CEPOL OTNA Child sexual exploitation

The EU Agency for Law Enforcement Training (CEPOL) has just released an Operational Training Needs Analysis on Child sexual exploitation (CSE), identifying priority training needs across the EU.

CEPOL conducted the analysis between December 2024 and February 2025, collecting input from practitioners across 24 EU Member States. The results reflect that the technological and investigative challenges in combatting this crime are evolving, and that specialised training at different levels is needed to keep pace.

The findings showed that the five most important EU-level training priorities are:

• victim identification
• investigation techniques and methodologies
• prevention
• victim-centric approach in investigations and support services
• mental welfare in CSE investigations

Furthermore, the topics of Artificial Intelligence (AI) related to CSE and handling encryption and anonymisation services in online child sexual abuse also demonstrated a strong relevance across responses, followed by financial investigations linked to such crimes. These findings suggest a broad recognition of evolving technological and investigative challenges in combatting CSE and the need for targeted, multi-level training to address them effectively.

The statistical analysis estimates that over 110 000 law enforcement officials across the EU may require training on the identified CSE topics. Training needs across CSE topics were consistently considered to be highly timely, with average urgency ratings falling between moderate and urgent. In terms of the proficiency level at which training should be targeted, the overall statistical analysis across all topics indicates a strong emphasis on awareness-level training, which accounts for over 45% of the total training requests.

All topics covered in this report received indications of regional training needs, confirming that CSE is widely recognised as a cross-border challenge requiring coordinated responses. For the five highest-ranked topics, regional training was suggested by a wide range of countries, bringing up repeated references to regional clusters with shared legal, operational or linguistic contexts, as well as training interests that extend beyond the EU.