I lost Brianna to the dark side of the web – I’m determined to stop other parents suffering the same fate

When my daughter was alive, I struggled to understand why she was self-harming and restricting her eating to the point of hospitalisation – I now know that she was influenced by the insidious side of the internet, writes Esther Ghey, the mother of murdered trans teenager Brianna Ghey

‘I recently sat through a video showing harmful images and videos, like those that Brianna would have watched on social media’ (PA)

Since Brianna’s death, I’ve had no choice but to wake up to the harmful content that our young people are accessing online. Her killers planned her murder over WhatsApp. One of them had accessed the dark web watching murder and torture videos.

When Brianna was alive, I struggled to understand why she was self-harming and restricting her eating to the point of hospitalisation – I now know that she was influenced by the insidious side of the internet.

I recently sat through a video showing harmful images and videos, like those that Brianna would have watched on social media. As I’m writing this, I’m replaying the content in my mind. Even after that one watch, I feel sad and sick to my stomach. Children aren’t watching this kind of content once; the algorithm is serving it to them repeatedly – there’s no doubt this is contributing to a mental health crisis.