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7 tricks used by sex traffickers to bait victims

By Evelyn Odhiambo on

Sex trafficking is a booming business across the world. You and I are at risk of falling victims.

We are sexual beings and should have the pleasure and benefit of sex that is consented to and safe. Sex trafficking breaks the three cardinal rules: consent, pleasure, and safety.

Sex trafficking is a well-organized crime where traffickers take women, men, and young people across borders to different countries forcing them into misuse.

They use various tactics to get people into their nests. Here are some of them.

1. The Lover trick (seduction and romance)

   Who doesn’t love that cute-looking guy or girl who is always in your business? You should be aware, not all ‘lovers’ are genuine, some are sex traffickers posing as the 21st century Romeo to trap young women or men. They start by forming a romantic and emotional connection and later become emotionally abusive and threaten you with their ill intentions. Through this, they force their target to sexual exploitation with threats.

2. False job advertisements

   That Dubai dream come true. Sex traffickers have mastered the art of controlling people’s desires to their personal advantage. They present themselves with fancy and well-paying employment opportunities abroad. Only to have the victims travel and their documents taken away and forced into sex slavery. 

3. Recruitment agencies

   These are companies run by individuals who gain commission upon every slave they recruit. Often, they present themselves as elite businessmen and women promising a brighter and better future. They lie to their target of having secured employment abroad only to be sold for sexual exploitation.

4. The internet

   The online space has made kids easily accessible and susceptible to sex traffickers. The perpetrators send you a friend request on different online spaces. Their trick is to befriend your contacts to create some sense of trust among the youth and lure you into their trap. In some instances, they use flashy lifestyles to lure their victims with the promise of a good life.

5. Abduction/Kidnapping:

   Sex traffickers forcefully carry off victims and transport them to other countries for exploitation and forced sexual activity.

6. Sale by family

   Poverty is the leading factor in sex trafficking. Men, women, and young people from vulnerable backgrounds are often sold by their families as a form of alleviating poverty. This is often not out of greed but through a falsified better future and employment for their children with a monthly stipend by the traffickers.

7. Drugs and substance abuse

   Sex traffickers have set out the business of drug abuse to trap their target. They target drug users and drug them so as to force them into sex slavery with the notion of them having no other better life if not what’s being offered.

Self-awareness and that of your surrounding can help in avoiding the sex traffickers’ tricks and traps.