Police warn of rising online threats to Kiwi children on social media – The Front Page

Child sex abuse material. Snapchat, Facebook, Instagram, Roblox, Tik tok

New Zealand Police are becoming increasingly concerned about online groups targeting Kiwi children through social media.

Investigations by the Herald have highlighted a rise in predators using social media to target their victims.

Among the figures that are startling officials, in 2024, there were 1549 referrals by Snapchat to police about grooming and child sex abuse material by local users, more than double the 617 reports in 2023.

NZ Herald investigative reporter Michael Morrah has been looking into the story for several months and told The Front Page he believes the scale of the issue across all platforms is likely under-reported.

“The reason I say that is because I have interviewed police from the Online Child Exploitation of New Zealand team. I have interviewed the Department of Internal Affairs, both from their child exploitation team and from their extremist online team.

“The concerns are real. And the referrals and the number of investigations that they’re involved in is increasing massively year on year.”

He said there are also concerns over changes in how predators operate.

In recent years there had been concerns raised over “sextortion”, where intimate photos obtained by deception are used as bribes, but Morrah said there is now an increase in people participating in “sadistic online exploitation” as a means of gaining clout.

“And the purpose of doing this is that they want to create, ultimately, social disorder. And so they do this by targeting the younger generation to try and corrupt their minds and exploit them and pressure them into doing horrific things.

“Now, this may sound, ‘oh, well I don’t think this will happen to my kids’ or ‘this all sounds a bit over the top’, but when you have the lead detective of police in New Zealand who sees this every day talking about this and saying it’s these extremist people who are of most concern at the moment.

“And when you hear from the Department of Internal Affairs that, indeed, there are New Zealand children who are being targeted by New Zealand sympathisers of these movements, you know that it is in fact very real.”

Listen to the full episode for more insights into the concerns about the exploitation of children online – including Morrah’s latest story on two young sisters targetted by a Wellington man pretending to be an 11-year-old girl.

The Front Page is a daily news podcast from the New Zealand Herald, available to listen to every weekday from 5am.

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