72 individuals have been charged with the sexual exploitation of children from 12 years old to as young as infants.  The ring, which was based in the United States, reached across 5 countries and 14 continents.  According to U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, who spoke at a Department of Justice Press Conference, members of this online community – titled Dreamboard – had to continually upload images of sexual abuse in order to maintain their membership; the more content they uploaded, the more they were able to access.

The “T Visa,” which offers trafficking victims protection – and even  citizenship – in exchange for their help putting traffickers behind bars is an underused program, NBC reporter Azriel James Relph writes.  Since T Visas became available in 2002, the U.S. Bureau of Citizenship and Immigration Services has been authorized to issue up to 5,000 a year — or enough for 10 percent of the 50,000 men, women and children trafficked into the U.S. for prostitution and forced labor each year, according to the U.S. Department of Justice.

The U.S. prosecuted a record number of human trafficking cases last year, the Department of Justice noted in a “Trafficking in Persons” report released by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.  Sec. Clinton reported that in the 2010 fiscal year, federal law-enforcement agencies charged "181 individuals and obtained 141 convictions in 103 human-trafficking prosecutions." The numbers do not include state cases.

A first-ever National Strategy for Child Exploitation Prevention and Interdiction was released by the Department of Justice. The report assesses dangers to youth from pornography, on-line predators, sex tourism and commercial sexual exploitation. Specific goals and strategies are established in the report with one of the strategies being the targeting of the 500 most dangerous sex offenders in the country.

A bulletin from the U.S. Department of Justice Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Program examines the effects of federal legislation on the commercial sexual exploitation of children. The Urban Institute directed research in 2007 that sought to examine how well existing federal laws against CSEC were being enforced, what successful prosecutions looks like, if penalties for commercial sexual crimes against children have increased and the effects of legislation on service providers.