Content: Exposure to Illegal, inappropriate, or harmful material

Harmful content refers to anything someone can access online that causes them harm.

The main safeguarding responsibilities for churches, charities and community groups in this area are to ensure children and adults at risk aren’t exposed to harmful content through their online interaction with your organisation and to know how to recognise, respond and report safeguarding concerns related to harmful content. 

Harmful online content includes: 

• Child sexual abuse material and indecent images of children 
• Terrorist content 
• Hate crime and hate speech 
• Intimate image abuse (sometimes called ‘revenge porn’) 
• Incitement to suicide or self-harm 
• Dangerous misinformation 
• Content linked to radicalisation e.g. incel culture 
• Extreme violence  
• Pornography (if accessed by children or that normalises sexual violence) 

Some of this harmful content is illegal in the UK. All of it is a safeguarding concern if it causes emotional or psychological harm to children or adults at risk. If you have concerns about what you or someone else has viewed online, talk to your Safeguarding Lead.

What can organisations do? 

Have clear policies and procedures about:

• What content can and cannot be accessed on your organisation’s devices, shared with vulnerable groups, posted on your website / social media site.
• What to do if you find harmful content  
• How wifi access will be restricted (e.g. regularly updated passwords, only given to certain people) and monitored 
• Safe usage for staff and volunteers 
• Use of filters and strong passwords to protect your organisation’s devices  
• Live streaming and photos (a risk assessment and parental consent are required). You need to ensure you don't share children’s names alongside their photos. For some children it will never be safe for their photos to appear online.
• Restrictions on who can update your website / social media site and provide training and clear codes of conduct around safe content.   

Reporting harmful content:

• Always report to your Safeguarding Lead.
• Report crimes to the police.
• If you are a Safeguarding Lead and you are concerned that harmful content is exposing a child or an adult at risk to harm or abuse, refer to statutory agencies.  
• Report suspected child sexual abuse images or videos to the Internet Watch Foundation 
• Report online material promoting terrorism or extremism via gov.uk
• Childline’s Report Remove tool enables under 18s to confidentially report sexual images and videos of themselves and remove them from the internet: Report Remove | Childline 
• Report harmful content to various online platforms and escalate your concerns if you have reported and content has not been removed: Reporting online harm