How violent gangs are grooming Brit kids as young as 5 on Roblox & Tiktok – forcing livestreams of self harm & suicide

When a school in Connecticut received a phone call from a youth with a British accent, reporting on one of their pupils, they were shocked about what he had to say. He calmly said that one of their students called Annie had admitted she had child pornography on her mobile phone. ‘THE COM: Online, Sadistic and Deadly’ can be seen tonight on Sky News at 9pm Credit: Sky Sky News investigative reporter Adele Robinson highlights the scale of online grooming Credit: Sky The police were called and when they went to her home, sherevealed to them and her startled parents that he had persuaded her online to cut herself while he and other members from a network called ‘Com’ watched live. On her body she showed them the evidence. Sign up for The Sun newsletter Thank you! When she finally blocked him, he took his revenge by ringing her school. Initially Annie had believed that the caller was her online boyfriend and that he was 16. He turned out to be just 14 – and a British schoolboy from Hampshire who it is believed had targeted and groomed hundreds of unknown young victims. In a shocking Sky News documentary, a six-month investigation reveals how a sinister network known as the Com or 764, has infiltrated major gaming and social media sharing sites such as Roblox, Discord, Telegram and TikTok, grooming vulnerable children – some as young as five – who can easily stumble upon them and be accosted with self-harm and suicidal references along with satanic and Nazi symbolism. This sinister network is believed to have thousands of members worldwide, indulging in child abuse. In the UK alone, the National Crime Agency receives an average of35 new cases a week. Most read in The Sun Yet many parents are unaware of them and are unable towarn their children of the danger. In some of the most extreme and disturbing incidents, members of the Com have encouraged victims to commit suicide, livestreamed for others to watch. Ahead of tonight’s documentary, THE COM: Online, Sadistic and Deadly, Sky News investigative reporter Adele Robinson, who highlights the scale of the problem, and Florence Hervey, whose troubled son livestreamed his suicide, talk exclusively to The Sun. “When I first heard about the Com as a concept a couple of years ago, it resonated because I am a parent,” says Adele, who has been looking into online harm and child sexual exploitation for years. “Some of the stuff that I’ve seen as part of this investigation has been the worst that I have ever seen in two decades. “It is absolutely horrific. The levels of harm that children are being subjected to, far surpasses the small relative number of perpetrators and that’s why I think it’s so important that parents need to know about it.” Adele, who is a parent, has been looking into online harm and child sexual exploitation for years Credit: Sky She travelled to Connecticut to speak to Detective Tommy Van Tasel, who investigated Annie’s case Credit: Sky Having been given a tip-off about this new and dangerous network that police had started to see more and more of in the UK, Adele travelled to Connecticut to speak to Detective Tommy Van Tasel, who investigated Annie’s case. Tommy had managed to identify the real name of her abuser and, back in the UK, Adele tracked him down to Hampshire. In the documentary, for legal reasons, he is referred to with a fake username of Lament. In one of his messages, he instructed a young female to carve “Lamentowns me” on her thighs and record it.” She replied: “I hate this. I’m literally in tears right now.” “We had evidence that he was hacking into people’s Roblox accounts,” saysDetective Constable Gemma, of Hampshire Police. “That would be part of the way in.” Roblox is the most popular gaming platform for eight to 14-year-olds in the UK. When Adele looked on there, she found five games specifically for Com members with names like Hangout and Natural Disaster Survival. There was also clothing, such as T-shirts, being sold with Com logos such as “I extort comgirls” and “Who’s my good little kitten?” The group had also infiltrated TikTok with satanic imagery and blood scrawled writing with words like terrorise. When Lament was eventually arrested, he calmly admitted in his police interview that he had asked victims to cut themselves for him. At his trial, Lament, who could not be identified because of his young age, was found guilty of encouraging self-harm and of making indecent images of children. In the UK alone, the National Crime Agency receives an average of 35 new cases a week Credit: Sky He was given a youth rehabilitation order and banned from using social media without supervision but will not serve a jail term. “One of the key things of the Com that we found is that there is such a blurring of lines between victim and offender,” says Adele. “Quite often, victims who become offenders were victims first, and they get involved in this community so that they themselves are no longer victimised. “Anyone who’s involved in this, from either side, has a vulnerability.” Emily was a British adult in her early 20s when she became a victim. Suffering with mental health problems, feeling anxious and lonely, she found comfort and company in playing online games for hours on end. But what she thought was a harmless pastime masked the darkest and deadliest of dangers in which her new online “friend” coerced her into acts of serious self-harm, taking intimate pictures of herself and then threatening to expose them and kill her if she did not continue to do everything he said. “I was using the platform Discord quite a lot,” says Emily, which isn’t her real name. She wants to remain anonymous for fear of reprisals by Com members. “It’s a website for gamers where people make servers and you can join them. “I was hanging out in a chat there when a guy that I knew, but hadn’t really spoken to, sent me an invite. “He said it was a good server and they were looking to have morepeople on there, why don’t I join? And so, I thought, ‘Why not?’” “In the chat forum I saw the terms 764 and Com and I had no idea what they were,” says Emily. “I was really enjoying this guy’s friendship. I felt like we had a lot in common. “There were definitely romantic undertones. He presented himself as this