Areas of Specialization
Journal Publications
Brewer, R., Swearingen, T., Westlake, B., & Patterson, S. (in press). Modelling the convergence of victims, offenders and media files in child sexual abuse investigations: A method for directing workflows using biometrics and core-periphery analysis. Trends and Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice.
Logos, K., Brewer, R., Seigfried-Spellar, K. C., Palmer, E., Napier, S., Nicholas, M., Westlake, B., & Cubitt, T. I. (2026). Examining how children experience, interpret, and respond to incidents of online grooming and solicitation: Results from an Australian study. Child Abuse & Neglect, 181, 108291. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2026.108291 [PDF]
Olson, I., & Westlake, B. (2026). Holes in kinky education: The role of pornography in learning about BDSM sexualities. Sex Education, 26(2), 263-278. https://doi.org/10.1080/14681811.2025.2461301 [PDF]
Forer, R., & Westlake, B. (2025). Pain for pain: The benefits and challenges of BDSM participation for people with chronic pain – An exploratory study. Psychology and Sexuality, 16(4), 1210-1226. https://doi.org/10.1080/19419899.2025.2507699 [PDF]
Westlake, B., Kusz, J., & Afana, E. (2025). A double-edged sword: The role of pornography in learning about BDSM. Sex Education, 25(1), 23-37. http://doi.org/10.1080/14681811.2023.2266808 [PDF]
Ratcliff, S., Westlake, B., & O’Neill, A. (2025). Only as a last resort: Perceptions of police among gender, sexual, and relationally diverse (GSRD) BDSM / kink participants. Policing and Society, 35(6), 849-866. https://doi.org/10.1080/10439463.2024.2435405 [PDF]
Westlake, B., & Mahan, I. (2025). An international survey of BDSM practitioner demographics: The evolution of purpose for, participation in, and engagement with, kink activities. The Journal of Sex Research, 62(3), 341-359. http://doi.org/10.1080/00224499.2023.2273266 [PDF]
Westlake, B. (2024). BDSM safety in pornography: Its perceived accuracy and impact on practitioners’ safe word practices. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 53(9), 3475-3484. http://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-024-02967-6 [PDF]
Westlake, B., Brewer, R., Toole, K., Daly, T., Swearingen, T., Fletcher, S., Ucci, F., & Logos, K. (2024). Benefits and risks of implementing cloud-based technology for child sexual abuse investigations in Australia. Trends and Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice, 699, 1-18. https://doi.org/10.52922/ti77550 [PDF]
Logos, K., Brewer, R., Langos, C., & Westlake, B. (2023). Establishing a framework for the ethical and legal use of web scrapers by cybercrime and cybersecurity researchers: Learnings from a systematic review of Australian research. International Journal of Law and Information Technology, eaad023. https://doi.org/10.1093/ijlit/eaad023 [PDF]
Westlake, B., & Guerra, E. (2023). Using file and folder naming and structuring to improve automated detection of child sexual abuse images on the Dark Web. Forensic Science International: Digital Investigation, 47(December), 301620. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fsidi.2023.301620 [PDF]
Brewer, R., Westlake, B., Swearingen, T., Patterson, S., Bright, D., Ross, A., Logos, K., & Michalski, D. (2023). Advancing child sexual abuse investigations using biometrics and social network analysis. Trends and Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice, 668, 1-16. https://doi.org/10.52922/ti78948 [PDF]
Westlake, B., Brewer, R., Swearingen, T., Ross, A., Patterson, S., Michalski, D., Hole, M., Logos, K., Frank, R., Bright, D., & Afana, E. (2022). Developing automatic methods to detect and match face and voice biometrics in child sexual abuse videos. Trends and Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice, 648, 1-15. https://doi.org/10.52922/ti78566 [PDF]
Guerra, E., & Westlake, B. G. (2021). Detecting child sexual abuse images: Traits of child sexual exploitation hosting and displaying websites. Child Abuse & Neglect, 122, 105336. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2021.105336 [PDF]
