Not long ago, modern slavery was thought to be a rare crime, until statistician Sir Bernard Silverman, then Chief Scientific Adviser to the Home Office, used a mathematical approach to model how many cases were under the surface, undetected by the authorities. Disturbingly, he found modern slavery in the UK to be a much bigger problem than was generally thought. Sir Bernard Silverman is one of the pioneers of Computational Statistics, the understanding and development of the ways that increasing computer power over the last 40 years has revolutionised the handling, analysis and presentation of data. His research has ranged widely across theoretical and applied aspects of statistics and he has acted as a consultant in many areas of industry, commerce, finance, law and government. From 2010 to 2017 he was Chief Scientific Adviser to the Home Office, advising the Home Secretary, ministers and officials on all aspects of science and research. In the first scientific approach to the problem, underpinning the Modern Slavery Act 2015, he estimated that there were 10000 to 13000 victims of Modern Slavery in the UK. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society, a past President of the Royal Statistical Society, and a member of the Prime Minister’s Task Force on Modern Slavery. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx