The Missouri Department of Public Safety has awarded a grant to the Southeast Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force to help protect local children from online predators.

The Southeast Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force in Poplar Bluff will receive $105,206 to continue its fight against Internet crime. Participating counties in the SEMO Cyber Crime Task Force are Bollinger, Butler, Cape Girardeau, Carter, Dunklin, Madison, Mississippi, News Madrid, Oregon, Pemiscot, Perry, Ripley, Scott, St. Francois, Stoddard and Wayne.

Last year, the Justice Department's first report to Congress about online crimes ranked Missouri's effort among the leaders of the 59 task forces surveyed nationally, including being first in computer forensics with 1,441 computer examinations, second in arrests with 337, and second in officers trained with 5,810 officers.

The task force use several methods to fight online crime, including undercover operations, during which officers pose as minors in online chat rooms; reactive enforcement, which utilizes and investigates tips from public or local law enforcement; and forensic investigation, which analyzes the computers of suspects for evidence of crime. Public education about the dangers of online crime is also a role of a cyber crimes task force.

The Southeast Missouri Cyber Crimes Task Force is one of 14 multijurisdictional task forces receiving grant awards of $1,516,702 from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act Justice Assistance Grant program.