By: Chris Klotz, Partner at AWK Survivor Advocate Attorneys
White Plains, NY—Children and teenagers spend a significant part of their lives online. They use social media, gaming platforms, messaging apps, video-sharing sites, group chats, livestreams, and school-related digital tools to learn, communicate, and connect with friends. These spaces can offer creativity and community—but they can also give predators direct access to children.
Online grooming is a form of manipulation. An adult, older teen, or other offender may use digital platforms to build trust with a child, isolate them from supportive adults, introduce sexual conversations or content, obtain images, pressure the child into secrecy, or arrange an in-person meeting. In some situations, the offender may begin with compliments, friendship, gaming help, gifts, or emotional support. In others, the abuse quickly becomes threats, coercion, blackmail, or sextortion.
Parents and caregivers cannot prevent every risk. But knowing what online grooming can look like, having open conversations with children, and responding calmly when something feels wrong can make a meaningful difference. If a child has been targeted, the priority is safety—not blame.
At AWK Survivor Advocate Attorneys, survivors and families can receive confidential information about potential legal options after online grooming, sexual exploitation, image-based abuse, or abuse by an individual or institution that failed to protect a child.
What Is Online Grooming?
Online grooming is a pattern of behavior used to gain a child’s trust for sexual exploitation or abuse. It often happens gradually. A predator may present themselves as a peer, use a fake identity, claim to share a child’s interests, or position themselves as someone who “understands” the child better than anyone else.
The process may occur entirely online, or it may begin online and move into the real world. Grooming can take place through social media, online games, chat apps, email, texting, dating apps, livestreams, forums, or any platform where users can communicate privately.
The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, or NCMEC, describes online enticement as communicating with someone believed to be a child through the internet with the intent to commit a sexual offense or abduction. It includes grooming, sexual conversations, requests for explicit material, sextortion, and efforts to arrange in-person sexual contact.
Online grooming may include:
- Sending frequent messages or giving a child excessive attention
- Pretending to be the same age as the child
- Offering gifts, money, game credits, rides, clothing, or other favors
- Asking a child to keep the relationship or messages secret
- Moving conversations from a public platform to a private app
- Asking personal questions about family conflict, location, school, schedules, or relationships
- Sending sexual jokes, sexual images, pornography, or explicit messages
- Asking for photographs, videos, livestreams, or video calls
- Encouraging the child to meet in person
- Threatening to share images, messages, or personal information if the child does not comply
Grooming is not the child’s fault. Predators often use tactics designed to make a child feel special, mature, understood, indebted, scared, or responsible for what is happening. They may alternate between affection and intimidation. They may exploit a child’s loneliness, curiosity, desire for approval, or fear of getting in trouble.
A child may not even recognize the behavior as grooming at first. That is why adults should approach these conversations with patience and without judgment.
Signs a Child May Be Groomed Online
There is no single behavior that proves a child is being groomed. Children may spend more time online, become private about their devices, or change their interests for many ordinary reasons. But a pattern of changes—especially when combined with concerning messages, unknown contacts, or signs of fear—may warrant attention.
Possible warning signs include:
- Becoming unusually secretive about phone, gaming, or social-media activity
- Quickly closing apps, switching screens, or becoming distressed when an adult enters the room
- Receiving unexplained gifts, money, game credits, packages, or rides
- Talking about a new online “friend” they have never met in person
- Using a new name, account, phone number, or social-media profile
- Spending increasing amounts of time online, especially late at night
- Showing sudden anxiety, shame, anger, sadness, or withdrawal after using a device
- Avoiding school, friends, activities, or family conversations
- Having unexplained knowledge of sexual topics that is not age-appropriate
- Being pressured to send images, participate in sexual conversations, or go on video calls
- Expressing fear that someone will release messages, photos, or videos
- Asking for money or gift cards without a clear explanation
- Deleting messages, accounts, or apps unexpectedly
Child-safety guidance identifies secrecy about devices, unexplained gifts or money, an unusually close connection with an older person, and changes in behavior as possible signs of grooming. It also emphasizes that children may show some signs, all signs, or none at all.
One critical point for parents and caregivers: do not assume that a child who sent an image, continued messaging, or agreed to meet “wanted” what happened. Grooming is designed to manipulate consent and judgment. Children need support and protection, not punishment.
How Online Grooming Can Escalate
Online grooming can begin with seemingly harmless interaction. A person may join a game, comment on a social-media post, offer advice, or send a child a private message. The offender may then work slowly to create trust and dependency.
For example, a predator may tell a child:
- “You are more mature than other kids.”
- “Your parents would not understand our friendship.”
- “You can trust me with anything.”
- “Don’t tell anyone, or you will get in trouble.”
- “If you really cared about me, you would send a picture.”
- “I will share your images with everyone if you do not do what I say.”
This progression can turn into sextortion, which is sexual extortion using threats to obtain money, more images, sexual activity, or continued contact. A predator may threaten to distribute private images to a child’s friends, family, classmates, or school. The child may feel trapped, ashamed, and terrified that adults will blame them.
If a child is being threatened over images or videos, do not pay the offender, send additional content, or negotiate privately. Preserve available evidence, report the conduct, and obtain support. The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children’s CyberTipline accepts reports involving online enticement, child sexual abuse material, sextortion, child trafficking, and other suspected forms of online child sexual exploitation.
Prevention Starts With Connection
No online safety plan can guarantee that a child will never be contacted by someone harmful. Predators are responsible for grooming and abuse. Still, families can reduce risk by establishing clear expectations, maintaining open communication, and helping children recognize unsafe conduct early.
Talk Early and Often
Conversations about online safety should not happen only after a problem arises. Children are more likely to seek help when adults have already made it clear that they can talk without being shamed or immediately losing device access.
