The head of the National Crime Agency, Graeme Biggar, has warned that the internet is "not safe" for children, as reports of suspected child sexual exploitation online reach as many as 900 a day. He said the UK has "already failed two generations of teenagers" by leaving them exposed to online dangers without adequate safeguards, and urged urgent action as families consider buying children smartphones before the new school year. Investigators warn that reports are growing not just in number but in severity, increasingly involving younger children and cases where children themselves are offending as well as being victimised.

The NCA now receives an average of 400 reports a day about the abuse of British children, a fourfold rise in seven years, with 92,000 reports logged last year alone and over 12,000 in the past month. Platforms flagged include Instagram (about 75 images a day), Snapchat (100), Discord (50), Roblox (25) and Google and X (25 each). Biggar said between 710,000 and 840,000 adults in the UK pose some degree of sexual risk to children, and criticised Facebook's move to end-to-end encryption, which he said caused a 50 per cent drop in reported child abuse detections as the platform effectively "blinded" itself to the problem.