Most parents can't imagine it happening in their own backyard.

While we know it's a global issue, child sex trafficking is finally starting to become a mainstream topic in the U.S.

A film called "I Am Jane Doe," released in February, highlights young girls between the ages of 13 and 15 years old who were picked up off the street and sold for sex online.

The film takes aim at Backpage.com. But in reality, the issue of child sex trafficking is so much bigger than one website. And the appetite for child sex abuse goes all the way to the top.

This is Reality Check you won't get anywhere else.

It's a disheartening statistic: the child sex trafficking market is resulting in more than 1 million children abused around the world each year. So how has this market proliferated?

Tim Swarens, a columnist and editor for The Indianapolis Star, recently began publishing a series of articles about the child sex trade, a subject he's reportedly investigated for more than a year. He explains that the child sex trade is like any other business trade, driven by supply and demand.

According to a study by the Center for Court Innovation from 2016, between 8,900 and 10,500 children ages 13 to 17 are being sold in the U.S. each year. Swarens writes, "The researchers found that the average age of victims is 15 and that each child is purchased on average 5.4 times a day."