Police in Angus have warned that indecent online and social media offences are becoming more prevalent.
Chief Superintendent Paul Anderson said the increase in crimes of indecency in Angus was continuing “but at a reduced level”.
He said the internet “unfortunately knows no bounds”.
Indecency online includes adults engaging young people in cybersex, encouraging young people to watch sexual activity or swapping explicit images of themselves, using webcams.
“The hardest one for us?” he said.
“The internet.
“Especially when you go in and you start to realise the level of offending.
“Without talking about specifics, we’ve been dealing with crimes from a Tayside-based offender this year yet the victims have all been down in another part of the country.
“The internet unfortunately knows no bounds.”
He said the reporting trend remains upwards with online and social media offences becoming more prevalent.
Crimes of indecency went up from 258 in 2014/15 to 264 in 2015/16 which is above the five-year average of 180.
Detection rates also dropped by 3.2% from 74% to 70.8%.
Mr Anderson said: “We term sexual crimes as Group 2 crimes.
“Across the whole of Scotland we have seen a rise and that’s something that I don’t regard as negative for a number of reasons.
“So we are really clear in what we are talking about in terms of indecency, there is a correlation in terms of domestic violence and what happens inside a house.
“We’re talking rape and we’re also talking a very large amount of internet-based offences.
“Recently there has been the inclusion under legislation of offences which involve – basically for financial benefit – getting young people to commit acts of indecency; selling pictures of themselves on the net.
“This is an area we are now moving into and currently there is a Scotland-wide operation going on targeting forms of indecency using the internet.”
Mr Anderson said there has been a rise in offences involving children and they would expect a rise in the detection rate as the year goes on.
