Thank you to everyone who has contributed childhood photos to this project! Collectively, your participation has enabled us to compile a fully consented dataset of everyday childhood images that will be used by researchers at Monash University’s AiLECS lab to improve the efficacy of machine learning to counter child sexual exploitation.

Images you have provided to the dataset will not be used without your consent by any other parties, or for any purposes other than machine learning research with a clear and specific intent of countering child sexual exploitation.

AiLECS is currently preparing the dataset for research use. This means:

• verifying the number of people in each image;
• confirming positions marked on submissions correspond to location of actual persons in the image;
• checking use consent is affirmed for each person depicted;
• standardising contributor-supplied age data (to be consistently expressed as a numerical age in years);
• removing any images that do not meet criteria for inclusion in this dataset;
• cropping to exclude image borders that are not part of original photos;
• validating a dataset documentation package to guide research use.

We will provide details of research activities that make use of the My Pictures Matter dataset on this page and/or on the AiLECS website.

You are free to withdraw consent for the use of photos you have contributed at any time. If you inform us that consent for research use has changed, we will issue an updated version of the dataset that does not include the relevant image(s), and this updated version of the dataset will be used for new research activities commencing after the date of the change request. If you have any questions about how the dataset is being used, or if you wish to revoke use consent for images, please get in touch at mypicturesmatter@ailecs.org.

This research is being conducted by AiLECS Lab, a collaboration between Monash University and the Australian Federal Police. The project has received funding from the Westpac Safer Children Safer Communities Fund and has approval from the Monash University Human Research Committee (Project ID: 31436). Content that you share with us will be stored and managed by Monash University in accordance with guidelines set out in the Australian National Statement on Ethical Conduct in Human Research. If you would like more information regarding any aspect of this project, email the researchers at mypicturesmatter@ailecs.org, or contact the project’s Chief Investigator: Associate Professor Campbell Wilson, Monash University, Department of Data Science and AI, Phone: +61 3 9903 1142, Email: campbell.wilson@monash.edu