More kids in the UK are unexpectedly finding deepfakes of themselves online
Watchdog warns of an “alarming” trend.
Image by Getty/Thomas Trutschel
- UK children are reporting more fake or manipulated images of themselves online in 2026 than in 2025.
- Report Remove received 420 reports from January to June 2026, compared with 397 across all of 2025.
- Some AI-generated or altered images met the legal threshold for child sexual abuse material, the Internet Watch Foundation said.
- The NSPCC said tech companies must build stronger safeguards into AI tools to stop abusive images being created.
Key Takeaways by nexos.ai, reviewed by Cybernews staff.
More kids in the UK are finding “faked” or manipulated images of themselves online more than ever before, and some of the images even qualify as child porn.
In the era of AI and deepfakes, children are increasingly finding fake or nudified versions of themselves on the internet.
Report Remove, run by the Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) and Childline, is the world’s first dedicated hotline for children to report nude or sexual images they find of themselves online.
The UK child protection foundation only started recording these reports last year, IWF told Cybernews. Roughly 397 reports were recorded for the whole of 2025.
Now, data from January to June of 2026 show a significant increase in “faked” imagery, with 420 reports received in the first 6 months of this year.
Stay updated with our latest stories and follow us on social media
Be the first to discover new stories, ideas, and updates from our team.
The reports include images that have been manipulated or falsified using AI technology, some of which “met the legal threshold for child sexual abuse material (CSAM),” according to the child protection watchdog.
Children in the UK are more frequently encountering manipulated or fake images of themselves in 2026 than in 2025, some of which are sexual in nature.
By the end of June 2026, 286 reviewed and resolved reports showed suspected AI-generated or otherwise manipulated imagery, exceeding the total for 2025 (268 actioned reports).
The increase in reports from children themselves is “alarming but also sadly predictable, Rani Govender, associate head of policy at Child Safety Online and the NSPCC, told Cybernews.
“Tech companies cannot keep pushing out AI products without embedding strong protections that prevent this material from being created in the first place,” Govender concludes.
