New AIC report sparks child abuse warning for parents on social media

Parents are being warned about the dangers of sharing photos of their children online, as a shocking new report reveals the prevalence of child groomers using social media.

The Australian Institute of Criminology, in collaboration with the eSafety Commissioner, found 2.8 per cent of the 4011 Australians it surveyed had reported receiving a request for “facilitated child sexual exploitation” in the past year.

It included requests for sexual images and questions of a sexual nature about children, or offers to pay for sexual images of children.

The report found that requests for facilitated child abuse material were “significantly higher among those who had shared a photo of, or information about children publicly online”.

In a statement, Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus said the government was encouraging parents to “limit who they share content with online”.

“Publicly sharing pictures places children at risk of exploitation and harm from offenders who may groom parents or guardians to create or distribute child sexual abuse material,” Mr Dreyfus said.

“No parent would ever hand a photo album of their children to a stranger and the same care should apply to photos posted online.

“Simple measures to protect children include changing privacy settings to ensure photos and information are only shared to friends and family.”

The report recommended education initiatives and platform changes to minimise the risk of harm.

Most social media platforms and dating apps prohibit the posting of material that sexually exploits or could lead to the sexual exploitation of children.

But there are no specific provisions regarding the posting of photos or information regarding children in general.

Mr Dreyfus said the government was considering how to better protect children from online harm.

“One measure that has been shown to effectively reduce the online distribution of child sexual abuse is a warning message which appears when anyone attempts to upload a photo of, or information regarding children, to a public site,” he said.

“The government’s Online Safety Act review is now looking at how we can strengthen our world-leading laws to protect the community from social media harms and ensure industry acts in the best interests of children.”