Children are being coerced by paedophiles into abusing their siblings online

Mike Wright
·2 min read
File photo dated 04/03/17 of a child using a laptop computer. A cross-party group of MSPs are calling on the Scottish Government to ban online pimping, after an inquiry found commercial websites are facilitating sex trafficking and sexual exploitation. Issue date: Friday March 19, 2021. PA Photo. The inquiry into Sexual Exploitation Advertising websites was launched by MSPs in response to mounting reports that websites hosting prostitution adverts are fuelling sexual exploitation and organised crime in Scotland. See PA story SCOTLAND Trafficking.  - Dominic Lipinski/PA Wire

Children are being coerced by paedophiles into abusing their siblings online, a watchdog has found as it warned parents of the "disturbing new trend".

The Internet Watch Foundation said it was finding on average eight images and videos a day involving children as young as three being tricked into abusing brothers and sisters.

The findings come after the National Crime Agency asked the watchdog to investigate the trend following the conviction of prolific paedophile David Wilson, who is serving a 25-year sentence for abusing more than 50 children online.

Police officers in the case discovered a pattern in Mr Wilson’s abuse, which often took place over social media sites like Facebook, of him coercing groomed children to abusing siblings as well as friends.

A study conducted by the IWF, which hunts down and removes child abuse material from the web, found over 500 self-generated images and videos in three months involving children determined to be siblings.

Almost half of the material was graded as the most serious Category A abuse.

The findings come as the IWF has reported a surge in ‘self-generated’ child abuse in recent years as paedophiles are increasingly grooming and abusing children via camera connected devices and phones in their own bedrooms.

The abuse often takes place over live streams that are hard to monitor, with the children unaware that screenshot images are secretly being taken of them.

Susie Hargreaves OBE, chief executive, IWF, warned parents not to assume their children are safe because they are at home or even in the presence of other children.

She said: “This tactic is emerging as a disturbing new trend in offender behaviour, and we know the youngest children are the most vulnerable, and often disproportionately suffer the worst kinds of abuse.

“Predators are now not only using the internet to contact, coerce, and abuse children – they are now using those children to get to other victims. Abuse often takes place in children’s own bedrooms, when parents think children are safe, playing with their siblings.”