To achieve the IWF’s vision of an internet free from child sexual abuse, we work hard to engage with as many organisations as possible from across a broad range of industry sectors – including our existing Members as well as prospective Members.
In 2023 we achieved a number of ‘firsts’ in our aim to expand our reach and bring on board more companies to help us disrupt child sexual abuse content online.
- We passed the 200-membership mark for the first time in our 28-year history.
- We grew our dedicated Membership Team to five full-time employees.
- We expanded into a new sector with Marriott International becoming the first hotel group to protect its guest Wi-Fi services across its portfolio of hotel properties.
- VPN Wholesaler became the first standalone VPN service provider to partner with the IWF to block child sexual abuse material from being viewed across its encrypted networks.
- Bitly, specialists in URL shortener services, became the first of its kind in IWF membership to remove and block shortened and customised URL webpage links, making it harder for perpetrators to hide criminal content.
Our Member partnerships are critical for helping us to drive our vision and remit, while playing a vital part in how we are funded and operate as a not-for-profit organisation. In return, we are a trusted partner and source of intelligence to our Members, providing access to datasets which block known child sexual abuse material on their networks and platforms, and alerts about new criminal content. Through affiliation with the IWF, our Members can provide reassurance to customers while deterring people seeking to misuse their platforms.
As more countries roll out reliable, affordable and accessible internet access, meaning more children and adults are online around the world, IWF’s mission to make the internet a hostile environment to share and trade in child sexual abuse material remains ever more important. We will grow and respond to greater demand for our services globally, including stronger regulatory environments and a welcome focus on trust and safety.
Get in touch at [email protected].