Young students looking for part-time summer jobs could end up becoming victims of forced prostitution as deceitful job ads fill newspapers, civic groups warned yesterday.
The groups conducted a survey of four of the leading Chinese-language newspapers on June 29, just days before the summer vacation began.
They found a total of 1,959 classified ads they suspected might be a front for recruiting prostitutes, Mennonite Good Shepherd Center director Chen Chai-hui (
"Newspapers ... are a good source for job hunters, but if there are traps in these ads, young girls may fall for them," Chen said.
The survey found Taipei County to have the highest number of such ads, followed by Taoyuan County and Taipei City, which tied for second, Chen said.
Chen urged students to pay attention to certain items in the ads that may hint that the job is in the sex industry.
"Most of these ads offer unreasonablely high salaries, loans to job hunters, do not specify job titles, or only give phone numbers and no addresses," Chen said.
Garden of Hope Foundation director Chi Hui-jung (
"The Government Information Office [GIO] requires employers to provide addresses in job ads, so ads without addresses should be rejected," Chi said.
Chi also urged local government information departments to pay closer attention to irregularities in employment ads.
Women's Rescue Foundation executive director Fran Gau (
Lawmakers attending yesterday's press conference vowed to increase their efforts to fight child prostitution, but said there were still some loopholes in the law.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Yang Li-huan (
Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Huang Sue-ying (黃淑英) said teaching appropriate values to students could also help to resolve the problem.
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