The Internet Watch Foundation identified more than 8,000 AI-generated images and videos from user reports over the past year. Of the AI-generated content, more than 3,400 involved 'full-motion' AI-generated videos that are hyper-realistic and allow for multiple people to interact. Over 65 percent of AI-generated videos depicted the most severe forms of abuse, including rape, sexual torture, and bestiality, compared to only 43 percent of non-AI-generated sexual content falling under the most extreme categories. Perpetrators are using AI tools to make more explicit, extreme, and complex content than before, according to the IWF report.
The IWF's researchers label content as AI-generated if there are obvious mistakes in the imagery, if the victim claims it is AI, or if there's information from the original creator about how AI was used. AI-generated sexual content is increasing at an alarming pace, the foundation reported. The material the IWF has been able to gather gives only a partial view of the overall amount of child sexual material online and is likely to be significantly greater than what it has found.
We now face a technological landscape that can generate infinite violations with unprecedented ease.
Single applications can now generate abusive imagery with minimal effort, removing the need for technical expertise and significantly lowering barriers to entry. In many cases, models require only a single reference image to produce child sexual content. There are a few well-known creators with more advanced skills who make longer, more sophisticated material, with one creator thanked over 3,000 times for creating a 30-minute AI-generated sexual abuse video.
Researchers observed discussions on the dark web where perpetrators trade and work together to develop custom AI models and databases that generate abusive material. In one example, researchers identified an advertisement offering 'custom courses' that promised to teach users how to create AI-generated images of teenagers.
It is clear criminals are exploiting systemic failures and are finding it far too easy to reap huge profits from children’s sexual exploitation. At every stage, we need to disrupt this system. It is an industry.
The online trade in child sexual abuse images has become an 'industry' with the number of websites involved doubling in a year. The Internet Watch Foundation found 15,031 vile sites in 2025, compared with 7,028 the previous year. Around 16% of the sites (2,458) were disguised to look as if they host legitimate content or appear inactive, but have a hidden way for paedophiles to access the material.
The IWF identified and digitally marked 317,101 images of child abuse, meaning tech companies can stop them being shared further. The IWF wants financial services to be forced to detect and report payment links for access to abuse images. Kerry Smith, chief executive of the Internet Watch Foundation, stated that mandatory measures are needed for financial services to proactively detect, take down, and report digital payment links for the sale of child sexual abuse images and videos. Smith added that companies using end-to-end encryption should adopt safety tools to prevent criminals from using these platforms as safe havens.
We need mandatory measures on financial services to proactively detect, take down and report digital payment links for the sale of images and videos of child sexual abuse.
The number of children who reported being victims of sextortion more than doubled last year. The IWF saw 397 sextortion cases in 2025, most of which were reported to the Report Remove helpline, up from 175 sextortion cases in 2024. Joao-Carlos Jardim Dos Santos Teixeira, 26, from Eastbourne, was jailed in February for 11 years and four months for running online child abuse chat groups. Teixeira was sentenced at Lewes Crown Court for sharing and discussing paedophile material online, including AI-generated images, after NCA officers arrested him at his home in February 2024 and seized a number of devices. In 2024, William Yates, 45, was jailed for five years and four months at the same court for running The Annex, a membership-only forum dedicated to child sexual abuse, where the site worked by promoting users from guests to members by live chat participation and sharing imagery.
Kerry Smith warned that criminals are exploiting systemic failures to reap huge profits from children's sexual exploitation, calling it an industry that needs disruption at every stage. Chris Sherwood, chief executive of the NSPCC, noted that the growing number of commercial child sexual abuse sites uncovered by the Internet Watch Foundation lays bare a severe problem.
We also need to see companies which use end-to-end encryption on their services adopt the tried and trusted safety tools which can prevent criminals using these platforms as safe havens to distribute child sexual abuse material.