New Delhi, December 11, 2025: Amid a sharp rise in online child exploitation cases in India, law enforcement agencies are increasingly adopting AI-driven tools to speed up investigations and strengthen victim protection efforts. According to the National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), agencies in India received 2.2 million cybertips related to child abuse in 2024, underscoring the urgent need for advanced digital investigation capabilities.
Katalyst—an AI-powered investigation platform developed by Kindred Tech, a nonprofit specialising in tools for law enforcement and NGOs—is emerging as a key technology supporting this effort. The platform automates the ingestion and prioritisation of cybertip reports, which typically contain around 35 pages of data, helping officers quickly identify critical leads hidden within large volumes of information.
Katalyst combines four core capabilities: advanced case management tools, a secure media library, AI-driven categorisation of sensitive media and automated computer forensic support. Together, these functions streamline workflows, improve evidence handling and help agencies manage rising caseloads more efficiently.
The platform is built on MongoDB Atlas’s AI-ready data infrastructure, enabling it to process structured and unstructured data, store AI inferences alongside case files, and use vector-based similarity searches for victim identification. Offline-ready features allow the system to function in low-connectivity environments, making it suitable for use across diverse policing conditions.
In India, Katalyst is already showing measurable impact. In 2024, Kerala Police’s Counter Child Sexual Exploitation Centre (CCSE) began an 18-month pilot with the platform. During this period, investigators used Katalyst to accelerate case resolution, making 96 arrests, safeguarding 20 children and issuing 18 international referrals. The initiative received the Technology Sabha Excellence Award 2023 for leveraging technology to protect children.
Bree Atkinson, CEO, Kindred Tech, said, “At Kindred Tech, our mission is to empower investigators and law enforcement agencies with tools that surface insights faster and ensure every child’s case receives the urgent attention it requires. MongoDB helps us combine the existing data with the power of AI so Katalyst can surface critical insights faster, allowing Indian investigators to spend less time buried in data and more time safeguarding children.”
Sachin Chawla, MongoDB VP India and ASEAN, said, “The efforts to safeguard children are a race against time. Yet legacy systems and siloed data often create critical delays. We're so proud of how Kindred Tech is combining the outstanding field work of law enforcement with modern data platforms and AI to turn massive volumes of digital evidence into immediate, life-saving insights.”
Kindred Tech plans to expand Katalyst to at least three more Indian states over the next year. Upcoming capabilities will include MongoDB Atlas Vector Search to support real-time image matching and cross-border investigations, along with predictive analytics to strengthen investigative responses at scale.
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