Human trafficking in the Netherlands: trends and recent developments

Notwithstanding the lift on the ban of brothels in the Netherlands during 2000, the introduction of the integral approach and other efforts to fight human trafficking; it still continues to exist within the licensed sector. Simultaneously, prostitution increasingly moved to Dutch cities with less strict regulations or control, and also to more invisible realms (escort services, internet). ICT facilitate this backstage informal sex work by offering a fluid, flexible, dynamic podium that is difficult to control. Internet is increasingly used by traffickers in order to recruit potential victims, to blackmail victims with confronting images or by exploiting victims through webcam exposure. In 2005 human trafficking is extended in law towards exploitation in all labor sectors and in 2011 illegal stay was criminalized in the Netherlands. This criminalization could hinder the fight against human traffickers.