Epstein, B., & Westlake, B. G. (2019). Determination of vehicle speed from recorded video using reverse projection photogrammetry and file metadata. Journal of Forensic Sciences, 64(5), 1523-1529. https://doi.org/10.1111/1556-4029.14053 [PDF]
Westlake, B. G. (2018). Delineating victims from perpetrators: Prosecuting self-produced child pornography in Youth Criminal Justice Systems. International Journal of Cyber Criminology, 12(1), 255-268. doi: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1467907 [PDF]
Westlake, B. G., Bouchard, M., & Frank, R. (2017). Assessing the validity of automated webcrawlers as data collection tools to investigate online child sexual exploitation. Sexual Abuse: A Journal of Research and Treatment, 29(7), 685-708. doi: https://doi.org/10.1177/1079063215616818 [PDF]
Westlake, B. G., Bouchard, M., & Girodat, A. (2017). How obvious is it: The content of child sexual exploitation websites. Deviant Behavior, 38(3), 282-293. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/01639625.2016.1197001 [PDF]
Westlake, B. G., & Bouchard, M. (2016). Criminal careers in cyberspace: Examining website failure within child exploitation networks. Justice Quarterly, 33(7), 1154-1181. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/07418825.2015.1046393 [PDF]
Westlake, B. G., & Bouchard, M. (2016). Liking and hyperlinking: Examining reciprocity and diversity in online child exploitation network communities. Social Science Research, 59(September), 23-36. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssresearch.2016.04.010 [PDF]
Paulhus, D. L., Westlake, B. G., Calvez, S. S., & Harms, P. D. (2013). Self-presentation style in job interviews: The role of personality and culture. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 43(10), 2042-2059. https://doi.org/10.1111/jasp.12157 [PDF]
Westlake, B. G., Bouchard, M., & Frank, R. (2011). Finding the key players in online child exploitation networks. Policy and Internet, 3(2), Article 6. doi: https://doi.org/10.2202/1944-2866.1126 [PDF]
Conference Proceedings
Westlake, B. G., Seigfried-Spellar, K., Brewer, R., Napier, S., Logos, K., & Davidson, J. (2024). Innovations from the launch of the child sexual abuse reduction research network. Child Abuse & Neglect, 155(September), 10699. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chiabu.2024.106999 [PDF]
Lin, H. Y., Moh, T. S., & Westlake, B. (2021, December). Gun violence news information retrieval using BERT as sequencing tagging task. In 2021 IEEE International Conference on Big Data. Orlando, USA, 15-18 December (pp. 2525-2531). IEEE. https://doi.org/10.1109/BigData52589.2021.9671919 [PDF]
Westlake, B. G., Bouchard, M., & Frank, R. (2012, September). Comparing methods for detecting child exploitation content online. In 2012 European Intelligence and Security Informatics Conference. Odense, Denmark, 22-24 August (pp. 156-163). IEEE. https://doi.org/10.1109/EISIC.2012.25 [PDF]
Joffres, K., Bouchard, M., Frank, R., & Westlake, B. G. (2011, October). Strategies to disrupt online child pornography networks. In 2011 European Intelligence and Security Informatics Conference. Athens, Greece, 12-14 September (pp. 163-170). IEEE. https://doi.org/10.1109/EISIC.2011.32 [PDF]
Frank, R., Westlake, B. G., & Bouchard, M. (2010, August). The structure and content of online child exploitation. In ISI-KDD ’10 ACM SIGKDD Workshop on Intelligence and Security Informatics, Washington, USA, 25-28 July (Article 3). ACM. https://doi.org/10.1145/1938606.1938609 [PDF]
Book Chapters
Brewer, R., Westlake, B., Hart, T., & Arauza, O. (2021). The ethics of web crawling and web scraping in criminological research: Navigating issues of consent, privacy and other potential harms associated with automated data collection. In A. Lavorgna & T. Holt (Eds.), Researching cybercrimes (pp.435-456). Palgrave Macmillian: Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-74837-1_22 [PDF]
Westlake, B. G. (2020). The past, present, and future of online child sexual exploitation: Summarizing the evolution of production, distribution, and detection. In T. Holt & A. Bossler (Eds.), The Palgrave handbook of international cybercrime and cyberdeviance (pp.1225 1253). Palgrave Macmillian, Cham. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-78440-3_52 [PDF]
