Prevalence estimates of child online solicitation by gender| ��ƽ��

Prevalence estimates of child online solicitation worldwide, by UNICEF region and gender

Characteristic	Boys	Girls
East Asia and the Pacific*	7.4%	4.7%
Eastern and Southern Africa**	15.6%	15.4%
Eastern Europe and Central Asia***	8.8%	12.1%
Latin America and the Caribbean****	6.1%	6.9%
North America	7%	14.8%
West and Central Africa*	22%	15%
Western Europe**	10.3%	16.4%
Worldwide***	9.9%	13.2%

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Release date

July 2024

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Region

Worldwide

Survey time period

2008 to 2021

Age group

Less than 18 years

Supplementary notes

No data was available for South Asia.

Online solicitation includes the following behaviors: online grooming, online solicitation, online sexual harassment, pressure to obtain images, voluntarily provided images in a statutorily impermissible relationship, unwanted/non-consensual/pressured sexting, and unwanted sexual talk.

Estimates for each region can vary considerably.

Methodology: Systematic review and meta-analysis of studies conducted 2011-2021 (lifetime recall) and 2008-2021 (past year recall).

*The uncertainty for boys varies from two to 23.8 percent, for girls from 0.5 to 34.8 percent (95 percent confidence interval).

**The uncertainty for boys varies from 8.7 to 26.3 percent, for girls from 6.8 to 31.2 percent (95 percent confidence interval).

***The uncertainty for boys varies from 6.6 to 11.6 percent, for girls from 9.5 to 15.3 percent (95 percent confidence interval).

****The uncertainty for boys varies from 5.8 to 6.5 percent, for girls from two to 21.5 percent (95 percent confidence interval).

The uncertainty for boys varies from 2.1 to 20.8 percent, for girls from 6.9 to 29 percent (95 percent confidence interval).

*The uncertainty for boys varies from 19.6 to 24.6 percent, for girls from 12.9 to 17.3 percent (95 percent confidence interval).

**The uncertainty for boys varies from 6.9 to 15 percent, for girls from 11 to 23.8 percent (95 percent confidence interval).

***The uncertainty for boys varies from 7.1 to 13.7 percent, for girls from 9.2 to 18.5 percent (95 percent confidence interval).

Citation formats

Worldwide, an estimated 10 percent of boys and 13 percent of girls had been victims of online solicitation in 2023. Estimated prevalence that year was highest in West and Central Africa among boys and in Western Europe among girls. The estimates should be taken cautiously, as the actual prevalence may be significantly higher than the estimated value.