Images of child abuse increasing on social media

 Offences involving paedophiles creating or circulating child abuse images were committed every 23 minutes in the last year, the NSPCC reveals today.

Police figures show the number of crimes where paedophiles were caught with child abuse images increased by a quarter to 22,724.

The NSPCC said the data, released under Freedom of Information laws, showed social media networks were increasingly being used by offenders to target children for abuse, grooming and manipulating them into sending naked images.

Tony Stower, NSPCC’S head of child safety online, said the police data reinforced the need for laws to force the social media giants to do more to crack down on child abuse online.

The Daily Telegraph is campaigning for a statutory duty of care on social media firms to better protect children.