By Ahmed Abdelsalam
New legislation banning pornography depicting strangulation, incest, and adults simulating sex with under-16s took effect in England and Wales on Friday. Police forces say they are increasingly relying on specialist charities to manage the growing number of teenagers caught up in online child sexual abuse, warning that extreme pornography can serve as a pathway to illegal abuse images.
Police see rising arrests and teenage involvement
Across England and Wales, officers arrest about 1,000 people each month for online child sexual abuse offences, most of them men. Detective Chief Inspector Gerard Smith, who leads a specialist team in West Mercia, said arrest volumes are rising significantly. His officers encounter young people, some in their early teens, who have viewed or shared illegal material, including sexting and exposure to violent child abuse images on chat sites and forums. Several forces are considering a pilot scheme modeled on Surrey's Solah project, which sends civilian safeguarding workers rather than police to visit children who have viewed illegal content, provided there are no aggravating factors such as coercion.
Experts call for platform accountability
Professor Clare McGlynn of Durham University, an expert on pornography regulation, emphasized that the law targets large platforms, not individual phone content. She warned that algorithms on major pornography sites and social media platforms like X normalize extreme material, including videos that simulate child abuse. Ofcom, the UK communications regulator, said new legal duties for tech companies will come into force after it updates its codes of practice, with consultation expected in the first half of 2027. The watchdog noted it has already investigated more than 100 platforms and issued fines totalling over £7 million against 11 providers under the Online Safety Act.
Charities welcome ban but warn of pathway
Vicky Young of the Lucy Faithfull Foundation, which runs the Stop It Now helpline, welcomed the ban. She said thousands of helpline callers report that extreme pornography played a role in their progression to viewing illegal sexual images of children. The foundation believes the new law will make children safer by removing egregious content at source.
