A 13-year-old girl in Maharashtra received a message on Instagram from someone who appeared to be another teenager. The conversations were ordinary at first: school, films, music and friends. The stranger was attentive, sympathetic and reassuring. Weeks later, he persuaded her to move to a private messaging platform. By then, trust had been established. Requests for photographs followed. Then came demands for more intimate images. When the girl hesitated, screenshots of earlier conversations appeared. Threats followed. Unless she complied, the images would be shared with her family, classmates and teachers, the girl is told.
This is not an isolated story. It is the anatomy of a crime that child-protection experts say is becoming one of the most dangerous threats facing Indian children: online grooming.
The latest National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) figures suggest that the landscape of child exploitation in India is undergoing a profound transformation. The crime scene is no longer confined to streets, schools or neighbourhoods. Increasingly, it is located inside smartphones, gaming platforms, social media applications and encrypted messaging services.
According to NCRB’s Crime in India 2024 report, crimes against children rose to 1,87,702 cases from 1,77,335 in 2023, pushing the crime rate from 39.9 to 42.3 per lakh children. Sexual offences remain a major concern, with 69,191 cases registered under the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act in 2024. Children aged 16 to 18 constituted the largest group of victims. In many cases, the accused were not strangers but acquaintances, friends or individuals known to the victim.
Yet buried within the NCRB report is a trend that deserves far greater attention. Of the 1,238 cybercrime cases against children registered under the Information Technology Act in 2024, as many as 1,099 — nearly nine out of every ten — involved the publication, transmission or circulation of sexually explicit content depicting children. The figures offer perhaps the clearest indication yet that online sexual exploitation has become one of the fastest-growing forms of child victimisation in India.
For predators, the internet has fundamentally altered the rules of engagement. In the past, offenders needed physical access to children. Today, they can establish contact from hundreds or even thousands of kilometres away. Through Instagram, Snapchat, WhatsApp, Discord, Telegram, online gaming platforms and live-streaming services, offenders can enter a child’s world without ever leaving their own home.
The process is known as grooming. Unlike physical assault, grooming is not built on force. It is built on manipulation. Predators typically create fake identities and pose as teenagers, fellow gamers, aspiring influencers or sympathetic peers. They identify emotionally vulnerable children and cultivate relationships over weeks or months. The conversations are rarely sexual at the outset. Instead, they revolve around friendship, trust and emotional support, says cyber law expert Prashant Mali.
Experts also say the objective is to create dependency. Children are told they are mature for their age. They are encouraged to confide in personal problems. Some are persuaded that their parents do not understand them. Others are made to feel special, valued or loved. By the time the relationship turns sexual, the offender has often become one of the most trusted figures in the child’s life.
That is what makes grooming so difficult to detect. Unlike conventional abuse, there are often no visible warning signs. Parents see a child using a phone. Teachers see a student attending online classes or playing games. The abuse unfolds privately, hidden within chats, disappearing messages and encrypted conversations.
The next stage is frequently sextortion. Once intimate images or videos have been obtained, predators use them as instruments of control. Victims are threatened with exposure unless they provide more content, perform sexual acts on camera or transfer money. What begins as manipulation quickly becomes coercion.
Cyber investigators increasingly describe sextortion as one of the most psychologically damaging forms of abuse. Unlike physical assaults, digital material can be copied, stored and redistributed indefinitely. Victims often live with the fear that the images may resurface years later.
The true scale of the problem may be far larger than official crime statistics suggest. One indication comes from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC), the United States-based organisation that operates the world’s largest reporting system for online child sexual exploitation. Through cooperation arrangements with India, reports generated by major technology companies are shared with Indian authorities for investigation.
According to data cited by the Ministry of Home Affairs, more than 69.05 lakh CyberTipline reports had been shared with states and Union Territories by March 2024. The volume dwarfs the number of criminal cases ultimately registered in India, suggesting a significant gap between detection and enforcement.
The discrepancy highlights a difficult reality. Many children never report what has happened to them. Some fear punishment from parents who may confiscate devices or restrict internet access. Others fear social stigma, public embarrassment or victim-blaming. In many cases, children do not fully understand that they are being groomed until exploitation is already underway. Psychologist Paromita Mitra Bhaumik says children who are targeted by online stalkers in the name of grooming may experience anxiety, fear, shame, or self-blame. “Parents should respond calmly, reassure the child that they are not at fault, and provide emotional support while taking practical safety measures.” Child-rights organisations have also repeatedly warned that under-reporting remains one of the biggest obstacles to tackling online exploitation.
The challenge is compounded by technology itself. Encrypted messaging platforms, disappearing messages, virtual private networks and anonymous accounts make investigations increasingly complex. Evidence may be stored on servers located in multiple jurisdictions. Offenders often use fake identities and disposable accounts that leave little trace. As one platform tightens safeguards, predators migrate elsewhere.
Gaming platforms have emerged as a particular area of concern. Many multiplayer games now include voice chat, private messaging and community-building features that allow sustained interaction between strangers. Child-safety experts warn that offenders increasingly exploit these environments because parents often view them as harmless entertainment spaces.
The pandemic accelerated this shift dramatically. Children today spend more time online than any previous generation. Smartphones have become integral to education, social interaction and recreation. Connectivity has created extraordinary opportunities, but it has also expanded the pool of potential victims available to offenders.
A predator who once had access only to children within a local community can now contact hundreds of minors across multiple states in a single day.
Meanwhile, the nature of online exploitation is becoming more sophisticated. Globally, child-protection agencies are warning about the growing use of artificial intelligence in creating synthetic sexual imagery, facilitating grooming and aiding sextortion schemes. NCMEC has reported rising concerns over AI-enabled exploitation and online enticement, adding another layer of complexity to an already challenging threat landscape.
India’s legal framework is not entirely inadequate. The POCSO Act, the Information Technology Act and various cybercrime provisions provide law-enforcement agencies with substantial powers to investigate and prosecute offenders.
The problem lies elsewhere. Cybercrime units remain overstretched. Digital-forensics capabilities vary widely across states. Investigations involving cross-border data requests are often slow and resource-intensive. Convictions can be delayed by difficulties in identifying suspects, securing digital evidence and obtaining cooperation from overseas platforms.
Detection is improving faster than enforcement. The result is a widening gap between the number of incidents being identified and the number being effectively prosecuted. Experts increasingly argue that prevention must become as important as enforcement.
Traditional safety advice — warning children not to talk to strangers — is no longer sufficient in a world where strangers arrive disguised as friends, classmates or romantic interests. Digital literacy, critical thinking and awareness of manipulation techniques have become essential child-protection tools.
Equally important is communication. Children who fear punishment are less likely to disclose troubling online interactions. Building trust within families may be one of the most effective safeguards available.
Schools also have a critical role to play. Yet cyber-safety education remains inconsistent across India. In many institutions, internet safety is treated as an occasional awareness programme rather than a core component of child protection. The NCRB’s latest figures suggest that this approach is no longer adequate.
Online grooming is not a niche cyber issue. It is a mainstream child welfare challenge. The most unsettling aspect of the crime is its invisibility. There are no dark alleys, suspicious vehicles or obvious physical threats. There is only a screen. A conversation. A friend request. A gaming invitation. A message notification that appears entirely harmless. For thousands of Indian children, that is where exploitation now begins. And by the time the danger becomes visible, the trap has often already been set.
(Mamta Chitnis Sen is a Mumbai-based journalist and artist. She writes on art, culture and current affairs)
