For many years, when we have spoken about child sexual exploitation and grooming, we have often talked about physical places.

We have talked about perpetrators waiting outside children’s homes, schools and shopping centres, approaching vulnerable children in parks and town centres, or driving around looking for children to exploit.

Those places mattered, and they still do. But the way perpetrators can reach children has changed dramatically.

Today, they do not necessarily need to be waiting outside a children's home or school. They can potentially reach a child through a phone, tablet or games console while that child is sitting in their own bedroom.

That is something I very much hope the national Inquiry into grooming gangs will examine.

The threat has moved online

A recent BBC report highlights just how much the landscape has changed.

Avon and Somerset Police's child exploitation prevention officer, Andri Nicolau, warned that children as young as five can be targeted through social media, gaming and messaging platforms and described online grooming as becoming "easier" and "quicker".

The figures reported are deeply concerning.

According to the BBC report, NSPCC research found that sexual communication offences involving children in the South West had more than doubled since the offence was introduced seven years ago, reaching 756 offences in 2024/25.

The article also reports that between April 2025 and March 2026, Snapchat was mentioned in 324 Childline counselling sessions concerning online sexual abuse, an increase of 19% on the previous year. TikTok was mentioned in 234 sessions and Instagram in 197.

This is consistent with recently published NSPCC data, which identifies Snapchat, TikTok and Instagram as the three most frequently mentioned platforms in relevant Childline counselling sessions during that period. 

A child can be at home and still not be safe

For me, this is perhaps the most frightening change.

Historically, safeguarding has quite understandably focused heavily upon where a child is. Are they missing from home? Who are they spending time with? Who is waiting outside school? What vehicles are they getting into? Which locations are they regularly visiting?

Those questions remain incredibly important, because not all abuse will be through online platforms, but we now also need to ask: who has access to that child through their phone?

Parents may put their child to bed knowing they are safely at home. They might hear them talking upstairs and assume they are playing an online game with friends. A child may be sitting on the sofa next to their family while messaging somebody online.

Physically, that child is exactly where their parents believe them to be.

Digitally, however, someone else could potentially have entered their world.

The NSPCC warns that online abuse can take place through social media, messaging applications, online chat, gaming and livestreaming, and that children can be groomed online either by strangers or by people they already know.

That fundamentally changes the safeguarding landscape.

The Inquiry must look forwards as well as backwards

The Grooming Gangs Inquiry will rightly have to look back.

It will need to understand what happened, what authorities knew, where opportunities to intervene were missed and why so many children were left unprotected.

But if its recommendations are going to protect children growing up today, it must also look forwards.

I hope the Inquiry will examine how perpetrators have adapted their behaviour and how social media, gaming platforms, messaging services and other online spaces can now feature in grooming and exploitation.

We cannot restrict our understanding of grooming to what it looked like twenty years ago.

IICSA and the Internet

This is not an entirely new warning. The Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse carried out a specific investigation into the role of the internet and made a number of recommendations aimed at protecting children online. These included requiring industry to pre-screen material to prevent access to known indecent images of children, stronger age-verification measures for online services and social media platforms, greater international action and a specific code of practice addressing child sexual abuse and exploitation.

The problem is that online grooming itself is ever-evolving, and we need to examine whether our safeguarding systems are evolving quickly enough with it.

I hope the Grooming Gangs Inquiry will build upon the work already undertaken by IICSA and look specifically at the way perpetrators now use social media, messaging applications, gaming platforms and other online spaces to identify, contact and groom children.

Sextortion and the changing nature of control

The BBC report also highlights another deeply worrying development: sextortion.

Children can be pressured or manipulated into sharing an image and then find that image being used to threaten or blackmail them.

The article describes the case of Suleman Aqeel, who was jailed for 17 years at Bristol Crown Court on 30 September. According to the BBC's reporting, he used social media, including Snapchat, to arrange meetings with young girls and threatened to share intimate videos and images.

We must not think of "online" and "offline" abuse as completely separate worlds.

Contact may begin through a screen and move into the physical world. Conversely, images created or obtained during physical abuse can potentially be used subsequently to exert control online.

Technology has changed the opportunities available to perpetrators. Our safeguarding response has to keep pace.

Pointing the Finger

It is important that none of this becomes another way of laying responsibility at the feet of parents.

The technology children use is changing constantly. Many parents are trying to navigate a digital world that simply did not exist when they were children themselves.

Nor is the answer necessarily to remove a child's phone the moment something goes wrong.

The BBC article contains an important message from Andri Nicolau: parents should listen, believe their child and reassure them that what has happened is not their fault, even where the child has shared an intimate image.

A child who believes disclosure will lead to punishment, judgement or having their phone taken away may be frightened to tell somebody what is happening.

Research from the NSPCC has similarly highlighted the importance of children feeling supported and heard following online harm, and the difficulties surrounding issues such as removing devices and secretive online activity.

We need children to know that asking for help will result in protection, not punishment.

What can parents do?

There is no perfect solution, and ultimately the responsibility for abuse belongs with the perpetrator. Technology companies and safeguarding agencies also have important responsibilities.

But there are practical things parents can do:

• Start conversations early. Online safety should be an ordinary family conversation, rather than something discussed for the first time after an incident.
• Take an interest in their online world. Know which games, applications and platforms your child uses and who they communicate with through them.
• Talk about online "friends". Help children understand that somebody behaving kindly online is not necessarily who they claim to be.
• Reassure them that they will not be blamed. Make clear that if something uncomfortable, frightening or embarrassing happens online, they can tell you without fearing punishment.
• Think carefully before simply removing a device. Keeping communication open can be enormously important if you are trying to understand what has happened.
• Discuss photographs and videos. Children should understand that once something has been shared digitally, they may lose control over where it goes.
• Check privacy and parental-control settings together. Make online safety something you do with your child rather than simply something imposed upon them.
• Pay attention to changes in behaviour around devices. Sudden distress, secrecy or anxiety connected with a particular platform or online contact may justify a gentle conversation.
• Know where to seek help. The NSPCC advises that concerns about online grooming can be reported to CEOP, which is part of the National Crime Agency.