Germany: Police raise alarm over spike in child trafficking DW 08/28/2025

"Germany's Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) on Thursday announced that it had completed 576 investigations into incidents of human trafficking in 2024 — a 13% percent jump from 2023 and the highest level since the BKA began compiling such data in 2000. The largest share of cases (364) involved sexual exploitation, the highest level recorded by Germany's BKA in a decade. Such exploitation is increasingly taking place in private homes, say authorities, a setting that is difficult to monitor."

"Many victims are women, young people and minors according to the BKA, which says contact is often established online using the so-called "lover-boy method." With this common tactic, men lure women into false relationships in order to create dependency before financially exploiting them through forced prostitution. "Increasingly, psychological and physical violence plays a role," the BKA said. Minors are particularly at risk say police, with more than 200 cases involving children and adolescents, almost all in the context of commercial sexual exploitation."

""One reason for the increasing numbers here is, among other things, that various online platforms have too few protective mechanisms, which facilitates the exploitation of minors using the internet as a tool," said the BKA in Wiesbaden on Thursday. "In two cases, children were offered for sale online." The BKA also said it investigated a record number of labor exploitation cases in 2024, saying, "The cases often involve temporary employment agencies and primarily people from Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia.""

Germany's Federal Criminal Police Office (BKA) completed 576 human trafficking investigations in 2024, a 13% increase from 2023 and the highest since 2000. Sexual exploitation accounted for 364 cases, the highest in a decade, with exploitation increasingly occurring in private homes that are hard to monitor. Victims and suspects often come from other European countries, with rising numbers among Chinese and Colombian victims. Many victims are women, young people and minors; online contact and the "lover-boy" method are common. Weak online protections facilitate exploitation of minors. Labor exploitation investigations also reached record levels, often involving temporary agencies and workers from Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia.

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