New (international) online threat to young girls, Australian federal police speak

[Manyanamanyana]

I have just had this shared with me, and it chilled me to the bone.
I don't really know what else to say but felt that sharing it might raise awareness and keep someone safe.
Telling our kids that the online world is fraught with danger is a start I guess, and to walk away if something feels off, is critical. And telling our boys that this behaviour is evil and unacceptable is also of equal importance.
Honestly, the internet has so much going for it, and yet so much of humanity's worst is amplified online.
https://www.facebook.com/share/v/17xKXdbTkj/

Can you share the gist of it at the very least? Not everyone has facebook!

I don't have Facebook either but the link worked. Anyway sorry yes, I've gone back through it and am using her words mostly here. It is presented by a female representative of the Australian Federal Police (AFP). She is doing a press club speech or similar. She says that the AFP have been working with the international policing community on a new threat, that has started online and spilled over into real life. That it is a gaming culture kind of thing where teen boys and young men (the ages she gives are around 17 I think) in online groups identify "hunt stalk and draw in" young girls from a range of online platforms and begin grooming her, then intimidating, exploiting and controlling her, and forcing her into acts of violence against themselves, siblings, others, pets etc. She says they are decentralised loosely affiliated networks, in Australia and off-shore, groups glorifying sadistic online exploitation, cyber attacks and violence. They are based on nilism, sadism, nazism and satanism. Most of their victims pre-teen or teenage girls. She describes it as a new and disturbing front in gender-based violence. 59 potential offenders identified in Aus, three arrests made, and some also overseas. Perpetrators are predominantly white middle class.
Horrific. Made my skin crawl.

Unfortunately, this trend is not confined to Australia - we have a few of these guys here too. There's a very interesting podcast on the BBC Sounds app about Cameron Finnigan, a young man from Horsham who did something very similar:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/p0m97p3r?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile
Assume Nothing: Creation of a Teenage Satanist. It's absolutely chilling. Don't listen if you have kids nearby, it's quite distressing.