The Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) says it examined 6,310 images generated by artificial intelligence that satisfy the legal definition of child sexual abuse in the first half of 2026. That figure represents a 40 percent increase compared with the more than 4,500 such images recorded in the previous year, and already surpasses the total volume investigated in 2025. The rise indicates a rapid acceleration of AI-produced illegal content online.
Analysts note that AI-generated child sexual abuse material has been climbing for several years, with a particularly sharp increase in video formats, although the latest IWF statistics cover only still photographs. The majority of the assessed images depict girls, and the children shown are typically between seven and thirteen years old. This demographic pattern mirrors earlier trends in non-AI-based abuse imagery.
Under UK law, AI-generated child sexual abuse material is prohibited, and recent legislation also criminalises the adaptation of AI models to produce such content or the distribution of those models. Creating a system expressly designed to generate hyper-realistic illegal images can attract a prison term of up to five years. Enforcement agencies are therefore expanding their focus from the content itself to the tools that enable its creation.
The Report Remove service, which aims to block intimate images from appearing online, recorded 420 reports from children in 2026 who believed their pictures had been fabricated or altered to look explicit. This tally already exceeds the 397 reports logged in 2025. The increase suggests that minors are increasingly encountering AI-manipulated depictions of themselves, heightening concerns about the technology’s misuse.
In response to the growing threat, the National Crime Agency and the IWF have issued guidance urging parents and guardians to limit the sharing of children’s photographs on social media. Recommendations include setting accounts to private and restricting image distribution to a close-friends list rather than public feeds. Officials argue that tighter control of personal images can reduce the material available for AI manipulation.