Online services can expose children to an array of harms involving sexual exploitation, including sex trafficking, sextortion, and invasions of intimate privacy. Perpetrators of child sexual exploitation use different platforms, including social media, gaming systems, private messaging, and chat apps. They use a variety of methods in their efforts to exploit children online sexually.
For example, perpetrators often engage in “grooming” behavior, in which they establish a connection with the targeted minor by offering support, attention, and friendship thereby gaining the minor’s trust which increases the chances that the minor will engage in sexually explicit acts with or for the offender.
Perpetrators may also use their online connection with minors to persuade, induce, entice, or coerce them into engaging in sexually explicit conduct.
Online Sexual Exploitation
One form of online sexual abuse is sextortion. Sextortion generally refers to the act of an offender threatening to distribute sexually explicit images of an individual unless the individual pays money or sends additional images of a sexual nature to the offender.
Sextortion has increased the threat to the health and safety of minors online. In 2023, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s (NCMEC)’s CyberTipline received more than 186,000 reports of online enticement—including sextortion—and between 2021 and 2023, the number of online enticement reports increased by more than 300%. Sextortion has devastating effects on victims. More than 20 minors, all teenage boys, in the United States have died by suicide as a direct consequence.
Criminal Acts of Abuse
Criminal acts of abuse of children in video games in the past two months (Dec 2024):
- U.P. Man Sentenced To 15 Years For Child Exploitation: “Salowitz pleaded guilty to repeatedly asking a 12-year-old girl, who was living in a different state, to send him sexually explicit photos and videos. He communicated with the child on his smartphone through the application Discord. One of the videos recovered from the defendant’s phone was a recorded livestream in which the child performed sexual acts at the instruction of Salowitz.”
- Florida Man Sentenced To 80 Years For Producing And Distributing Child Sexual Abuse Material: “According to court documents, Tipton groomed a minor victim (who was 12 years old when they met) and, through online gaming and social media platforms, convinced the victim to create pornographic images and videos of himself for Tipton. In return, Tipton sent gifts and food to the victim. Tipton also used the victim to “bait” other children on the internet into creating child sexual abuse material. Further, Tipton groomed a second minor victim and similarly convinced this victim to send pornographic pictures and videos of himself to Tipton in exchange for gifts. At one point, Tipton met the second victim in person and attempted to lure the victim into a public restroom for oral sex. Lastly, Tipton was also active in online chat groups, where he shared child sexual abuse material and instructed that other members would need to also share material or be removed.”
- Member Of Violent 764 Terror Network Sentenced to 30 Years in Prison For Sexually Exploiting a Child: ‘Richard Densmore will spend the next 30 years in federal prison for sexually exploiting a child and for his role in creating 764’s online networks through online gaming sites that coerced children into recording themselves engaging in self-harm, sexually explicit acts, and violence”.
- Texas Man Indicted For Coercion And Enticement Of A Minor To Engage In Sexual Activity And Receipt Of Child Sex Abuse Material: According to court documents, Davila met a 12-year-old girl online while playing a video game. The two continued to communicate and exchanged sexually explicit photos. Davila later drove from Texas to Florida to pick up the child and engage in sexual acts with her.
- Sioux Falls Man Sentenced to 30 Years in Federal Prison for Production of Child Pornography :“The investigation discovered that Tatar had been grooming a 10-year-old female for months through the online application “Discord”. Tatar convinced the child into thinking they were in a romantic relationship which ultimately led to him convincing her to create for him and send to him depictions of herself engaged in sexually explicit behavior.”
- “ U.S. Attorney Alison J. Ramsdell. “His 30-year sentence rightfully reflects the gravity of his crime. More than that, however, this case is yet another reminder to parents and caretakers across the state that we must be vigilant when it comes to our children’s use of smartphones, tablets, and gaming devices. Each platform provides defendants like this one an avenue through which children can be targeted and victimized. It will take all of us—community members, caretakers, educators, and law enforcement—to put an end to this nightmarish criminal activity.”
Tips for parents:
- Have regular conversations with your child about their gaming experiences and potential risks.
- Help your child build their friend list, ensuring it only includes people they know in real life. Remove strangers regularly.
- Enable or disable chat features for younger children using parental control settings in games.
- Teach them not to trust people they meet in the online space, and tell them they should tell you if someone makes them feel uncomfortable.
- For older kids, remind them about the risks of chatting with strangers and emphasize never sharing personal information.
- For older kids, explain that if someone wants to keep their conversation a secret or private or ask them to share private information with them, it’s a warning sign of something bad.
- If someone attempts to contact your child or requests inappropriate material from them:
- Do not delete the conversation.
- Take screenshots and save chat history as evidence.
- Report the incident to the game platform and, if needed, to authorities.
- Explain the dangers of sharing private information online. Make it clear that once something is posted, it cannot be fully removed.
- Advise your child to never leave a game to chat with someone they don’t know on a different platform, as this increases risk.
- You can contact the cybertip line in case of harassment https://report.cybertip.org/