January is Human Trafficking Awareness Month.
You’ve seen the posts. You’ve shared a statistic. A ribbon. Maybe even a moment of “that’s awful.” But here’s the brutal truth: awareness without action is like knowing there’s a fire in a building and not calling 911. You know something’s wrong, you talk about it, but nothing changes. So let me ask you a deeper question.
What would actually happen if you got involved?
Not in theory. Not on someday. In real, measurable ways.
From Comfortable to Confronted
I didn’t have to get involved.
I had a good corporate job. A busy life raising a young family. I lived in a beautiful place in California. My days were full—but not with the horrors of what was happening right under our noses.
Then I read an article in USA Today about a crime ring that had made millions of dollars selling child sexual abuse material. I didn’t have to read another paragraph to feel that prickle of discomfort—the kind that doesn’t go away. Millions of dollars. Children. Exploited. Sold.
That wasn’t an abstract problem anymore. It was a call.
I volunteered.
I got trained by Shared Hope International to see the signs—what predators actually look like in the real world, not in the movies. I learned how to be an advocate and a defender instead of just a bystander. I petitioned my members of Congress. I learned how I could take what I knew about technology and put it to work for human good—not just user engagement metrics.
And those trainings didn’t come from textbooks. They came from real survivor experiences.
Listening to Lacy
One of the most unforgettable stories I encountered was that of a girl named Lacy. She was a regular kid—church, school, friends and family—until she was 13 and trafficked into commercial sexual exploitation (Shared Hope International).
What struck me wasn’t just the horror of what happened to her, but the complexity of how she was seen by others while it was happening. Adults walked past her trauma and interpreted her behavior through assumptions. What she really needed was someone trained to recognize trauma, not punishment for survival (Shared Hope International).
Lacy’s story—painful, honest, and human—reminded me that trafficking doesn’t always look like a mystery thriller. Most of the time it looks like someone slipping through the cracks of systems that weren’t built to catch them.
Involvement Isn’t Always Loud
Getting involved didn’t look like a headline in USA Today. It looked like late-night training sessions. It looked like advocating for policy changes instead of posting applause emojis. It looked like learning the warning signs so someone who is in danger doesn’t go unnoticed. It looked like using technology and expertise to lower friction for people on the frontlines—so a child’s story doesn’t get lost.
You don’t need a cape. You need awareness paired with action.
The Cost of Standing Still
Here’s the hard part most people don’t say:
- Doing nothing is not neutral.
- It means evidence goes uncollected.
- Cases collapse for lack of information.
- Traffickers go free because systems weren’t coordinated.
- Children are re-traumatized because they have to tell their story again and again.
In business we call that “technical debt”—an unmanaged problem that compounds until it becomes a crisis. In human terms, it’s a child who could have been protected if we had just done the work.
What Happens When You Say Yes
So what would happen if you got involved?
Maybe you take the training. Maybe you support an organization doing the grunt work. Maybe you ask harder questions about how evidence and technology can support survivors. Maybe you advocate for policies that protect victims instead of punishing them.
One thing I learned is that people are already doing heroic things every day—law enforcement officers who go beyond their job descriptions, advocates who fight systemic inertia, care providers who stay when it’s emotionally exhausting—but they shouldn’t be doing it alone.
When you get involved, even in practical ways, you make it easier for their work to matter more.
Awareness Is Only the Beginning
Human Trafficking Awareness Month matters—but only if it becomes a trigger for action.
You don’t have to be an expert.
You don’t have to quit your job.
You don’t have to know it all.
But you do have to ask:
What happens if I actually get involved?
Because real involvement turns awareness into systems that protect, respond, and restore. And real involvement saves lives in ways no social post can.
With care,
Ben Jackson
CEO, Guardify
