Mr. Paul Maguire:

It is extremely difficult to put a figure on it. One needs to differentiate between a profile and an image of a particular individual posted on a website. In many cases, it bears no resemblance to the reality of the individual. Therefore, one needs to differentiate between physical bodies, people who are available for sex and profiles. It appears that most of the women involved have at least two profiles and alternate between them, depending on the area they are in and the services they offer.

During the early part of our research we noticed that the numbers given to each profile were rising sequentially and just before the programme was aired, the figure was up to 21,000 profiles on one website. That does not mean there were 21,000 people involved with the website, but it goes to show that people can create a number of profiles. We know for a fact from some of the women to whom we spoke could have had four profiles each. It is very difficult to be definitive. What is certain is that somewhere between 500 and 700 women are available every day; however, the superintendent thinks the figures could be up to 800, which may be accurate as we have not been monitoring the website for a while.