Calls double in London from potential online child sex abusers

The number of people in London looking for support for online child sex abuse doubled in 2022

Calls from Londoners seeking help to prevent them carrying out online child sex abuse have doubled in the past year, new figures show.

Stop it Now is an anonymous helpline to support those who may offend.

According to the charity, 77,821 people in London sought advice in 2022, representing a 114% increase on the previous year.

It says heavy pornography usage is often a common pathway into viewing sexual images of children online.

The helpline, supporting people worried about their own or someone else's sexual thoughts or behaviour towards children, has seen a 67% rise of calls received across the UK in 2022 compared to the previous year.

The charity is urging men to be careful of their pornography viewing habits, as insights show that developing an interest in more extreme porn can lead to online offending against children.

Excessive porn viewing can cause viewers to become desensitised, explains senior helpline manager Vicky Young, and lead people to seek more "extreme" viewing.

She said: "We know that there is an increase in online offending, people moved to the online world more through lockdown and there was increase in sexual offending then.

"What some offenders have told us is that feelings of loneliness, isolation and depression have driven them to use pornography and look an indecent images, so a change in lifestyle habits may have contributed since the pandemic."

'Possible arrest, jail, job loss'

Child sexual abuse prevention expert and director of Stop It Now, Donald Findlater, added: "The way people use pornography today is unrecognisable from 20-years ago.

"The days of top-shelf magazines have been replaced by sophisticated methods that can show people things online they weren't looking for or usually interested in.

"This can mean people then search for and need more extreme videos to be satisfied, with some individuals then looking for under-age material and offending as a result.

"Our message to anyone on that path, or already offending, is that these pictures and videos cause huge harm to the children in them.

"And watching them has massive consequences for the viewer, including possible arrest, jail, job loss and family breakdown. But it isn't too late to stop.

"The thousands of men who call us after being arrested tell us they wish they'd made a change and stopped sooner. Many felt they were in a cycle they couldn't break and we helped them find a way out - to stop and to stay stopped."

In 2018, the National Crime Agency (NCA) estimated 80,000 people in the UK posed a sexual threat to children online, and, in 2021, they estimated between 550,000 and 850,000 people posed a threat to children either online or offline.

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