The Internet Watch Foundation, a UK-based organization that monitors child sexual abuse material globally, has documented a substantial increase in AI-generated illegal content. Analysts assessed more than 6,310 synthetic images meeting the legal definition of child sexual abuse material during the first half of the year, representing a 40% increase compared to the prior year’s total of approximately 4,500 images. The majority of detected material depicted girls aged seven to 13.
This rise in AI-generated abuse material has prompted calls for stronger regulatory action. Hannah Swirsky, head of policy at the IWF, has advocated for binding legislation requiring technology companies to design safer AI models that cannot be misused for creating such content. She emphasized that the responsibility falls on tech firms to implement safeguards, noting the problem originated from technological advancement. The UK’s AI minister, Kanishka Narayan, has indicated that regulatory options remain open, with the standard for any new legislation being whether it would enhance public safety.
Current UK law prohibits AI-generated child sexual abuse material regardless of origin, and the government has extended protections by criminalizing the creation, adaptation, or distribution of AI models designed to produce such content. Developing models intended to generate hyper-realistic abuse imagery carries potential sentences of up to five years imprisonment. A government spokesperson reiterated the legal prohibition and emphasized enforcement efforts against models used to create such material.
Beyond still images, the issue extends to manipulated videos and deepfakes. A separate initiative called Report Remove has received 420 reports from children concerning fabricated or altered explicit images of themselves so far this year, already surpassing the previous year’s total of 397 reports. In response, the National Crime Agency and IWF have advised parents and guardians to limit children’s photographs shared publicly, recommending private social media accounts or restricted sharing through close contact groups only.
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