Social Media and Child Abuse

TThe internet has opened up new means of sexually abusing children; it has increased the range, volume and accessibility of the abuse. Today is not uncommon for a single suspect to be arrested with tens of thousands of images on his computer. In 2003 one man in Lincolnshire was found with 450,000 child abuse images and a private individual in New York was found with 1,000,000.

  

Many paedophiles acknowledge that exposure to child abuse images fuel their sexual fantasies and play an important part in leading them to commit hands on sexual offences against children. 

The internet has provided an anonymous platform for paedophiles to access children in order for them to eventually meet them to abuse them. Because communications on the Internet are public and perceived as anonymous, children often feel they are safe. One of the largest dangers is that children don’t know who they are talking to, or they have been misled into believing they are talking to a child their age.

Online grooming is much easier and much quicker process than in real life, as they are already talking directly to the child in an isolated and private environment away from adult supervision, and the anonymity allows them to build the trust quicker.

Not only has the advent of the Internet provided sex offenders with easier means to access children, it has also created a platform in which they can seek out other offenders and build networks in which they are able to justify their thoughts, beliefs and fantasies.

As well as this, the internet is also facilitating the major increase in children and young people being exposed to a wide range of age-inappropriate or illegal sexual and other kinds of material. No one knows what the long term effects of this exposure are just yet, but parents, teachers and others with a responsibility for children have expressed great anxiety.

Carr, J. (2003) Child abuse, child pornography and the internet. NCH The children charity
Krone, T (2004) A typology of online child pornography offending. Australian Institute of Criminology
CEOP (2013) Threat Assessment of Child Sexual Exploitation and Abuse

Social Media and Cyber-Terrorism

In 2014, a video entitled ‘A Message to America’ which directly addressed the US President, Barack Obama, was uploaded to video-sharing social networking site, YouTube.

This video depicted 40 year old American photo journalist James Foley. He was seen dressed in an orange jumpsuit kneeling on the floor at the hands of terrorist militants, Isis as he was violently beheaded. As the views grew, the video was rapidly circulated across all social media platforms, including, but not limited to, Facebook, YouTube and Twitter. Trending worldwide on twitter were terms such as #ISIS #JamesFoley and #IslamicState.

These videos and images have been produced by terrorist’s organisations with the intention of creating a state of fear throughout the western world, and that by sending out this message they create an illusion of their power and of intimidation. By continuing to distribute this message, you are promoting this statement, and giving them the publicity and attention they crave.

Not only do terrorist organisations use social media to spread their message of hate, they also use it as a recruitment tool, depending on sites such as Facebook, Twitter and Skype to contact potential extremists all over the world.

Ashford, W (2015) Social media the main cyber terror threat facing the UK, says former MI6 officer[Blog] ComputerWeekly. Available from: http://www.computerweekly.com/news/4500255638/Social-media-the-main-cyber-terror-threat-facing-the-UK-says-former-MI6-officer

Imran, A (2014) Debating the term Cyber-Terrorism: Issues and Problems. Internet Journal of Criminology

The Telegraph Online (2014) How terrorists are using social media. 04 November. Available from: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/islamic-state/11207681/How-terrorists-are-using-social-media.html