Join Google and Interpol by Buying SomethingDate: 27/7/2012

This past week, Google and Interpol presented a concrete way to fight trafficking. Google is supporting a scanning app that allows consumers to verify products they buy through security features. How it works: Consumer (You) scans a security tag on the product. If the app registers ‘green', then the product has been verified - it is in the country/store/region it was intended to reach. However, if it's ‘red', then the product likely is in the wrong place, meaning it was ‘trafficked' and arrived there illegally. The app registers the instances of ‘verified' and ‘unverified' products, developing a map. Law enforcement, such as Interpol who have been dealing with these problems forever, can then identify the product and its manufacturer, and then start investigating the fraudulent product's supply chain, putting them on the trail of the perpetrators. Also, once you've identified a product as ‘unverified,' you don't buy it, which stops your participation in the trade of fraudulent goods. Why is this important for human trafficking? Two reasons. First, human traffickers use the same transport channels that illicit product transporters do. Second, forced labor also goes into making the unverified (read: counterfeit) products. For more info on this Google and Interpol effort, read this: http://m.economictimes.com/tech/internet/google-chief-eric-schmidt-declares-war-on-illicit-networks/articleshow/15026816.cms For information on contraband (from Angry Birds plush toys to batteries to pharmaceuticals) and its toll on people and economies, check out YouTube for things like: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2Sg5lxVzlo&feature=results_main&playnext=1&list=PL6C6D7AC15C853037

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