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Capstone Abstract

The purpose of this research is to help Rahab’s Daughters prepare for prevention activities against buyers at future Super Bowls and other events, therefore better understanding the process of communication in human trafficking to improve how we combat human trafficking using better communications strategy. According to the New Jersey Representative Christopher Smith who said in a House hearing that 10,000 women and girls were funneled into Miami for the 2010 Super Bowl celebrations alone (Straw, 2014), Super Bowl week is widely considered one of the worst weeks for human trafficking in the USA (Coker, 2014). This paper looks at the network of communication of the buyers known as “johns” who are customers that solicit to buy sex during Super Bowl 53, leading up to and during Super Bowl week. Technology has made communication easier, but it has a dark side, that is being used to commit crimes such as human trafficking with more ease and provides buyers of sex with more anonymity. We will look at the backpage ads from 2018 pre FOSTA - SESTA (Romano, 2018) and post FOSTA-SESTA era and see how it has affected the supply and demand and discuss how communication through technology is playing a part in supply and demand. The research shows that the buyers have a savvy communication network using technology to anonymize themselves and to spread information in real time. We will show that a similar approach is needed to fight human trafficking with a more advanced network internally and externally for real-time information, distribution, and dissemination.

Capstone Overview

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