Drill Music & Online Gang Recruitment

Myth: A child who ends up dealing drugs, carrying weapons, or running errands for an older group made a bad choice and is a young criminal, not a victim.

Fact: UK safeguarding guidance is explicit that children groomed and coerced into this activity have not freely chosen it and cannot meaningfully consent to their own exploitation, so they should be treated as victims of child criminal exploitation first and foremost. Section 45 of the Modern Slavery Act 2015 can also provide a legal defence against prosecution for offences a child committed as a direct result of that exploitation.

Myth: This is an inner-city gang problem, so a family in a small town, coastal area, or the countryside doesn't need to worry about it.

Fact: County-lines networks deliberately move outward from cities into smaller towns, coastal resorts, and rural areas, partly because an unfamiliar face draws less attention from local police there. Recruitment happens over social media, so it can reach a child anywhere with a phone signal, not just in areas already associated with gang activity.

Myth: Gang and county-lines recruitment mainly targets boys, so it's not something to watch for with a daughter.

Fact: Girls and young women are also recruited and exploited through these networks, sometimes in roles — such as carrying drugs or weapons — that are wrongly assumed to draw less suspicion. Their exploitation, including sexual exploitation alongside criminal exploitation, is often under-recognised, so professionals are now told not to assume a girl's involvement is passive or automatically sexual rather than criminal.