The online gangs forcing innocent children to commit unspeakable acts for ‘content’

tolijah Palmer was hunting for a victim when she first contacted Ania* through the online gaming platform Roblox. He pretended to approach the teenager as a friend, directing him to the Discord messaging site.

There, he persuaded her to commit a series of haunting and sadistic acts, blackmailing her into cutting her online username handle into her skin and sending him sexual images. He threatened her and her family and even said that if she refused, he would send a manufactured bomb threat to a local school with an email address in her name.

His sickening demands were made as part of an increasingly extreme quest for “influence” among a group of similarly violent boys and young men. These groups, collectively known as Com networks, deliberately target vulnerable victims, often young girls, by blackmailing them to obtain sadomasochistic “content” to share with other members of the network.

Palmer was jailed for four years and nine months after admitting a string of offenses including encouraging or assisting serious self-harm, causing a person to engage in sexual activity without consent and taking indecent photographs of children at Sheffield Crown Court last month.

To talk IndependentThe National Crime Agency (NCA) has warned that Com networks are a “deeply worrying” threat that crosses national borders and causes “unprecedented” and “serious” harm to young girls.

The groups constitute a “priority” for the Five Eyes intelligence group, which brings together law enforcement agencies in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the UK and the US.

Rob Richardson, the NCA’s threat lead for Com networks, said the agency is currently investigating nearly 200 cases involving Com networks, and reports of abuse have increased by 2,900 per cent since 2022.

Because the threat was identified relatively recently, Mr Richardson said it was impossible to tell whether this explosion in referrals reflected rapid growth or whether criminals were being identified more successfully.

But Com networks represent a unique challenge, he said. “These are children who are drawn to harmful places online and cause that harm to be inflicted on other children,” he said. “Our concern is the severity of the damage.”

Members of Com groups such as 764, which Palmer joined, target young girls in particularly vulnerable online spaces, including forums for those with eating disorders or self-harm. They are known to coerce and groom victims from as young as 11 years old to seriously harm or sexually abuse themselves, their siblings, or their pets. Images and videos of these disturbing acts are then shared with the group in an attempt to gain notoriety for the criminal, and tips on how to “extort” victims are shared via “cheatbooks”.

Discord and Telegram are the two platforms that appear most frequently in cases, according to Mr. Richardson. Neither are currently understood to be included in the government’s social media ban on under-16s because they are seen as messaging apps rather than social media platforms. The government told Independent He said the social media ban was “just one of the measures to keep children safe” and that the platforms had duties under the Online Safety Act.

It is also believed that some gaming apps are a way to attract boys into networks.

Palmer is not the first Com network member to face justice in a UK court. In 2025, 19-year-old Cameron Finnigan pleaded guilty to soliciting suicide, possessing a terrorism manual and possessing indecent images of children. He was also a member of 764 and was sentenced to six years in prison.

Mr Richardson described Com groups as a “gender-based threat”. He said the boys involved were often lonely, socially isolated individuals who struggled to form relationships in real life and spent most of their lives online; this is a pattern seen in both Palmer and Finnigan.

These children are then captured by the extreme, nihilistic content constantly fed to them via social media algorithms, drawing them into the dark corners where Com networks operate, Mr. Richardson said. He added that content linked to the “manosphere” promoting male supremacy and aggressive masculinity is one of the routes identified as the common route to Com networks.

“A lot of this content is on the transparent web, not necessarily on the dark web, so it’s pretty easy to identify,” he said. “This creates a sense of grievance among young men. This bleak view of their own existence leads some of these young people to harmful areas online.”

Mr Richardson said he believed tech companies needed to take more responsibility for promoting this sadistic content to young men: “Once you pay attention to it, the algorithms come into play and show more and more of this harmful content.

“I think there’s something to be answered about the way algorithms work. There’s definitely more the industry can do. It doesn’t take much. [to get fed harmful content].”

The next phase of the Southport Inquiry, launched to understand how killer Axel Rudakubana’s devastating knife attack on a Taylor Swift-themed dance class could have been prevented, will investigate the role of social media in radicalizing young people.

While many offenders are drawn to Com groups due to social isolation and a lack of curiosity about the online activities of parents and those around them, Mr Richardson said this was not always the case.

“There are also examples where you have children who would otherwise be described as caring, loving, wealthy families, and the parents only detected this behavior after the police came through the door,” he said.

He urged parents to have “open” and “non-judgmental” conversations with their children about their online lives.

“Children are much more cyber literate than the generation before them, and this can often be quite scary for parents,” he said.

“So it’s really important to have those kinds of nonjudgmental conversations with kids, to be interested in what they’re doing, to be able to challenge that, and to use parental controls.”

A Telegram spokesperson said: “Telegram’s terms of service expressly prohibit actions involving Com/764. Telegram has continuously removed groups and channels associated with Com/764 since its discovery, including with the help of hashes of Com/764 content – both collected by Telegram moderators over the years and provided by outside organizations.”

A Roblox spokesperson said: “This behavior has no place on Roblox. We work with law enforcement to hold bad actors accountable. Roblox takes reports of redirecting users off-platform seriously, and we have rules and security systems designed to make it difficult for users, especially younger users, to share personal information or be directed off-platform. We will continue to strengthen our security measures to help protect our community.”

*Victim’s name has been changed to protect his identity

Discord has been contacted for comment.

If you are experiencing distressed emotions or struggling to cope, you can speak to Samaritans confidentially on 116 123 (UK and ROI) or Samaritans Website to find details of your nearest branch.

If you are a US resident and you or someone you know needs mental health help right now, call or text 988 or visit: 988lifeline.org To access online chat on the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline. This is a free, confidential crisis helpline available to anyone 24 hours a day, seven days a week. If you are in another country you can go www.befrienders.org To find a helpline near you