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What Parents Should Do if a Child Receives an Exploitative Message Online

If someone sends your child sexual pressure, threats, or image demands, reassure them, preserve the account and messages, report the sender, and contact the right local service.
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Tell your child they are not to blame, they are not in trouble, and you will help. If someone is pressuring them for sexual images, threatening to expose them, demanding money, or trying to arrange a meeting, take it seriously: do not pay or comply before getting help. Report the sender through the platform, block the account, and preserve the existing messages and profile. Then contact the appropriate local reporting service; the routes below cover the United States and Australia.

Start by supporting your child

Stay calm and make it easy for your child to tell you what happened. Shame or fear of punishment can make a child hesitate to ask for help. Say plainly that the sender is responsible for the exploitation and that you will deal with it together. Australia’s eSafety Commissioner likewise advises parents to stay calm and reassure a child they are not at fault or in trouble.

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Listen without blaming, interrogating, or criticizing your child for replying, sharing something, or keeping the conversation secret. You do not need to establish who the sender really is or prove their intent before taking protective steps.

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Recognize the message and assess immediate danger

The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) describes online enticement as online communication with someone believed to be a child, intended to commit a sexual offense or abduction. It can happen on social media, messaging apps, and gaming platforms. Grooming may involve steering a child toward sexual conversation or images, an in-person meeting, or the sale or trade of images. Sextortion is one form of this abuse.

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Warning signs can include sudden requests for nude images, an attempt to move the conversation to another platform, a sender pretending to be younger, gifts or other incentives, sexual role-play, or a relationship built through compliments and shared interests. Threats to create or share manipulated sexual imagery are also a reason to seek help. These signs do not prove who is behind an account, but you do not need proof to report a concerning message.

  • Act urgently if the sender is threatening immediate harm, knows the child’s location, or is pressuring them to meet. Keep the child with a trusted adult and contact local emergency services or police if anyone may be in immediate danger.
  • Treat sexual pressure and blackmail seriously even if the sender claims to be a peer or the child has already replied or shared an image.
  • Ask about image threats without asking the child to show or send you an explicit image. If an image may exist or be online, use the official removal resources below.

Report, block, and preserve the account

  1. Keep the existing account and messages. Do not delete the profile or conversation. NCMEC says the account and messages may help stop the blackmailer.
  2. Report the sender through the platform’s safety or reporting feature. Use the service where the message arrived; if the sender moved the child between apps, report the relevant accounts there too.
  3. Block the sender after reporting. Do not continue negotiating or responding to threats.
  4. Do not pay or comply before getting help. NCMEC advises getting help before deciding whether to pay or otherwise comply, and says cooperation or payment rarely stops blackmail.
  5. Use a local reporting route. Report suspected exploitation to the appropriate authority for your country, in addition to making a platform report.

Do not forward or redistribute sexual imagery as a way to document it. Preserve the account and messages, and use official reporting and removal channels instead.

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Contact the right reporting service for your location

United States

Report suspected online child exploitation, including online enticement and sextortion, to NCMEC’s CyberTipline. It is the national reporting system for suspected online child exploitation; NCMEC reviews tips and may route information to the appropriate law-enforcement agency. Its public reporting scope also includes child sexual abuse material and other listed forms of exploitation. NCMEC reports more than 36.2 million total CyberTipline reports in 2023; that figure covers all CyberTipline reports, not only online enticement.

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Australia

For urgent concerns about child sexual abuse, including grooming or sexual extortion, contact the Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation (ACCCE). Report illegal or harmful online content to the eSafety Commissioner. eSafety also lists support options, including Kids Helpline.

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Use your local police or child-protection reporting service, as well as the platform’s reporting feature. The right authority depends on where you live; the US and Australian services above are not global reporting channels.

If intimate images are involved

If your child’s intimate image exists, is threatened, or may have been shared, use NCMEC’s Take It Down and its “Is Your Explicit Content Out There?” resource for guidance on removal. NCMEC describes Take It Down as a free service to help get explicit images removed. Australia’s eSafety Commissioner also points to Take It Down as a free service for eligible images of people who were under 18 when the image was taken. Check the service’s eligibility and instructions directly.

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How widespread the reports are—and what the figures mean

NCMEC reported more than 186,800 online-enticement reports in 2023, a category that includes sextortion. It also reported that online-enticement reports increased by more than 300% between 2021 and 2023. These are report-count figures, not estimates of how many children experienced exploitation. NCMEC later reported more than 456,000 online-enticement reports through October 5, 2024; that is a partial-year count, not a full-year total.

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Keep the next conversation open

After reporting, let your child know they can come back to you if the sender contacts them again or if anything else happens. Focus on helping them feel safe and supported rather than trying to settle every detail in one conversation. If they need additional support, use the family or youth-support options offered by the relevant local service; in Australia, eSafety lists Kids Helpline.

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