Parents & Guardians
Parents, guardians and caregivers play a critical role in protecting children from sexual exploitation by fostering open communication, recognizing warning signs of abuse and educating children and youth about boundaries, consent and digital safety.
By creating a safe and trusting environment, parents empower children to speak up about any uncomfortable or inappropriate situations. Staying informed about online activities, monitoring social interactions, and building awareness of grooming tactics further strengthens a child’s safety. Proactive engagement and ongoing dialogue are essential to prevention and ensuring children grow up protected and supported.
Nearly 1 in 4 parents have come across inappropriate behaviour aimed at their child online.
Sexual exploitation can occur anywhere and to any young person regardless of their gender, family situation or social, cultural or economic background.
Who are SEXUAL EXPLOITERS?
Anyone who seeks out a child or youth and uses them for sexual purposes is a sexual exploiter.
They can:
Be male or female; young or old; rich or poor.
Be a family member or friend.
Pose as a boyfriend or girlfriend.
Be a religious leader; a team coach; an employer; a teacher.
Be manipulative, threatening or violent.
Offer money, drugs, alcohol, items of value or emotional support for participating in sexual activities.
Act like a manager by placing ads, arranging hotels and driving victims to meet-ups.
What YOU can do!
Our children deserve our protection.
Have age-appropriate conversations about body safety.
Monitor online activity and teach digital literacy.
Know the adults in your child’s life and their supervision practices.
Talk to those adults about your abuse prevention practices.
Trust your instincts! If something feels off, investigate.
Create an environment where your child feels safe reporting uncomfortable situations.
Get educated on the threats that are impacting children and youth - things like, sexting, sextortion, and deepfakes.
Key Terms
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An actual or attempted abuse of a position of vulnerability, power or trust for sexual purposes either online or in-person.
It includes a wide range of behaviours and situations such as: grooming, sexting, blackmail/coercion, luring, trafficking, distributing sexually explicit material, and consuming child sexual abuse material [CSAM].All types of sexual exploitation and abuse are illegal whether you are communicating with someone older than you or someone your own age.
Children and youth involved in sexual exploitation are victims of abuse who need help and protection.
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Refers to an actual or threatened physical, verbal or emotional intrusion of a sexual nature, whether by force or under unequal or coercive conditions. It can occur between an adult and a minor or between two minors. It may include non-contact and contact activities and involve a range of behaviours including, but not limited to:
Sexual acts of any kind
Inappropriate touch such as fondling.
Exhibitionism or exposing oneself to a minor.
Any sexual interaction or conversation online, on the phone or through text messages.
Exposing a child to pornography or producing, owning, downloading or sharing CSAM.
Sex trafficking
Sexual abuse can happen online or in-person.
*Sexual activity with a child (someone under the age of 18) is illegal regardless of the age of majority or age of consent locally. Not knowing or mistaking the age of a child is not a defence. -
Any unwanted comment, gesture, or action that is sexual in nature (aside from unwanted touching of sexual body parts, which is sexual assault), that makes someone feel afraid, embarrassed, uncomfortable or ashamed.
Sexual harassment can take physical, verbal, and visual forms and include comments, behaviour, and unwanted sexual contact.
It includes, but is not limited to jokes, threats, discriminatory remarks about someone’s gender or sexuality, making crude gestures, leering and stalking or following.
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Sex trafficking is a form of human trafficking that involved recruiting, moving, or holding victims for sexual exploitation purposes. Sex traffickers can coerce victims into providing sexual services by force or through threats, including mental and emotional abuse and manipulation.
While anyone can be a victim of trafficking, police-reported incidents show that 96% of victims are women and girls. Girls under the age of 18 make up 24% of those incidents.
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Sextortion is a form of online blackmail.
Perpetrators either manipulate victims into sending explicit photos/videos or create fake explicit content [deepfakes] of the victim and then threaten to release the sexual material publicly unless they receive payment, more images or both. Sextortion is a crime.
Children and youth involved in this type of sexual exploitation are victims of sexual abuse who need help and protection.
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Gender-Based Violence (GBV) is any violence directed towards a person based on their gender, gender expression, or perceived gender. It is often rooted in unequal power dynamics between genders. While anybody can be abused, women, girls and gender-diverse people are at a higher risk.
It can take physical, emotional, and economic forms and includes, but is not limited to, name-calling, hitting, pushing, blocking, stalking, harassment, sexual assault, rape, control, humiliation and manipulation.
GBV can happen between people in romantic relationships, within families, at work, and between friends, acquaintances and strangers.
It is estimated that one in three women will experience sexual or physical violence in their lifetime.
*UNHCR
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When an exploiter targets and communicates with a child or youth for the purpose of sexual exploitation.
Online luring is when someone (typically an adult, but not always) communicates with a child or youth through technology like texting or chatting through an app, game or site, in order to commit a sexual offence against them. It can involve a person asking, hinting at, or trying to convince the child or youth to send naked or semi-naked sexual pictures of videos.
Luring can also lead to predators manipulating children into meeting in person, where sexual abuse occurs.
1 in 3 luring attempts reported to Cybertip.ca happened on Instagram, Snapchat or KIK Messenger.
39% of luring attempts reported in the last two years involved victims 13 and under.
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The tactics abusers/exploiters use to gain trust and prepare children and youth for sexual exploitation.
It can happen quickly or over time, but at its core, it is a process of exploiting trust to shift expectations of what safe behaviour is and leveraging fear and shame to keep a child silent.
Nearly half of kids online have been approached by someone who they thought was attempting to ‘befriend and manipulate’ them.
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Sending, receiving, or forwarding sexually explicit messages, photos or videos, primarily between mobile phones.
It may also include the use of a computer or any other digital device.
1 in 4 teens report receiving sexually explicit texts, DMs, and emails.
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When someone, typically an adult, takes screenshots of children and youths’ images, videos, or live streams from various platforms without consent.
They may share these images and videos with others, use them to create AI deepfakes or use them to extort their victim.
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Child Sexual Abuse Material
Any sexual image or video of a person under the age of 18 years, including sexting, visual and audio materials.
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When a child or youth is exploited or sextorted by another minor - this can be a friend, boyfriend/girlfriend, classmate or any other peer.