Westlake, B. G., & Frank, R. (2016). Seeing the forest through the trees: Identifying key players in online child sexual exploitation distribution networks. In T. Holt (Ed.), Cybercrime through an interdisciplinary lens (pp.189-209). New York: Routledge. doi: https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315618456 [PDF]
Technical Reports
Westlake, B., & Peters, R. J. (2023, April). The current and emerging landscape of child pornography on the internet: An overview guide for US Prosecutors in a courtroom setting. Zero Abuse Project. St. Paul, Minnesota. [PDF]
Brewer, R., Langos, C., Lagos, K., Westlake, B., & Spence, C. (2022, September). Examining the ethical and legal dimensions of using automated data collection technologies to combat cyber threats in Australia. Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre. Joondalup, Western Australia. https://adelaidecybercrime.org/legal [PDF]
Westlake, B. G., & Soliman, A. (2018, December). San Benito County Sheriff’s Office Strengthening Families Program evaluation. San Benito County Sheriff’s Office. Hollister, California.
Conference Presentations
Westlake, B. (2024, December 6). Enhancing automated identification of child sexual abuse media files through file/folder naming practices and website structuring attributes. [Oral]. 2nd Annual Child Sexual Abuse Reduction Research Network Workshop, Leiden, Netherlands.
Brewer, R., Patterson, S., Swearingen, T., & Westlake, B. (2024, December 6). Modelling offender and victim networks across child sexual abuse investigations [Oral]. 2nd Annual Child Sexual Abuse Reduction Research Network Workshop, Leiden, Netherlands.
Logos, K., Brewer, K., Palmer, E., Westlake, B., & Napier, S. (2024, December 5). Understanding the experiences and navigation of online sexual abuse and solicitation amongst Australian adolescents [Oral]. 2nd Annual Child Sexual Abuse Reduction Research Network Workshop, Leiden, Netherlands.
Westlake, B., Brewer, R., & Swearingen, T. (2024, November 15). Modelling the convergence of victims, offenders, and media files in child sexual abuse investigations. [Oral]. 79th American Society of Criminology Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA.
O’Neill, A., & Westlake, B. (2024, November 14). Perceptions of law enforcement’s ability to respond to and protect sexually marginalized BDSM practitioners [Oral]. 79th American Society of Criminology Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA.
Westlake, B. G., & Brewer, R. (2024, September 10th). Revolutionizing Data Management: AI and Oracle Autonomous Database [Oral Presentation]. Oracle CloudWorld 2024, Las Vegas, Nevada.
Brewer, R., & Westlake, B. G. (2024, April 10). University of Adelaide and San Jose State University cybercrime researchers leverage Oracle Autonomous Database to help investigators combat child exploitation [Oral Presentation]. Oracle Data and AI Forum, Sydney, Australia
Westlake, B., Brewer, R., Logos, K., & Lagos, C. (2023, December 6). A framework for the ethical and legal use of web scrapers by cybercrime researchers [Oral]. Australia and New Zealand Society of Criminology, Melbourne, Australia.
Westlake, B., Brewer, R., Swearingen, A., & Ross, A. (2023, December 4). Developing automated methods to detect and match face and voice biometrics in child sexual abuse material [Oral]. 1st Annual Child Sexual Abuse Reduction Research Network Workshop, Adelaide, Australia. https://www.csaresearch.org/december4
Brewer, R., Westlake, B., Swearingen, A., & Ross, A. (2023, December 4). Understanding child sexual abuse offending and victimisation patterns through the extraction and analysis of biometrics: Results from an Australian seizure [Oral]. 1st Annual Child Sexual Abuse Reduction Research Network Workshop, Adelaide, Australia. https://www.csaresearch.org/december4
Westlake, B. G., & Brewer, R. (2023, November 9th). Identifying key victims and offenders in child sexual abuse media files using voice and facial recognition within a social network analysis framework [Oral Presentation]. Asia-Pacific Financial Coalition Against Child Sexual Exploitation, Virtual.
