Police have urged parents to understand how the internet works after a man who encouraged girls to send him explicit pictures before threatening them has been jailed.

Officers were told Jordan Towers, 22, formerly of Northdown Road, Broadstairs, had been using Skype along with social media sites Facebook, Kik and Tagged to get in touch with his victims.

Having engaged them in conversation he would encourage them to take intimate pictures of themselves and then send them to him.

Towers would perform sexual acts via a webcam and then encourage them to do the same.

If they refused, he threatened to contact their friends and family with the messages and pictures the girls had previously sent.

Towers, who targeted girls aged between 14 and 17 years old, was jailed for 52 months today (Tuesday). An indefinite sexual offences prevention order was also granted.

Having been identified by detectives from the paedophile online investigation team, Towers was arrested in June 2013 and later charged with six offences.

He pleaded guilty in January 2015 to five offences: inciting a child to engage in a penetrative sex act, inciting a child to engage in a non-penetrative sex act, sexual activity in the presence of a child, possessing indecent images of children and inciting a child to be involved in pornography.

"Jordan Towers systematically set out to humiliate and threaten girls for his own sexual purposes." - DC Dave Taft

DC Dave Taft said: "Jordan Towers systematically set out to humiliate and threaten girls for his own sexual purposes.

"I would like to pay tribute to those who were brave enough to contact the police, and say to all children that if you are concerned about the way someone is behaving towards you online, please tell someone.

"It may be that the offender is offending against others as well, and your piece of information could be the final part of a jigsaw that helps to protect other people."

He added: "We can’t emphasise enough how important it is for parents to understand how the internet works, to know how social networking works and to know what their children can access online, and who can access them.

"The internet is an incredible tool, but there are people who use it for bad purposes.

"Parents should talk with their children, open up those lines of communication and learn together to ensure children use the internet safely.

"The stranger danger concept is as relevant to the internet as it is to meeting strangers in real life."