A Survey of Operations Research and Analytics Literature Related to Anti-Human Trafficking

Human trafficking is a compound social, economic, and human rights issue occurring in all regions of the world. Understanding and addressing such a complex crime requires effort from multiple domains and perspectives. As of this writing, no systematic review exists of the Operations Research and Analytics literature applied to the domain of human trafficking. The purpose of this work is to fill this gap through a systematic literature review. Studies matching our search criteria were found ranging from 2010 to March 2021. These studies were gathered and analyzed to help answer the following three research questions: (i) What aspects of human trafficking are being studied by Operations Research and Analytics researchers? (ii) What Operations Research and Analytics methods are being applied in the anti-human trafficking domain? and (iii) What are the existing research gaps associated with (i) and (ii)? By answering these questions, we illuminate the extent to which these topics have been addressed in the literature, as well as inform future research opportunities in applying analytical methods to advance the fight against human trafficking.Comment: 28 pages, 6 Figures, 2 Table

Why are You Here? Modeling Illicit Massage Business Location Characteristics with Machine Learning

Illicit massage businesses are a venue for sex and labor trafficking in the United States. Though many of their locations are made publicly available through online advertising, little is known about why they choose to locate where they do. In this work, we use inferential modeling to better understand the spatial distribution of illicit massage businesses within the U.S. Based on addresses web-scraped weekly from online advertisements over 6 months, we modeled illicit massage business prevalence at the census tract and county levels. We used publicly available data to characterize census tracts and counties, finding that the state in which they are located, distance to international airports, rent and income levels, racial composition, and religious presence all had significant relationships to illicit massage business presence. Illicit massage businesses operating with unethical labor practices and/or forced sexual services are not in line with just, peaceful, and inclusive societal goals, and the burdens of this industry disproportionately fall on women. While we emphasize that not all illicit massage businesses are settings of human trafficking, better understanding this industry is a key step toward better regulating it and protecting those harmed within it

Optimization of Port-of-Entry Operation in the U.S.: An Anti-human Trafficking Focus

Although decisions at the U.S. port-of-entries take into consideration many factors and stakeholders like government, citizens, travelers, security is their main priority. Officer\u27s decision relies on letting someone into the country or forbids their entrance if they present some threat. They are trained to detect criminals, but little focus is given to identify possible victims. This thesis presents a model that finds an optimal policy regarding how many travelers are going to be conducted to further screening to better detect human trafficking victims. A Bayesian Decision Model was developed and the estimation of costs for the different possible outcomes and scenarios were made and compared. Human trafficking costs and the POE operation were considered. Results showed that decisions were affected by the human trafficking and POE operation costs, as well as the expected number of victims at the border