Experts in warning on dangers to the young
THE number of webpages containing the most extreme images of child abuse has doubled in recent years, according to a report.
The Internet Watch Foundation issued a warning about the stark increase in child sexual abuse imagery on the internet and said children were becoming more vulnerable to grooming and abuse by strangers “even in their own bedrooms”.
The foundation said 51,370 of the webpages it took action to remove or block from the internet in 2022 contained Category A child sexual abuse material.
This category can include the most severe kinds of sexual abuse, including babies and covering acts such as bestiality or sadism.
The amount of Category A content has doubled since 2020 when the foundation uncovered 25,000 pages with this kind of abuse, it said.
A senior analyst at the foundation, named only as Rosa, said: “People are now only one click away from Category A material.
"That is a public safety issue. This extreme material is no longer in the creepy corners of the internet. It’s in plain sight.”
In its annual report, the foundation said it found a record number of URLs containing Category A child sexual abuse images.
The foundation, which works alongside industry and law enforcement to make sure such content is quickly taken down, also noted a 60 per cent increase overall in the number of abuse images including children aged seven to 10, across all three categories.
In total, 255,571 webpages were confirmed as containing child sexual abuse imagery, having links to the imagery or advertising it – a 1 per cent increase from 2021, the foundation said.
It added that each page could contain one, tens, hundreds or even thousands of individual child sexual abuse images or videos.
Category B images are those involving non-penetrative sexual activity, while category C covers other indecent images not falling within categories A or B.
The foundation’s report stated: “As ever-younger children become more tech-aware and active online, they become more vulnerable to grooming and abuse by strangers – even in their own bedrooms.”
The foundation repeated its opposition to the introduction of endto-end encryption on platforms “without there being the necessary, technically possible child safeguards in place” as it warned that tech companies must do everything they can to prevent the upload and distribution of images.
It added: “We have been working closely with colleagues across the Government to ensure that the Online Safety Bill does what it sets out to do and makes the UK a safer space to be online and as part of that, protect the critical work of the foundation as, without us, it will be children who suffer.”
The sites are typically not hosted by mainstream hosting companies but are instead mainly found on servers in countries in Europe or Asia, the foundation said.
It said the UK hosted a “small volume” of online child sexual-abuse content, with 640 webpages displaying child sexual-abuse imagery hosted in the UK last year – an increase from 381 in 2021.