How to recognise online grooming behaviour, protect your child from predatory adults, and respond if you suspect grooming is taking place.
Grooming is the process by which an adult builds a relationship, trust, and emotional connection with a child, online or in person, in order to manipulate, exploit, or abuse them.
Online grooming is when someone builds a relationship with a child in order to exploit or abuse them. Groomers often use social media, gaming platforms, and messaging apps to make contact. The process can be gradual, making it difficult for a child — or parent — to recognise until significant trust has been established.
A groomer typically identifies a vulnerable child and begins by offering attention, compliments, and gifts. Over time they isolate the child from friends and family, introduce sexual content, and create a sense of secrecy and obligation. They may use multiple platforms simultaneously and encourage the child to move conversations to private or encrypted channels.
In your child's behaviour
On their device
Set privacy settings to maximum
Ensure profiles are set to private, direct messages are restricted to known contacts, and location sharing is turned off on every platform your child uses.
Review friend lists and contacts
Look through who your child is connecting with on games, social media, and messaging apps. Ask about any new contacts in a conversational, non-confrontational way.
Have the 'anyone can pretend' conversation
Explain in age-appropriate language that not everyone online is who they say they are, that genuine adults do not ask children to keep secrets, and — most importantly — that they can always come to you and will never be in trouble for telling.
In immediate danger: call 999. For non-emergency police matters, call 101.
Concerned about a child but it's not an emergency? NSPCC helpline 0808 800 5000. Childline for young people 0800 1111.
This is practical educational content to support families. For case-specific concerns about a child's safety, contact the NSPCC helpline on 0808 800 5000 or your local safeguarding team.
7,062
Sexual Communication with a Child offences were recorded by UK police in 2023/24 — a record high.
NSPCC, 2023/24+89%
the rise in recorded online grooming offences since 2017/18, when the offence first came into force.
NSPCC, 2024Myth: Groomers are obvious strangers who seem suspicious.
Fact: Groomers usually pose as a friendly peer or a helpful older 'friend', and are patient and charming. The whole method is to seem safe and known — which is why 'stranger danger' framing misses how grooming actually works.
Myth: Grooming only happens on dodgy or hidden apps.
Fact: It happens on the mainstream games, social media, and messaging apps children already use every day — often starting in a game or a public comment section before moving to private chat.
Myth: My child would tell me straight away if something felt wrong.
Fact: Groomers deliberately build secrecy, obligation, and shame so the child feels unable to speak up. That is exactly why 'you can always come to me, and you will never be in trouble' has to be established long before anything happens.
Teach that people online may not be who they say they are, never to share personal details or photos, and to always tell you about any adult or older child who contacts them.
Talk about how someone might pretend to be a friend to gain trust, the warning signs (secrecy, gifts, being asked to move to another app), and that no topic is off-limits with you.
Discuss grooming into both sexual images and crime (money-muling, gangs), the tactic of moving chats to private or disappearing apps, and that being groomed is never the young person's fault.
Reinforce that grooming and exploitation affect older teenagers too, especially around relationships and 'easy money', and signpost confidential help.
Full conversation guides: stranger messages talk, you can always tell me
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