A British judge has warned of the dangers posed by easy internet access for young people as he sentenced a teenage girl for downloading bomb recipes in a case with links to a Melbourne terror plot.
The 16-year-old, who cannot be named for legal reasons, avoided a jail term but was ordered to undergo 12 months of intensive supervision and rehabilitation by District Judge Khalid Qureshi in the Manchester Youth Court on Thursday.
The girl pleaded guilty to two charges of possessing documents likely to be of use to a person preparing or committing an act of terrorism, namely a recipe for explosives and The Anarchy Cookbook.
The girl's offending began when she was 15 and was uncovered after a 14-year-old boy she was having an online relationship with came to the attention of police after he threatened to behead his teachers in Blackburn in England's north.
The boy later pleaded guilty to inciting a Melbourne man online to carry out a terror attack on police on Anzac Day. Earlier this month he was given a life term with a minimum detention period of five years.
A Melbourne man remains before the courts in Australia.
Police said that over an eight-day period the boy and the girl exchanged a staggering 16,260 WhatsApp messages via their phones, most of it about their relationship but some of it terror-related.
Police found no evidence the girl was complicit in the plotting of the Anzac Day attack or was planning any attack of her own.
When the girl was arrested in April police seized her Blackberry mobile phone and a sketchpad in which she had written a recipe for explosives.
The court was told that on the girl's Blackberry police found the cookbook, the Islamic State group magazine Dabiq and a range of images including that of an execution and people about to be beheaded.
Other images included IS flags, guns, knives and grenades as well as photos of al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden and IS leader Sheik Abu Al Baghdadi.
Police also found the girl had made internet searches at her school for Islamic State and the Taliban, IS executioner Jihadi John and other terror-related subjects.
Judge Qureshi said the girls mother was horrified to learn what her daughter had done.
"It must be every parent's nightmare to discover their child has been accessing material that they should not have, whatever type.
"Sadly many parents are still ignorant of the dangers that easy and unrestricted access to the internet can pose," Judge Qureshi said.
The girl's lawyer, Nasir Hafezi, told the court the girl's family was going through difficulties and she felt neglected and unloved so turned to her Muslim religion and the internet which drew her into the orbit of anti-Western groups promoting violent action.
"She exposed herself to a very narrow view of the world and how to change it," Mr Hafezi said.
"She readily accepts she was in a fantasy world."
Mr Hafezi said the girl had learnt "a bitter lesson" not to trust people online.
The girl told the judge she was deeply ashamed of her actions.
"I deeply regret what I've done and I wish to make changes and I can only make them if I get the chance to prove Im not a terrorist," she said.
In sentencing, Judge Qureshi said the girl had offended while she was vulnerable and susceptible but she had shown regret and remorse and there was no evidence she was involved in plotting a terror act.
He said the girl had not sent terror-related material to anyone else and had not sought to radicalise others.
The judge concluded "the risk of serious harm was low" from her offending.
