The report found that perpetrators are finding "new ways" to groom younger children, including through social media and dating apps.

It also found examples of children, including babies, being livestreamed for money, and sometimes sexually abused at the direction of the paying perpetrator.

Victim says she was ignored

Fiona Goddard, from the north of England, was in care when her abuse began. Aged 13, she was offered kindness, then made to feel like she owed the men sex, and if she refused, things got nasty.

She said: "I was threatened, I was beaten, and then every time I did get away and I went to a service and tried getting help, they would normalise it even more by saying it was my fault, it was my choice, and that I had to live with the consequences - that I was a child prostitute, that I was asking for it and I didn't get listened to and I didn't get help. And that pushed me back to them."

Another woman, Anna, whose name has been changed, said she was picked up from school and abused.

She told Sky News: "One of them did mention a list that my name had been put on, and that's how other people had got to me, because my name was on this list.

"I'd get people come from like, Birmingham, across the Humber Bridge, and they'd pick me up, assault me, rape me, whatever, and then I'd never see them again."

Anna shared her teenage diary, which chronicled her abuse and how she felt "controlled". She also showed messages and images of injuries that appeared to support her story.

The report said "extensive failures" by local authorities and police forces have meant they are struggling to keep pace with the changing nature of sexual exploitation of children by networks.

'Abducted at gun point'

The inquiry looked at six local authority areas: St Helens, Tower Hamlets, Swansea, Durham, Bristol and Warwickshire.

It heard evidence about more than 30 children and young people, and survivors who described their experiences between 2003 and 2011.

One survivor, who was first abused when she was 12, described being forced to perform a sex act on more than 20 adult men.

A number of men were charged, but the charges were later dropped and a few months later she told the inquiry she was abducted by another group of men at gunpoint.

She was placed back into care and returned to "a pattern of repeated self-harm".

'Victims treated as offenders'

It said there is a "flawed assumption" that child sexual exploitation was decreasing, when in reality it has become more of a "hidden problem" that is underreported unless linked to other forms of criminal behaviour such as county lines.

Read more:
Dramatic rise in online-linked sexual crimes against children

It said children had been described as "at risk" despite clear evidence harm had occurred and too many victims of exploitation are treated as offenders.

The report makes a number of recommendations, including strengthening the criminal justice system, updating government guidance on child sexual exploitation and better data collection by police forces and local authorities.

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It is the inquiry's 18th report into child sex abuse; the final report, into residential schools, will be published next month.

The independent inquiry was launched when Theresa May was home secretary to look at how institutions and organisations, including councils, schools and religious groups, handle abuse claims.