Children selling sexual images or videos of themselves on platforms such as Snapchat and TikTok is a phenomenon that has existed for a while, but now developments point to younger and younger children being victimized by perpetrators who come with promises of compensation, something P4 Östergötland was the first to report on.
According to Kajsa Rietz, it is a widespread problem, and the need to talk to children is great both in terms of the children’s own consumption but also when it comes to messages that they get sent to them directly.
– As soon as children and young people get access to social media platforms, which they usually get early on with the knowledge of adults, they are fed suggestions that they should send pictures and then get compensation – and it can be about everything from money to cigarettes, alcohol, shirts and phones, she says.
Novahuset, which works in prevention, support and outreach when it comes to sexual violence, testifies that children as young as ten years old receive messages with offers sent to them.
– By the time we are in year four, the majority of classes and students have received messages with offers of compensation for sexual images or services. They are ten-year-olds and younger, often they have received messages before the fourth grade, says Kajsa Rietz.
“Missing a large majority”
Most often, children who have been exposed have time to reach their teenage years before they raise the alarm themselves and dare to tell about what they have been through. However, most of the children who are exposed are not discovered at all, says Kajsa Rietz.
– We miss a large majority of the children, which is an incredible betrayal because many of them are already in society’s system – they are already at BUP or with the counselor at the school.
– We raise the alarm if we see that children are unwell, but we do not ask about this type of vulnerability, which means that the vulnerability continues. We treat the anxiety and everything around it but not the core itself – and that is incredibly problematic.
According to Kajsa Rietz, it is common for children to subject other children to this type of action.
– Very often it’s children who do it to other children, so it’s important to talk about what you can and can’t do on social media, she says.
“Adults are very bad in this situation”
She goes on to say that adults often react in a blaming way when a child talks about what he has been through.
– Adults are very bad in this situation, but we also have a world on the internet that largely glorifies this and thinks it’s cool and a good way to make money.
Kajsa Rietz understands that it can be difficult to keep up with everything that children engage in on social media, but advises adults to make children aware that they are always there.
– The only thing you need to tell children is that they can always tell, regardless of what they have done.