really kind guy who would never hurt anybody. “But four to five months into chatting with him his personality changed and he became demanding of my time and so I didn’t want totalk to him so much. “Feeling rejected, he switched into a mindset of trying to ruin my life. He sent screenshots of all the information that he had, which included intimate pictures, information about what schools I used to go to, where I lived. “And then he started to use that to control me to do things. “He told me to mutilate myself. To cut his name into my skin, very deeply. “He wanted me to engage in sexual acts and send him the proof that I was doing it. “He forced me to do things that I didn’t want to do, over 20 times. “He then shared everything about me in multiple different servers affiliated with Com and 764. “He also sent me death threats saying he was going to come to my house and rape me. “I had horrific thoughts about ending my life because I just didn’t know what to do. “It got to the point where I just couldn’t keep going. So, I made the decision to come forward and talk to my dad about it. “It lifted a huge weight off my shoulders because it took the control that he had, away. “The guy that targeted me is still doing it to this day. From what I know, he’s targeting girls much younger than me. “It needs to be spoken about. I think parents, especially, need to be aware of what’s happening on these sites.” TV cameras follow Staffordshire Police as they arrest a Com member in his bed. McKenzie Winkle, 17, had contacted a number of young girls online and incited them into committing harmful acts. He was sentenced to nearly four years in jail, given a 10-year sexual harm prevention order and placed on the sex offenders register forlife. Rebecca Riggs, Acting Chief Constable National Policing Lead for Child atStaffordshire Police, says, ““We often think that somebody is in a safe environment in the confines of their bedroom. “And, actually, there could be as much risk in there as there would be outside. It’s a very real threat and it is here in the UK.” In Minnesota, Florence Hervey’s troubled son, Sammy, diagnosed withschizophrenia, was encouraged by a 15-year-old British girl online to livestream his suicide. The programme features an extraordinary interview with the girl,anonymously named Sofia, about what made her do it and how she later apologised to Florence. “When covid hit I kind of lost my social skills,” she says. “I was an outcast. I stopped attending a lot of my classes and I became really depressed. “I started spending a lot more time online and I stumbled upon 764. I was exposed to a very gruesome environment where they would constantly post child abuse material. “At the time I didn’t really think about it in a negative sense because in those types of communities, that content is encouraged.” Sofia says she was groomed by an older Com member who urged her to find victims. “I started looking for vulnerable people to take advantage of. I thought it would gain me respect from the people within those communities. “I came across a mental health server that was tagged with ‘depression’ and I messaged Samuel Hervey. “We began chatting online every day. He was talking about taking his life and I kept encouraging him to livestream his suicide for the group, until he did. “I slowly realised how terrible it was to be involved in those communities and I stopped. “Samuel was someone who was going through a mental health crisis and I took advantage of a person who needed help. “I shouldn’t have done what I did. I am talking out about it now because I care a lot about Samuel’s mother and I feel like this is a way for me totake accountability for my actions.” Showing amazing forgiveness, Florence has accepted her apology. She says that there was an FBI investigation into “Sofia” but that the case was not pursued because she was a juvenile. Speaking from her home in Minnesota, Florence tells us, “I find hate and anger to not be worth the emotional pain and resulting damage it causes to anyone’s peace of mind. If I want others to be understanding and forgiving of me, I need to be anexample of understanding and forgiveness. “Sam was manipulated at a very vulnerable time in his life. Maybe Sofia was suffering an emotional breakdown of her own. “She also could have been a victim of manipulation and abuse by this group. “It would be a better world if we could all work toward feeling compassion for those who are not perfect, learn to forgive, and show others they can step forward in spite of mistakes, even horrible mistakes.” How to get help EVERY 90 minutes in the UK a life is lost to suicide It doesn’t discriminate, touching the lives of people in every corner of society – from the homeless and unemployed to builders and doctors, reality stars and footballers. It’s the biggest killer of people under the age of 35, more deadly than cancer and car crashes. And men are three times more likely to take their own life than women. Yet it’s rarely spoken of, a taboo that threatens to continue its deadly rampage unless we all stop and take notice, now. If you, or anyone you know, needs help dealing with mental health problems, the following organisations provide support: CALM, www.thecalmzone.net, 0800 585 858 Heads Together,www.headstogether.org.uk HUMEN www.wearehumen.org Mind, www.mind.org.uk, 0300 123 3393 Samaritans,www.samaritans.org, 116 123 Roblox told the programme: “We have dedicated teams working proactively to remove content promoting these groups, and we engage with law enforcement. “We will continue to strengthen our safeguards to protect our community from extremist groups like the Com.” Discord said: “Disrupting the 764 network has been among our highest priorities. “We have highly skilled teams who work relentlessly to combat them and have removed thousands of servers and banned hundreds of thousands of users. “We will continue to disrupt their behaviour and assist in their capture and prosecution.” A TikTok spokesperson said: “Sadistic content of this sort has no place on TikTok, and we have removed it and permanently shut down accounts associated with this network. “We use the latest technologies and robust systems to detect and removeany content that attempts to exploit or harm young people.” THE COM: Online, Sadistic and Deadly, Sky News, can be seen tonight at 9pm Comment now