Louise* thought she had been honest with her two children about the risks of the internet. However, last year, at 6 a.m., the police knocked on her door looking for her 17-year-old son.

“Five or six police officers came up my stairs,” she recalled. She exclaimed, “When they informed her they were searching for her son due to indecent images, she felt like she was going to pass out.

“I said, ‘Oh my god, he’s autistic. Has he been taught?’ They confiscated all his devices and took him away. I was so stunned that I almost vomited after they left.”

Louise’s son is just one of many under-18s accused by law enforcement of viewing or sharing indecent images of children in the past year.

the study Published in February Some individuals who consume child sexual abuse material (CSAM) admit to becoming desensitized to adult pornography and are now in search of more extreme or violent content. It appears that there are people.

In December, an investigation by The Guardian revealed that in certain areas, the majority of individuals identified by authorities as viewing or sharing indecent images of children were under 18.

Experts argue that this is part of a larger crisis caused by predators grooming children through chat apps and social media platforms.

In January, the Internet Watch Foundation cautioned that over 90% of child abuse images online are self-produced, meaning they are generated and distributed by children themselves.

Louise attributes her son’s natural teenage curiosity about pornography to steering him towards a dangerous path of interacting with strangers and sharing explicit images. Alex* was convicted of viewing and distributing a small number of child abuse images, some falling under Category A (rape and abuse of young children). Categories B and C.

While Louise acknowledges that her son, who received an 18-month community sentence and is now on the sex offenders register for five years, committed a serious offense and must face the consequences. But she also wants other parents to comprehend the sequence of events.

“It all began with an obsession common among many young people with autism,” she explained. “He adored manga and anime. I can’t even count how many miles he traveled to buy manga for himself.

“This interest led him from innocent cartoons to sexualized images, eventually leading him to join a group where teenagers exchange pornography.”

Alex has since admitted to his mother that he had an interest in pornography and was part of online groups with names like “Sex Images 13 to 17.” “What teenager isn’t curious?” Louise pondered.

It was on these popular sites and chat apps that adults were waiting to exploit vulnerable young individuals like him.

“He was bombarded with messages,” Louise shared. “Literally thousands of messages from individuals attempting to manipulate him. This boy has struggled for years to fit in as an autistic kid at school. He’s been a victim of bullying. And all of a sudden, he felt accepted. He felt a sense of excitement.

“Adults coerced him into sharing images of abuse. If he hadn’t been caught, who knows where it could have led?”

Louise questioned Alex why he didn’t show the images he received to an adult.

“I even asked him, ‘Why didn’t you tell me immediately when you saw the image?'” And he replied, “Mom, I know it’s difficult to do that. Did you know?” to describe the months I’ve been online in these spaces. ” His actual words when the police arrived were, “Oh, thank God.” That was a relief to him. ”

She mentioned that the lockdown has shifted the dynamics for young people like her son, with their lives increasingly reliant on the internet. “They were instructed, ‘Just go online and do everything there.”

Both Alex and his mother are receiving assistance from the Lucy Faithful Foundation, a charity aiding online sex offenders. Last year, 217,889 people expressed concern about their own or someone else’s sexual thoughts or actions and have reached out to seek help.

The organization recently launched a website called coast, targeting young individuals anxious about their own sexual thoughts and behaviors. Following the lifting of lockdown restrictions, calls to support hotlines for under-18s rose by 32%.

Alex also reflected on the precarious position he found himself in. “I was in my final year of sixth form, at home while my friends were heading off to university, so I felt anxious and fearful about our friendship drifting apart.

“Here, I made the fateful decision to use multiple chat platforms to try to build friendships. Although I had no intention of sexual involvement, I approached my friend in a natural sexual interest, experience. The fear of delay, combined with the powerful effect of anonymity, has made it very easy to engage in these matters.”

He cautions that his generation’s utilization of the online realm demands novel approaches to safeguard children better.

“This issue cannot be resolved by simply advising against talking to strangers on the internet. That information is outdated,” he remarked.

“Many people believe that this content can only be found on the dark web, when in fact it can be found in the shallowest parts of the internet without any effort. It was so scary that I might have thought about it, but unfortunately I was in too deep and it was too late.”

*Name has been changed

• If you have concerns about images your child may have shared themselves, you can report them through the joint Childline and Internet Watch Foundation service. Delete report. You can also report images of child sexual abuse from the same website. If you are concerned about the sexual behavior of young people, please visit: shorespace.org.uk