NCOSE's Dawn Hawkins Testifies Before House Committee, Expressing the Dire Need for Child Online Protection Legislation
Dawn Hawkins, senior advisor at NCOSE, testified before the House Committee on Energy and Commerce on Wednesday. Her testimony relayed a powerful message, displaying the urgent need for Congress to pass legislation to protect children online.
"Since 2019, Congress has held 23 hearings, but has passed nothing to prevent harm," said Hawkins. "This can be the Congress that finally says 'Our kids deserve better.'"
While legislation continues to fall behind the pace of technological development, parents are feeling increasingly hopeless about their children's safety.
Hawkins stressed app stores play in a big role in preserving the safety of children in the digital world.
"They label nudifying tools, chat routlette apps, and strip club simulators as safe for 9-year-olds. We have act. Congress has the tools and we have bipartisan solutions."
Watch the Hearing Now
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ACTION: Ask Your State to Pass App Store Accountability Legislation
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NCOSE Says Andrew and Tristan Tate "Will Not Silence Us"
WASHINGTON, DC (March 21, 2025) – The National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE) responded to the news that Andrew and Tristan Tate have filed a defamation lawsuit against NCOSE Vice President Eleanor Gaetan. This is the second time the Tate brothers have filed a lawsuit against a NCOSE employee.
“This SLAPP lawsuit against a NCOSE executive is utterly without merit and an attack on her First Amendment Rights. The Tate brothers are credibly accused and charged with sex trafficking in Romania. They also face criminal charges of sexual violence in the United Kingdom where their extradition was already granted by a Romanian court. The Florida Attorney General says they are also under investigation in that state. This defamation suit is yet another intimidation tactic that is the Tate brothers’ modus operandi for silencing critics and witnesses against them. Andrew Tate
publicly stated
that he will use the legal system to harass dissenters and that is exactly what he is doing,” said Marcel van der Watt, President, National Center on Sexual Exploitation.
Read the Full Press Statement
To learn more about the allegations against Andrew and Tristan Tate, and NCOSE's pursuit of justice for survivors
read this article.
The Women Who Grew Up in the Dawn of Social Media
The birth of modern-day social media was in the early 2000s, about the time many of us were being born.
So, you could say social media grew up alongside us.
As the technology was aging, so were we.
The release of all these new platforms was so exciting! Facebook and Twitter were the first really big ones. Tumblr and Vine rose in popularity almost as quickly as they fell, while Instagram and Snapchat became dominant. Then, Musical.ly seemed to take the place of Vine, and Musical.ly became TikTok. Today, there’s BeReal, where users photograph one moment of their day all at the same time, Threads and Bluesky, similar to Twitter (now X), and even Strava, a social media app for joggers to share their morning run. VSCO, LinkedIn, Reddit, Telegram, Kik, WhatsApp, Discord, Pinterest, Ask.fm… And these are just some of the most popular ones.
The point is, everything is social media.
It’s quite ironic that just over a decade ago, we were all scrambling to get our hands on these apps and now, many of us are frantically running in the other direction.
So what changed?
The truth is, we do look back on some of these experiences fondly. We can all remember a Vine that made us laugh. But the more you dive in beyond the surface level of social media, the more you discover its vices.
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ACTION: Ask Congress to End CDA 230 Immunity!
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Justice Betrayed: The Urgent Need to Combat Image-Based Sexual Abuse
This week in Utah, the arrests of a county judge and fire chief
for possessing and sharing child sexual abuse material (CSAM) are a stark reminder that sexual exploitation is not confined to the shadows...it exists even within the institutions meant to uphold justice and safety.
How can victims trust the system when those in power are the very perpetrators of harm?
To protect the vulnerable, we must take a stand. It’s time to denounce image-based sexual abuse as unacceptable, demand accountability, and advocate for stronger policies that prevent individuals in positions of power from accessing and distributing exploitative content.
NCOSE is calling on lawmakers, law enforcement, and communities to act. We must push for:
Stronger policies to prevent and remove predators from positions of power
Enhanced legal consequences for those who consume and distribute IBSA and CSAM
Public awareness campaigns to expose the connection between pornography and sexual abuse
We can end this epidemic—but only if good people speak up and refuse to stay silent. Join us in the fight to hold perpetrators accountable and create a society where exploitation is no longer tolerated.
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