After her mother’s passing, a woman goes back to her childhood home for the first time in years, along with her 7-year-old daughter.

Inside the house, the daughter discovers her mother’s childhood belongings and tries them on one by one: a headband, then a necklace, and finally, a beautiful red dress. Each one reminds the woman of her painful past, bringing her back to the time her own mother forced her to strip for a paid livestream with a predator.

Victims of online sexual abuse grow up with the effects of mental, physical and emotional trauma, suffering from depression, paranoia and anxiety well into adulthood. Despite the seriousness of consequences, 95% of victims don’t get the help they need to recover.

SaferKidsPH, a project of UNICEF created to fight online sexual abuse among children, needed to create a campaign that would generate awareness about the continuing effects of online sexual abuse, and drive donations that would fund the recovery and reintegration of victims.

The film was launched during the Charity Ball of The Australian-New Zealand Chamber of Commerce Philippines (ANZCHAM), a non-profit organization that has partnered with the Australian Embassy and UNICEF to promote awareness on the dangers of online sexual abuse.

During the event, UNICEF SaferKidsPH was able to raise a total of P826,500 in donations, 38% more than total donations from the previous year.

The proceeds from this event supported the rehabilitation of 1,377 online sexual abuse victims in the Philippines.

“Red Dress” brought to life how victims of online sexual abuse actually live with their childhood trauma and continuously suffer from the tormenting consequences of the abuse — stories that are not usually shown or bannered in campaigns advocating the same cause. The film became a powerful prompt, effectively driving people to take immediate action to give victims a stronger chance at a better life.

By launching the film during a charity event, SaferKidsPH was successfully able to raise enough funds to support the reintegration of over a thousand victims.

Global hotspot for online sexual abuse

The Philippines is the leading global source of child online pornography. In 2018 alone, at least 600,000 images and videos of Filipino children as young as 3 months old were shared and sold by their own parents to online predators.

Cases of online sexual abuse surged during the pandemic as children were locked down with their families. From March 1 to May 24, 2020, during the start of the pandemic, the Department of Justice reported a 265% increase in OSAEC cases vs. the previous year.