Fighting To Hunt Predators Online

Congress Hears Firsthand Reasons To Fund Online Child Safety

(CBS)  Six years ago Alicia Kozakiewicz lived through what she says was nothing less than hell.

“I am that 13-year-old girl who was lured by an Internet predator, transported across state lines to Virginia - in fact not so very far from here - and enslaved by a sadistic pedophile monster,” Kozakiewicz, now 19, told Congress in a Wednesday hearing. She moved members of Congress to tears, CBS News correspondent Chip Reid reports.

She told of the four days she was chained, raped and tortured in a Virginia townhouse.

Her captor sent her image over the Internet. One viewer tipped off police leading to her rescue.

Her abuser is now in prison and Alicia, who believes she was saved for a reason, now tours the country warning children and parents of the perils of internet chat rooms.

“A lot of kids aren’t going to be as lucky as me,” she said. “A lot of them ... you know are dead.”

Kozakiewicz told Congress it can happen to any child looking for a new friend on the Internet. Her predator, she says, posed as a 14-year-old girl and knew all the tricks.

“He had it all down to the abbreviations, the music, the slang, the clothes. He knew it all,” she said. “I never had a chance.”

A map shows the traffic in child pornography in just one day: 4,500 separate computers. Experts say at least 350,000 Americans actively trade in images of the abuse of children.

Law enforcement officials told Congress today it's outrageous that they now have the technology to find the perpetrators - but don't have the resources to go get them.

“We are overwhelmed and underfunded and drowning in a tidal wave of tragedy," said Flint Waters, of the Wyoming Internet Crimes against Children Task Force. "And we don’t have what we need to save these children."

Thousands of children - many who aren't as lucky as Alicia Kozakiewicz.

[Joe posey]

in most of the quote on-line game rooms you will find alot of minors! we at first tryed to scold them away, but to no avail! now we try to talk with them in open forum and hope they get bored with aduld conversation and go back to yahooligan or wherever they go,the main thing is we try just keep them outta private convos..and bash the hell out of anybody that comments to them unrespectfully, its not much, but its really all we can do. but we watch! well! some of us do,, ty

[sonotso]

'' ...

imagine shoving trillions of dollars

of drugs

down kids throats,

imagine waving trillions of dollars

of guns

in kids faces,

imagine all the people

sharing all the world,

i hope some day you''ll join us

and the world will live as one,

... ''

[bsafemom]

I can''t believe how many people are out there trying to lure my children over the Internet. We use a filter that records all chat room and IM conversations. Perhaps if this girls'' parents had something like that, they would have know what was going on and prevented this tragedy. I encourage all parents to be more active in their children''s online lives and get a filter. We use Bsafe Online.

[whispyseas]

'' .. as long as the wealthy and entreprenuerial classes fail to provide for the needs of the more poor and less skilled classes: the more poor less skilled classes will tend to compete for resources, thereby utilizing and wasting far more resources than are required or even desired .. if, however, the needs of the more poor less skilled classes are met, then they will be satisfied to tend to settle for far less and to wait out want based shortages, thereby freeing up resources for the wealthy and skilled classes ... it is exactly that people tend to utilize hapazzard and extravagant amounts of food and land and medicine because they are not allowed reasonable amounts of free food and land and medicine .. why invest money and votes in guns to keep folk reminded that most folk most time do not invest money and votes in guns that remind folk most folk most time do not invest money and votes in guns .. ''

'' .. they''ve got trillions in nuclear biological chemical stealth raype arsenals, but spend most of their time educating and disciplining ignorant naive children so the kids don''t get hurt by a world that invests trillions into educating and disciplining ignorant naive children with nuclear biological chemical stealth raype arsenals .. ''

'' .. the pharoah got so rich, that her tinyest most worthless piece of garbage did far more than feed all forever, and then she forgot all about how rich she was and whined of her poverty, ignorance, and mortality .. for a shortest while anyway .. ''