Brewer, R., Westlake, B., Swearingen, T., Ross, A., Michalski, D., Logos, K., Frank, R., & Bright, D. (2022, September 21-24). Developing automated methods to investigate child sexual abuse using face and voice biometrics [Oral]. Eurocrim 2022, Malaga, Spain. https://eurocrim.secure-platform.com/spain2022/solicitations/8/sessiongallery/356
Brewer, R., Westlake, B., Swearingen, T., Logos, K., & Ross, A. (2023, September 11). Identifying offending and victimisation patterns in child sexual abuse investigations using face and voice biometrics [Oral]. 2023 Human Factors in Cybercrime, Halle, Germany. https://www.hfc-conference.com/day-two
Westlake, B., & Mahan, I. (2022, November 26). Surveying the motivations, benefits, and experiences of those who engage in BDSM/kink [Lecture]. CARAS Conference: Leather-Kink Research and Clinical Knowledge (C2C) – West, Los Angeles, CA, United States. https://www.carasresearch.org/c2c-west
Westlake, B. G. (2022, November 26). What research on leather and kink is needed today? [Panellist]. CARAS Conference: Leather-Kink Research and Clinical Knowledge (C2C) – West, Los Angeles, California. https://www.carasresearch.org/c2c-west
Westlake, B. G., & Brewer, R. (2022, July 20). Advancing child sexual abuse investigations using biometrics and social network analysis [Oral Presentation]. Asia-Pacific Financial Coalition Against Child Sexual Exploitation, Virtual.
Westlake, B. G., & Brewer, R. (2022, May 16). Facial and voice recognition tool to identify victims and perpetrators in CSAM [Oral Presentation]. 31st Session of the Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice (United Nations), Vienna Austria. https://youtu.be/g5E96XxiT-o?t=5222
Brewer, R., & Westlake, B. G. (2022, February 23). Developing tools to detect and combat sexual abuse [Panellist]. The Stretton Institute Webinar & Australian Institute of Criminology, Adelaide, Australia. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwRuY98LhlU
Guerra, E., & Westlake, B. G. (2021, November 17-20). Child sexual abuse material on the Dark Web: An analysis of TOR website structure [Oral]. American Society of Criminology, Chicago, IL. https://asc41.com/events/2021-asc-annual-meeting/
Brewer, R., & Westlake, B. G. (2021, June 3). Using automated audio and facial recognition biometrics tools for detecting child sexual abuse material [Oral Presentation]. Asia-Pacific Financial Coalition Against Child Sexual Exploitation, Virtual.
Brewer, R., Westlake, B. G, Fanucchi, F., & Guerra, E. (2021, May). Using automated methods to detect, analyse, and investigate cybercrime [Oral Presentation]. 2021 Cybersecurity Revolution, Virtual. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLx-UAt5wSTnm4jnkXp4GnVocrMMz2in1Z
Guerra, E., & Westlake, B. G. (2020, September). Detecting child sexual abuse material: Traits of hosting and displaying websites [Oral]. American Society of Criminology – Cybercrime Division Virtual Conference, Virtual. https://csrcl.huji.ac.il/event/cyber-crime-day-1
Westlake, B. G., & Alder, L. (2019, April 27). Could sex in VR be exploitative? What is the potential for queering virtual bodies? [Oral Presentation]. CFP: Gender, Bodies, & Technology 5th Transdisciplinary Conference, for Playing with Our Selves: Examining Life through Virtual Media Part II, Roanoke, VA.
