How many of those arrested for online communications in the UK were subsequently charged, convicted, or imprisoned?
Executive summary
In 2023 UK police recorded roughly 12,000 arrests for online communications offences under Section 127 of the Communications Act 2003 and Section 1 of the Malicious Communications Act 1988 (about 12,183 in one widely cited tally) [1][2]. Only a small fraction of those arrested are ever prosecuted, convicted, or given custodial sentences: prosecutions numbered around 1,160 in 2024, convictions were roughly 1,119 in 2023, and immediate custodial sentences were reported at 137 in 2024, with most prison terms under two months [3][4].
1. Arrests: the scale that sparked the debate
Reporting based on freedom‑of‑information returns to The Times and aggregated in a number of subsequent briefings says officers from roughly 37 police forces made about 12,183 arrests in 2023 for communications offences — a rise of around 58% since 2019 and equivalent to roughly 30–33 arrests a day [1][2][5].
2. Charged or prosecuted: only a fraction proceed to court
Although arrest figures are high, prosecutions are far fewer: one charted figure shows about 1,160 prosecutions for malicious communications in 2024, indicating that the majority of arrests do not lead to formal charges being pursued through the courts [3]; parliamentary debate and library briefings underscore that “many of these cases never get to court” [5].
3. Convictions: a declining tide over the decade
Ministry of Justice and library analyses cited in parliamentary materials show convictions for communications offences have fallen “dramatically” over the past decade, with Ministry of Justice–derived counts in 2023 at about 1,119 convicted under Section 127 and related provisions — far smaller than the arrest tally and consistent with the prosecution numbers cited [6][3][4].
4. Imprisonment and custodial sentences: rare and often brief
Custodial penalties are uncommon relative to arrests: reporting indicates that in 2024 only 137 people received immediate custodial sentences for malicious communications and that most of those terms were for less than two months, while Freedom House noted that in 2023 “less than one‑tenth of arrests resulted in sentencing” [3][4].
5. What the gap between arrest and punishment signifies — and its limits
The mismatch between ~12,000 arrests and roughly 1,100–1,200 prosecutions/convictions with only about 137 immediate custodial sentences suggests arrest is frequently the end point rather than the start of a sustained criminal case; parliamentary speakers and analysts warn this may reflect policing practice, court backlogs, evidential thresholds, or prioritisation decisions [5][6]. These sources also emphasise caveats: The Times’ arrest count covered data from a subset of forces (reported as 35–37 forces in different summaries), so the headline figure is not a complete national census and other official datasets may classify offences differently [6][1][2]. Finally, the material available does not allow a definitive matching of individual arrests to their eventual outcomes (i.e., an exact percentage of the same cohort who were charged, convicted, or imprisoned), only aggregated annual totals for arrests, prosecutions, convictions and reported custodial sentences [6][3][4].