Islamic terrorists are using pedophile websites to communicate secret coded messages, according to anti-terror experts.
A link between hardcore child pornography and Muslim extremists has been uncovered by police raids.
The discovery could lead to child welfare experts being trained to identify signs of terrorist involvement as they monitor pornographic sites.
Police are now investigating the link in an attempt to learn more about the way terrorists operate.
Conservative security spokeswoman Baroness Neville-Jones told The Times newspaper: ‘The information about a possible link between extremism and child pornography potentially provides useful insight into three things: the methods that extremists use to communicate; the methods they use to target vulnerable people in society; and the techniques they seek to use to conceal their online activities.’
She added: ‘There is no doubt that these possible linkages should merit further research.’
Images of child abuse were found during Scotland Yard anti-terrorism swoops and in big inquiries in Italy and Spain.
British police were first alerted to the link in 2006 when they investigated the possible terror links of a former Mujahideen fighter who preached at a London mosque. They discovered computerized images of child abuse.
Five years earlier an investigation of a mosque run by an al-Qaeda recruiter in Milan found child pornography that police believe contained encoded messages.
British security sources are unsure why people claiming to be devoted to the teachings of Islam are would use such offensive material.
A source said: ‘It shows that these people are very confused. Here they are hating Western decadence but actually making use of it and finding that they enjoy this stuff.’