Westlake, B. G. (2018, November 14-17). Self-produced child pornography: When the victims are the perpetrators [Oral]. American Society of Criminology, Atlanta, GA. https://asc41.com/events/2018-asc-annual-meeting/
Westlake, B. G. (2018, February 1-3). Delineating victims from perpetrators: Prosecuting self-produced child pornography in youth criminal justice systems [Oral]. 45th Western Society of Criminology Conference, Long Beach, CA. https://westerncriminology.org/documents/conference_proceedings/WSC_2018_Conference_Program.pdf
Westlake, B. G. (2016, November 16-19). Network Capital: Identifying key players within criminal networks through weighted measures of connectivity and resource-sharing [Oral]. American Society of Criminology Conference, New Orleans, LA. https://asc41.com/events/2016-asc-annual-meeting/
Westlake, B. G. (2016, November 16-19). Operation child pornography: How organized is the distribution of child sexual exploitation material? [Oral Presentation] American Society of Criminology Conference, New Orleans, LA. https://asc41.com/events/2016-asc-annual-meeting/
Westlake, B. G., & Frank, R. (2016, June 12-14). Seeing the forest through the tree: Identifying the key players in the online distribution of child sexual exploitation material [Oral]. 4th Annual International Conference on Cybercrime and Computer Forensics, Vancouver, BC. https://www.apatas.org/icccf/icccf-2016/
Girodat, A., Westlake, B. G., & Bouchard, M. (2016, February 4-6). How obvious is it: Do child sexual exploitation websites hide their intent? [Oral]. 43rd Western Society of Criminology Conference, Vancouver, BC. https://westerncriminology.org/documents/conference_proceedings/WSC_2016_Conference_Program.pdf
Westlake, B. G., & Bouchard, M. (2016, February 4-6). Liking and hyperlinking: The community structure of child sexual exploitation distribution websites [Oral]. 43rd Western Society of Criminology Conference, Vancouver, BC. https://westerncriminology.org/documents/conference_proceedings/WSC_2016_Conference_Program.pdf
Westlake, B. G., & Bouchard, M. (2015, November 18-21). Liking and hyperlinking: Community detection in online child exploitation networks [Oral]. American Society of Criminology Conference, Washington, DC. https://asc41.com/events/2015-asc-annual-meeting/
Westlake, B. G., & Bouchard, M. (2014, March). Monitoring the evolution of child exploitation networks [Oral Presentation]. Interdisciplinary Conference on Cybercrime, East Lansing, MI.
Westlake, B. G., & Bouchard, M. (2013, November 20-23). Surviving online: Attributes which influence child exploitation website survival [Oral]. American Society of Criminology Conference, Atlanta, GA. https://asc41.com/events/2013-asc-annual-meeting/
Westlake, B. G., & Bouchard, M. (2012, November 14-17). Conceptualizing co-offending online [Oral]. American Society of Criminology Conference, Chicago, IL. https://asc41.com/events/2012-asc-annual-meeting/
Westlake, B. G., & Bouchard, M. (2012, October 1-2). Conceptualizing co-offending for cybercrime: Reciprocity and homophily in the online child exploitation community [Oral]. Illicit Networks Conference, Vancouver, BC. https://illicitnetworksworkshop.com/
Westlake, B. G., Frank, R., & Bouchard, M. (2011, February 3-5). Finding the key players in online blog and non-blog child exploitation networks [Oral]. 38th Western Society of Criminology Annual Conference, Vancouver, BC. https://www.westerncriminology.org/documents/conference_proceedings/WSC_2011_Conference_Program.pdf
Frank, R., Westlake, B., & Bouchard, M. (2011, February 3-5). Extracting dark cyber networks [Oral]. 38th Western Society of Criminology Annual Conference, Vancouver, BC. https://www.westerncriminology.org/documents/conference_proceedings/WSC_2011_Conference_Program.pdf
Westlake, B. G. (2010, June). Normalizing polyamory in a mono-centric society [Oral]. Work in Progress Conference, Burnaby, BC.