Jon Rouse

Jon Rouse APM spent 39 years with the Queensland Police Service, most of them investigating crimes against children and online child sexual exploitation. At Task Force Argos he helped establish Australia's first proactive online child protection capability and worked on national and international investigations targeting offender networks and identifying victims, including Operation Achilles, which received the International Cyber Crime Gold Award.

From 2019 to 2023 he was seconded to the Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation, where he set up and led its covert online operations, victim identification and training teams. He conceived the Australian Victim Identification Database (AVID) and chaired INTERPOL's Covert Internet Investigations Group until March 2023. He delivered training to child protection investigators in 29 countries and represented Australia at United Nations meetings in Vienna and Kenya.

Since leaving policing he has continued to work in child protection and online safety. He is a Professor of Practice at Monash University's AiLECS Lab and at the Childlight East Asia and Pacific Hub at UNSW, and a Founding Partner of Onemi-Global Solutions.

His current work focuses on the rights of victims and survivors in child sexual abuse material cases, including whether Australian sentencing law recognises those depicted in such material as victims. Through Onemi-Global Solutions he delivers training and operational capability enhancements in victim identification for agencies internationally. He also works on the application of artificial intelligence to child protection, and on prevention and online safety policy.

Jon is a director of the Daniel Morcombe Foundation, and an ambassador for the Carly Ryan Foundation, Act for Kids and Bravehearts, supporting their work in child protection and prevention. In 2018 he received the Champion for Children Award from the International Centre for Missing and Exploited Children in New York, and in 2019 he was named Queensland Australian of the Year.