully understand the consequences of their behaviour.
“The motivation of individuals within these networks is not financial nor is it for sexual gratification – this is purely for their amusement, for fun, or to be popular online.”
Almost 60 alleged offenders have been identified in Australia alone, Ms Barrett says, and the AFP is working with other Five Eyes nations – the US, UK, New Zealand and Canada – to target the groups.
It comes as Australia prepares to introduce a world first social media ban for kids under the age of 16, aimed at minimising online harm. However gaming and messaging platforms are exempt from the new laws, which come into effect in December.