Washington, DC (February 19, 2021) – The National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE) is recognizing United Parcel Service (UPS) and Truckers Against Trafficking in its Dignity Defense Alert for partnering to train 100,000 drivers to recognize and report signs of sex trafficking. NCOSE’s Dignity Defense Alert is a new campaign to recognize the people, companies, and nonprofits, who are taking action to defend human dignity from any form of sexual abuse or exploitation.
“UPS and Truckers Against Trafficking are in a unique position to combat sex trafficking and we applaud their creative partnership to help solve this human rights abuse,” said Haley McNamara, vice president of the National Center on Sexual Exploitation. “We recognize these companies with our Dignity Defense Alert for working together to help identify sex trafficking victims.”
“We recognize that drivers are the eyes and ears of our nation’s highways,” says Kendis Paris, executive director of Truckers Against Trafficking, and explained that truck stops and rest stops are common places where traffickers force their victims into prostitution, and so the paths of drivers and victims will often intersect. Thus, drivers are uniquely positioned to see and report instances of sex trafficking which would otherwise go unnoticed.
Previously, UPS had already trained its freight drivers to identify and report signs of sex trafficking. Through the 2020 partnership with Truckers Against Trafficking, UPS proceeded to extend that training to delivery drivers.
Given the training that Truckers Against Trafficking provides to truck drivers throughout the country, 1,296 victims of human trafficking have been identified, as a result of calls made by TAT-trained drivers.
About National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE)
Founded in 1962, the National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE) is the leading national non-partisan organization exposing the links between all forms of sexual exploitation such as child sexual abuse, prostitution, sex trafficking and the public health harms of pornography.
