Many images of online child abuse are made by very young children: ‘They must know that online abuse is not their fault’

A ‘worrying trend’ keeps the child pornography report: one third of the images of sexual child abuse that the hotline processed in 2024 has been made by children themselves, often under forced. This is evident from the annual report of the Offlimits expertise center published on Wednesday evening, which includes the hotline. Three quarters of those homemade images also involve children under the age of twelve and strikingly often even children between the ages of six and nine.

It often seems strong that there is pressure or coercion of adults. « For example with very young children where sex toys are in the picture or because they take certain sexual poses. » The figures are alarming, but it continues to speculate for Madeleine van der Bruggen from the reporting point largely about what is behind the worrying images. « A lot of research on, for example, the forwarding of nude images focuses on adolescent children or older teenagers, we know quite a bit about it. But we know very little about the age group. »

Following the figures, offlimits and the center of sexual violence are evoking research into ‘the nature, size and impact’ of the online abuse. « We must not forget that there are really many children who are physically abused, » says Eva Verlinden, coordinator at the sexual violence center. « That can lead to visual material by coercion or because sexual development is disturbed. But it is also possible that children are put under social media, chat rooms or video games under pressure or blackmailed to make images. Whether children become online gummed By adults, who sometimes even occur as a peer. « 

Puberty

Of all the cases investigated, a third was made by children themselves. « We see that, for example, because images are made with a smartphone in the mirror, » says Van der Bruggen. In three of the four cases by children under the age of twelve who are not yet in puberty, of whom it is hardly conceivable that they decide to make such images themselves.

The average age of the children on the self-made abuse images in 2024 is estimated between five and twelve, and the hotline also sees « shockingly many » six to nine-year-olds in the images. In almost all cases (96.5 percent) it concerns girls.

A « worrying trend, » says Van der Bruggen, although it is not yet possible to determine whether there is really a trend. There are no figures from previous years, because only since the mid -2023 does the hotline have stopped or images have been made by children themselves. « Because we, and also our contacts in treatment practice and at the police, noticed that that kind of reports seemed to increase. »

Online abuse in an increasingly lower age

Eva Verlinden from the center of sexual violence calls it « not new that abuse occurs among such young children ». That center helps victims to get medical, forensic, legal or psychological help and works with offlimits. « We know that on average two children per primary school class experience physical abuse. We are now also seeing the online abuse moving from teenagers and adolescents to young children. There was always a picture of young children, but that they now also make images that we really did not see ten years ago. »

« That physical abuse, sometimes creating a picture, remains a major problem, which is too often not seen by the environment. Now that is the online world, in which children come into contact with people with evil intentions. »

« The consequences of online abuse can be just as great as those of physical abuse, » Verlinden emphasizes. « With online abuse, the processing can even be more difficult, because the images keep wandering and you don’t know when they pop up again or who sees them. »

Instead of leaving children online to their fate, with regard to Verlinden, ‘online parenting’ must become a natural part of education. « Children can hide a lot out of fear, shame or guilt. They must know that online abuse is not their guilt, even if they have sent the images themselves. That is why you have to talk to your child, in keeping with age about sexual development and online safety and really listen if it tells something. If you give your child access to the online world.

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