Calls for phone tech to block live-streamed child sex abuse

Campaigners, including the former safeguarding minister, Jess Phillips, have called on the government to push for technology that will block live-streaming of child sexual abuse.

Speaking at the launch of a policy report in Parliament, Phillips said: “The technology, the evidence and the public support are all there - I want to work with ministers to extend on-device blocking to child sexual abuse material on every device sold in Britain, making children here and over the world safer.”

On-device blocking is technology that prevents child sexual abuse material (CSAM) from being filmed or viewed on devices such as smartphones, laptops, and tablets. The government has already demanded tech firms block under-18s from taking or sharing nude images. The vast majority of CSAM, however, is captured on devices belonging to adults.

The device’s software uses artificial intelligence to recognise child sexual abuse images without information being stored or sent anywhere else. It can then block the material at the point that it is created or viewed.

According to research from child safety institute Childlight, around 1.8 million men in the UK have admitted to some form of sexual offence against children. The UK is the third biggest market in the world for live-streamed child sex abuse, according to the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA).

Phil Eccles from the NCA said that the scale of the problem was “at crisis point”. He said: “This would cut off at source somebody on the UK their ability to direct a live stream for a child to be abused," adding, “To me, safeguarding children will always supersede the ability to prosecute. If we can stop that abuse we must.”

Lord Nash, who led a campaign for a ban on social media for under-16s said: “By the time the police are involved, a child has already been abused and the images and videos have gone round the globe. The material has to be blocked on the phone itself, before the harm is done. The government deserves real credit for committing to exactly that on children's phones. I urge it now to extend that commitment to every device sold in Britain, targeted at CSA material, and to lead the world in doing so.”