Cross-border investigative journalism from Japan

Thank you once again for your continuous contribution to our project.

This June, the BBC World Service's investigative unit, BBC Eye, has published the film titled "Catching the men who sell subway groping videos”. A Chinese crime group based in Japan was making significant profits by selling videos of molestations and sexual assaults filmed in Japan and other parts of East Asia.

Some videos cost less than a dollar. The site even once allowed users to order tailor-made abuse videos.

The number of users of the site who gather on the messaging app Telegram is as many as 4,000. Within the community, they share tips and advice on how to sexually assault women.

One man in the community was treated as a "master". He had filmed at least dozens of videos of molestation and promoted the videos for sale on his site to his 80,000 followers on Twitter.

The BBC team used every means at its disposal, including undercover interviews, to get to the bottom of the case. They identified the perpetrators and held them accountable for their attempts to get away with it in the anonymity of the Internet.  It took a year of diligent reporting.

I supported their investigation of identifying this person and several others.

During the research, I sensed a similarity with Tansa's series, "Uploaded and Re-Uploaded”.

In the series as well, videos of victims, sometimes even sexually abused children as young as 10 years old, were sold for as little as $1. Sometimes I found videos in which foreign children were also filmed.

Convenient tools such as social media, web forums, and applications make these crimes possible. Various sites allow anyone to post and view sexual images, and videos of victims can spread anywhere, across countries and regions, and never disappear.

Japanese police say it is not easy to investigate illegal acts happening via foreign servers. This is because it takes months for police in foreign countries to corporate with each other, while criminals quickly cover their tracks and the data on the servers has a limited shelf life. The sheer number of crimes is another reason why police are unable to pursue this issue. 

And it is also possible that police still think  the damage is downplayed as "not serious".

On the other hand, journalists can work together across borders. The BBC's project also involved British, Chinese, and Japanese journalists working together to expose the reality of the situation.

International collaboration is needed for not only digital sex crime but also other serious issues. 

We plan other international collaborations for this year and next year. I believe cooperating journalists from different countries generate a greater impact on society.

We sincerely appreciate your ongoing support for our projects.

I look forward to sharing the next story with you.

Dear all,

We, Tansa, would like to thank you again for your generous donation to our project. 

We are pleased to inform you about Tansa's initiatives for young people.

Tansa believes that the youth of today needs the skills and mindset for investigative reporting. Whether or not they become journalists in the future, young people must be able to discern the truth from the vast amount of available information themselves. 

Tansa is conducting a program for young people, between their teens and twenties, to learn the skills and mindset for investigative journalism.

Currently, three students are participating in this course. Each of them has chosen a social issue of interest as their reporting theme and they have been covering the issue since June 2022. 

One staff member is assigned to each student so that they can immediately respond to the reporting and writing of the students.

Their themes are as follows: teachers' imposition of values on students in schools, the isolation of residents created by the redevelopment of a city after a major earthquake,and the issues that young people over the age of 18 who suffer domestic abuse are not eligible for protection under Japanese law. They interview not only the victims but also the person who caused the problem to identify the root causes of why such problems occur.

Although the students have no experience in investigative reporting, they continue to investigate with the hope of improving the situation of the victims as much as possible.

In addition, from 2021 to 2022, we conducted classes at an alternative school in Hiroshima Pref. to teach investigative reporting skills and mindsets to junior high school students. The students chose a social issue that they were interested in and completed the entire process from investigating to reporting.

So far, students have worked on three different themes. In the first part, we allow any topic that the students want to research. For the second part, we chose a theme of a social issue that was familiar to each student. In the third part, students interviewed local adults, introducing their work and activities, while also painting an in-depth picture of how they spent their childhood and who they became. This third part is accomplished by the students themselves, without the direction and help of Tansa reporters.

During the course, some other activities included a simulated experience of a press conference in which Tansa’s reporters acted as politicians and the junior high school students acted as reporters to allow them to practice interviewing skills.

Tansa will continue to provide education and opportunities for young people to learn investigative journalism so that they can be active around the world.

From everyone at Tansa, we greatly appreciate your continued support, and we’re looking forward to sharing more stories and events with you!