Children’s access to child protection social work through mobile apps

Carlick, Sarah and May-Chahal, Corinne (2025) Children’s access to child protection social work through mobile apps. British Journal of Social Work. ISSN 0045-3102

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Abstract

Direct reporting of child abuse by children themselves is rare. Children’s communication is increasingly managed through mobile phones and associated apps. Yet little is currently known about how statutory child protection services might be accessed through apps to support direct reports, or to find out about statutory child abuse responses. The objective of the present study was to identify the characteristics of apps that included reference to child abuse and to understand how a child might report if they had concerns. Searches of Google and Apple app stores were conducted at four intervals over a nine-year period from 2014 to 2023. Developer descriptions of apps containing terms relevant to child abuse were thematically analysed according to the app categorization in the store, target user, and child abuse report function. A total of 258 apps met the child abuse app inclusion criteria,