BLITZ ON A.I PAEDOS
Sick paedophile gangs making millions of pounds from AI-generated sexual abuse images are facing a legal blitz
Police are worried about a booming black market in material made with AI that is shared in paedophile groups
PAEDOPHILE gangs making millions of pounds from sick AI-generated sexual abuse images are facing a legal blitz.
Britain is set to become the first country in the world with artificial intelligence sex abuse offences.
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Police are worried about a booming black market in material made with AI that is shared in paedophile groups.
Some criminals are earning £1million salaries by selling AI tools and guides on how to create images, sources say.
The announcement of the new offences comes weeks after a bust-up between the British Government and Elon Musk over child grooming.
The boss of social media site X tore into Safeguarding Minister Jess Phillips for refusing to hold a Home Office-led public inquiry into historic sexual abuse.
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But as Labour unveiled the crackdown, Ms Phillips said: “Everyone has a role to play, and I would implore Big Tech to take seriously its responsibility to protect kids and not provide safe spaces for this offending.”
Plans say anyone using AI tools designed to create child sexual abuse images will face up to five years in prison.
People caught with AI “paedophile manuals” teaching others how to create images face up to three years in jail.
And ringleaders running websites for paedos will face sentences of up to ten years.
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Border Force will have new powers to make suspects unlock devices for inspection.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: “We know sick predators’ activities online often lead to them carrying out the most horrific abuse in person.
Shocking moment paedo is caught with young girl after harrowing 999 call
“This Government will not hesitate to act to ensure the safety of children online by ensuring our laws keep pace with the latest threats.
“These four new laws are bold measures designed to keep our children safe online as technologies evolve.
“It is vital that we tackle child sexual abuse online as well as offline so we can better protect the public from new and emerging crimes.”
Police have seen a surge in people modifying AI models to create sick images like “nudeifying” real photos of children.
They make images to order using AI tools and even use the real-life voices of children in generated material.
The gangs also market content and build websites.
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They use fake images to blackmail children into abuse and stream it live to other paedophiles.
In a boost for The Sun’s Keep Our Kids Safe campaign, the Government will crack down on sextortion groups, who pretend to be someone else to trick children, and groups, that encourage children to self-harm.
They use message apps such as , where some sick groups have 60,000 members, sources say.
to disguise their own identity to groom children online.
Ministers fear the AI images are normalising sexual violence towards children and leading those who view it to offend in real life.
Some content is so realistic that cops are unable to tell the difference between AI videos and real ones.
Groom children online
And the amount of AI sexual abuse images is soaring, according to the Internet Watch Foundation.
Over a 30-day period in 2024, the charity identified 3,512 AI child sexual abuse images on one dark web site.
The number of Category A images — which are the most severe — had risen by ten per cent since 2023.
Reports of AI-generated child sexual abuse images have risen 380 per cent — with 245 reports last year compared to 51 in 2023. Each report can contain thousands of images.
The IWF’s Derek Ray-Hill said the speed AI abuse had advanced was frightening.
He added: “It is a nightmare scenario and any child can now be made a victim, with life-like images of them being sexually abused obtainable with only a few prompts and a few clicks.
'Nightmare scenario'
“The availability of this AI content further fuels sexual violence against children. It emboldens and encourages abusers, and it makes real children less safe.”
The point was driven home in a raid by Hertfordshire police last week on the home of two men suspected of contacting children online for sexual purposes.
The cops took “digital dogs” on the swoop, which can sniff out hidden devices such as phones and laptops.
It comes after graphic design student Hugh Nelson, of Bolton, was jailed for 18 years for using AI to create abuse images with photos of real kids.
In the first prosecution of its kind in the UK, Nelson was convicted last summer.
He sold his images in online chat rooms where he made around £5,000 over 18 months.
The new laws will be introduced as part of the forthcoming Crime and Policing Bill.
Telegram said: “Moderators empowered with custom AI and machine learning tools proactively monitor public parts of the platform and accept reports in order to remove millions of pieces of harmful content each day.
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“Every piece of media uploaded to Telegram’s public platform is compared with a database of everything moderators have ever removed in order to prevent the spread of child sexual abuse material.
“More than 61,000 groups and channels related to child sexual abuse material have been banned in January alone.”
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