Almost half the images and videos featuring the sexual abuse of children found by a British research group were hosted in the Netherlands, the organisation said on Wednesday.

The Internet Watch Foundation said it had found 48,9000 web addresses containing child abuse with links to the Netherlands, or 46% of the total addresses which had been monitored. In 2017, imagery hosted in the Netherlands accounted for almost 36% of the total.

By contrast, the amount of imagery hosted in the UK is at its lowest level ever recorded, at just 0.04% of the global total, down from 18% in 1996.

The organisation did not give an explanation for the prevalence of Dutch web addresses but said it had ‘offered support’ to the Dutch organisation dealing with child sexual abuse imagery.

The IWF said it found record amounts of the imagery last year due to improved technology to speed up the detection and assessment of the material.