The UN says that there are an estimated 21 million people across the globe that fall victim to human trafficking and forced labor, creating widespread misery not only for them, but also for their families and friends. That number is undoubtedly rather large, but it can be difficult to visualize – pot into perspective, it’s roughly equivalent to the population of Australia being enslaved.

Worse still, human trafficking affects just about every country in the world according to the UN, either as a country of origin, transition, or the ultimate destination of the victims. There are of course numerous agencies, charities and NGOs battling to combat the problem, and now Google wants to step in to help eradicate this evil trade.

The search engine giant might seem an unlikely savior of trafficked victims around the world, but it believes that its technological expertise might just tip the balance in the favor of agencies and NGOs. To this end, Google has announced the creation of a new collaborative project with three other organizations – Liberty Asia, La Strada International and Polaris Project – that aims to build a Human Trafficking Hotline Network that can assist victims through better international coordination.

Here’s an excerpt from Google’s announcement by Jared Cohen, Director of Google Ideas and Jacquelline Fuller, Director of Google Giving:

“Human trafficking, the narcotics trade and weapons smuggling all have one major thing in common: Their ill-gotten proceeds feed conflict, instability and repression worldwide. Out of all of these, human trafficking is perhaps the most devastating, enslaving nearly 21 million people and generating at least $32 billion of illicit profits every year. At last summer’s Google Ideas summit on mapping, disrupting and exposing illicit networks, it became clear that connecting anti-trafficking helplines in a global data sharing collaboration could help identify illicit patterns and provide victims anywhere in the world with more effective support.”

Of course there are already a number of hotlines setup around the world. People can call these numbers to report suspected traffickers, or alternatively the victims themselves can call for support. But until now, all of these hotlines have been working in isolation, which limits their usefulness. To address this problem, Google wants to connect all local, regional and national anti-trafficking hotlines into a single “data-driven network” that it hopes will allow law enforcement authorities to better cooperate with each other. The basic premise is that traffickers can be outwitted through greater technological sophistication and know how, Google claims.

Being able to access a share data platform, authorities will be able to better coordinate trafficking investigations which, by their very nature, are multinational enterprises. The project is being funded by a $3 million award from Google’s Global Impact Award program.

“Through future collaboration with many more hotlines, the integrated system will hopefully provide insights and protection for hundreds and thousands of potential victims around the world,” said Google.