Police forces from Avon and Somerset, Devon and Cornwall, Wiltshire, Dorset and Gloucestershire are today joining forces with a leading child protection charity to launch a campaign to tackle growing demand for sexual images of children online.

The regional campaign represents a multi-agency approach to tackling what police say is a growing demand for sexually explicit images of children.

The campaign team says the action will bring together robust law enforcement work with work already being undertaken by UK child protection charity, The Lucy Faithfull Foundation.

The charity works to prevent people from viewing such illegal material in the first place; and to get them to stop if they have already started.

It directs offenders to the charity’s Stop it Now! Get Help website that hosts online self-help resources, as well as the Stop it Now! confidential helpline (0808 1000 900) where they can get help to address their online behaviour and stop looking at harmful and illegal images.

Viewing and sharing indecent images of children online is a serious and growing problem, police say.

In 2013 the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (CEOP) estimated that as many as 50,000 individuals in the UK were involved in downloading or sharing sexual images of children.

Police estimate that the number of offenders has grown since then.

The number of people in South West England already seeking help from the Lucy Faithfull Foundation is described as ‘significant’.

In 2017 564 people from Devon and Cornwall visited the charity’s online self-help resources or called the confidential helpline to get help with their own viewing of sexually explicit images of children, or that of a loved one.

The joint campaign will use traditional media, social media, posters and other public relations activities to:

Raise public awareness of the growing problem of people viewing and sharing sexually explicit images of under 18s online.

Educate those offending about the harm caused to children in the images who are re-victimised each time their image is viewed online.

Drive home the consequences of their behaviour to offenders – including arrest, possible imprisonment, break up of family and being put on the Sex Offenders Register.

Make people aware that there is help available to stop such behaviour.