Yesterday I had a confluence of events that helped educate me on the underbelly of society and then some of the things that technology companies are doing to fight it.

I had the opportunity yesterday to tour Microsoft's Digital Crime Unit in Redmond. It was fascinating to learn what Microsoft is doing to help fight some of the digital crimes in the world. Here is a wikipedia article about it: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Digital_Crimes_Unit

"There are three areas on which the DCU concentrates:"
"Child sexual abuse facilitated through information technology"
"Copyright infringement and intellectual property crimes (see Infringement, misappropriation, and enforcement)"
"Malware crimes, particularly botnets used for malicious purposes"

One of the technologies that Microsoft in partnership with Dartmouth University has developed is called PhotoDNA. It is a technology that is being used in a number of different ways. One of them is helping fight child sexual abuse. Companies are using this technology to combat this hideous evil. Here is another wikipedia article about the technology: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PhotoDNA. Very, very interesting and fascinating. Microsoft is providing this technology free to other companies to help combat child sexual abuse. They gave some amazing statistics about how many pictures are shared every minute across the world. Microsoft and other companies are in the war to combat this.

Lastly - yesterday - I had a friend on Facebook post a story about someone who had been exploited as a child and who is overcoming the effects of it through her Christian faith. Very sobering to read this in light of the tour I took earlier in the day: http://iwantrest.com/blog/post/a-survivors-story-meet-mia

After all of that - I am so grateful that my family has not had to deal with this. This world is a very wicked place. It makes one want to cry out for the Second Coming to come already.