CEOP reports Increase in Child Abuse from Social Networking Sites

CEOP - the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre has released its annual Intelligence Report, covering the period between March 2008 and Feb 2009.

The summary reveals how the growth in social networking has impacted online child abuse: 22% of all online abuse reported between March 2008 and February 2009 took place in a social networking environment, compared with 11.4% the previous year, according to CEOP’s latest annual intelligence document.

Figures published in its 2008-2009 Strategic Overview reveal that CEOP received 5411 reports between 01/03/2008 and 28/02/2009, 2543 (47%) of which came from members of the public. 2868 (53%) came from other sources including industry, children’s charities and law enforcement agencies around the world. The document outlines the key trends and updates following analysis of these reports.

CEOP has seen a particular increase in the use of webcams and instant messaging technology to incite a child to perform or to witness a sexual act: 34% of grooming reports made by children under 18 incited a child to perform a sexual act; 20% incited a child to watch a sexual act.
On average, CEOP can expect to receive approximately 450 reports a month as a matter of course – or, in other words, 104 reports of online child sexual abuse per week every week, or one every 103 minutes every day of every year.

In addition, analysis of the reports demonstrates that the online andoffline worlds are truly converged: the ‘virtual’ environment is simply an extension of the real, physical world and that is as true for youngpeople as it is for offenders. Where there used to be separate online services such as email, photo sharing, gaming and chat – all these services are now rolled into one environment; further, the internet can be accessed from a range of devices. This means that children and young people are increasingly accessible to offenders: like them, they can access the internet 24/7 from any location.

“We are now seeing increasingly complex patterns of offending against children, involving a multitude of online environments and different technologies”, CEOP’s Chief Executive Jim Gamble said. “This means that it is more critical than ever to educate children about safe online behaviour. These basic principles need to become second nature to children from the very beginning of their online lives.”

CEOP’s Strategic Overview also highlights that offenders are moving away from buying child abuse images on commercial sites, preferring to use private peer-to-peer software to support paedophile networks and to share and create child abuse images to order.

To view the full report or get it in podcast form, follow this link http://www.ceop.police.uk/mediacentre/strat_overview.asp