Use age-appropriate language. Younger children may need simple rules about not chatting privately with strangers, asking before downloading an app, and telling a trusted adult if anyone asks them to keep a secret. Older teens may need direct conversations about fake accounts, online relationships, image sharing, consent, sextortion, and the permanence of digital content.
Remind children that a safe adult or friend should never ask them to:
- Keep secret conversations about sex
- Send nude or sexual images
- Move chats to a private platform to avoid adult oversight
- Share identifying information, such as a home address, school, daily schedule, or live location
- Meet an online contact alone
- Pay money or send gift cards to prevent information from being shared
Build a No-Blame Reporting Rule
A child who fears punishment may hide an unsafe interaction. Make this message clear: “If someone online makes you uncomfortable, asks for pictures, threatens you, or tells you to keep a secret, you can come to me. You are not in trouble.”
This does not mean there will be no changes to online access or safety settings. It means the immediate response should center on safety, evidence preservation, and emotional support—not anger or blame.
A child may disclose grooming indirectly. They may ask a hypothetical question, say a “friend” is having a problem, or become upset when a certain app is mentioned. Stay calm. Listen. Ask open-ended questions such as, “Can you tell me more about that?” or “What did that person say?” Avoid demanding details before the child is ready.
Use Privacy and Safety Settings
Review device, game, and app settings together. Help children understand who can contact them, view their posts, see their location, or add them to group chats. Consider limiting direct messages from unknown users, keeping profiles private when appropriate, disabling location sharing, and setting parental controls based on the child’s age and maturity.
However, technology should support—not replace—communication. Children need to know that a person can still be unsafe even if they appear to be a friend of a friend, have a verified-looking profile, or claim to be a teenager.
Know the Platforms
Parents and caregivers do not need to use every app their child uses. But they should understand the basic functions of the platforms: direct messages, disappearing messages, livestreaming, video chat, friend requests, private servers, in-game chats, and location sharing.
Ask children to show you how an app works. This can be a collaborative conversation rather than surveillance. It also gives you an opportunity to discuss privacy settings and red flags without suggesting that every online interaction is dangerous.
What To Do If You Suspect Grooming
If you believe a child may be groomed online, respond thoughtfully and act quickly. Your first goal is to protect the child from further contact and avoid unintentionally destroying evidence.
Stay Calm and Believe the Child
A child may fear being blamed for responding to messages, sharing images, or continuing contact. Tell them they did the right thing by speaking up. Avoid saying, “Why did you talk to them?” or “Why did you send that?” Those questions can make a child feel responsible for the offender’s conduct.
Instead, say:
- “I believe you.”
- “This is not your fault.”
- “You are not in trouble.”
- “We will figure out what to do together.”
- “You are not alone.”
Preserve Available Evidence
If it is safe to do so, preserve information before blocking or deleting an account. This may include screenshots of messages, usernames, profile links, email addresses, payment requests, images of threats, dates, times, and platform names.
Do not forward, download, save, or redistribute child sexual abuse material. If illegal images have been shared, focus on preserving information that helps identify the account, sender, or location of the content without creating additional copies. A report can include usernames, URLs, links, screenshots of non-explicit communications, and other identifying details.
RAINN recommends preserving relevant information, including URLs, usernames, and messages, then reporting suspected online child sexual exploitation to the CyberTipline and notifying the platform where the abuse occurred.
Report the Conduct
If a child is in immediate danger, if an in-person meeting is planned, or if the offender knows the child’s location and may act soon, call 911 or local law enforcement immediately.
For suspected online sexual exploitation, grooming, sextortion, child sexual abuse material, or online enticement, a report can be made to NCMEC’s CyberTipline at report.cybertip.org or by calling 1-800-THE-LOST, 1-800-843-5678. The CyberTipline is the nation’s centralized reporting system for suspected online child exploitation, and NCMEC reviews reports to help route them to appropriate law-enforcement agencies for possible investigation.
You may also:
- Use the platform’s reporting tools to report the account and specific content
- Report suspected criminal conduct to local law enforcement
- Submit information to the FBI through tips.fbi.gov
- Contact the child’s school if there is a school connection or immediate safety concern
- Seek support from a crisis counselor, therapist, survivor advocate, or trusted medical provider
The FBI advises calling 911 if someone is in immediate danger and identifies both the FBI’s online tips system and the CyberTipline as reporting routes for suspected child exploitation.
Legal Options After Online Grooming
Online grooming may lead to criminal investigation, but families may also have civil legal options. A civil claim may seek accountability against the individual who groomed or exploited the child. Depending on the facts, a case may also involve a school, youth organization, employer, platform, property owner, or another institution that failed to protect the child.
Potential civil claims can depend on the location of the conduct, the child’s age, the relationship between the parties, the type of content or abuse involved, and whether an institution had notice of a danger. Legal options may involve damages for emotional distress, therapy expenses, medical costs, lost educational opportunities, and other harm allowed by law.
Each case is unique. There may be important filing deadlines, preservation needs, or opportunities to identify responsible institutions. A lawyer can help families understand the facts without requiring the child or family to navigate the legal system alone.
How AWK SAA Can Help
Online grooming is abuse. It is not harmless “internet drama,” and children should never be blamed for a predator’s manipulation, threats, or exploitation.
At AWK Survivor Advocate Attorneys, the team works with survivors and families affected by sexual abuse, online exploitation, image-based abuse, and institutional failures to protect children. A confidential consultation can help you understand potential civil legal options, discuss evidence preservation, identify responsible parties, and determine appropriate next steps.
If you believe your child has been groomed, exploited, threatened, or targeted online, act promptly—but remember that your child needs compassion above all else. Contact AWK Survivor Advocate Attorneys for a free, confidential consultation.