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What Changed in KCSIE 2025
Annex F of the 2025 guidance carries the official summary. Four things changed, and none of them touched Part One.
1. The Four Cs picked up misinformation
Content, contact, conduct and commerce now explicitly include misinformation, disinformation and conspiracy theories. The last of those is named as a route into extremist material rather than as a curiosity.
2. Generative AI got a named reference
KCSIE 2025 points directly at the DfE's generative AI product safety expectations. Schools are expected to assess a tool against those expectations before pupils use it.
3. A filtering self-assessment tool
The filtering section links to the DfE's Plan technology for your school service, which gives schools a way of checking themselves against the standards rather than guessing.
4. Housekeeping throughout
Hyperlinks updated, dead references removed, wording tidied in places. Nothing here changes what a school has to do.
In 2026: this list gets a lot longer. Annex A is withdrawn, volunteers lose the supervision exemption, and Part Five is rewritten. See what's changed in KCSIE 2026.
The Four Cs and Misinformation
The four categories of online risk stayed as they were. What sat inside them widened.
Misinformation
False information shared without any intention to deceive, which can still cause harm.
Disinformation
False information created and shared deliberately to deceive.
Conspiracy theories
Recognised in the guidance as a safeguarding harm in their own right, and as a way into extremist content.
What This Means in Practice
- ✓ Add misinformation and critical thinking to the online safety curriculum rather than treating it as a media studies topic.
- ✓ Brief staff that a pupil deep in conspiracy material is showing a safeguarding indicator, not just an odd interest.
- ✓ Update the Online Safety Policy so it reflects the widened Four Cs.
- ✓ Look at age appropriate media literacy teaching across year groups.
In 2026: the online safety section moves on considerably. Nudes and semi-nudes are redefined to include AI generated and digitally altered images, and deepfakes are named. Read nudes, semi-nudes and AI images under KCSIE 2026.
Generative AI in Schools
KCSIE 2025 does not set out its own AI rules. It points at the DfE's generative AI product safety expectations and expects schools to work to those.
What the DfE Expects of an AI Product
- Age appropriate content filtering built into the tool.
- Data protection and privacy standards that hold up for pupil data.
- Transparency about what has been generated by AI.
- Safeguards that stop the tool producing harmful content.
The DSL and DPO Working Together
Your data protection officer belongs in filtering decisions, AI risk assessments and DPIAs, cyber security governance and the annual technology review. Complete a DPIA for each tool, and check it against the DfE expectations before pupils get near it.
In 2026: AI stops being a cross reference and gets its own section in Part Two, with the Four Cs naming AI directly under contact and conduct risk. See generative AI under KCSIE 2026.
Filtering and Monitoring
The standards did not change in 2025. The guidance added a link to the DfE's Plan technology for your school tool so schools could self assess against them.
The Standards
Appropriate filtering limits harmful content across school devices and networks.
Appropriate monitoring flags unusual online activity to the DSL.
Staff are trained to understand the systems and to report what they see.
The DPO is involved in filtering and monitoring decisions.
In 2026: the standards still hold, and the evidence expectation hardens. Reviews must happen at least once an academic year, cover all internet connected devices in all relevant locations and be formally recorded. There is also a new expectation that schools run as mobile phone free environments. See filtering, monitoring and mobile phones under KCSIE 2026.
The Structure of KCSIE 2025
Part One: Safeguarding information for all staff
Read by every member of staff annually. Unchanged in 2025.
Part Two: Child protection policies, procedures and practices
Child protection policy, DSL arrangements, staff code of conduct.
Part Three: Safer recruitment
Recruitment practice, DBS checks, prohibition orders, overseas checks, references.
Part Four: Allegations of abuse made against teachers and other staff
LADO referrals, low level concerns, whistleblowing, staff conduct.
Part Five: Child on child sexual violence and sexual harassment
Peer on peer abuse, reporting, support for victims and for those who have caused harm, online incidents.
Annexes A to F
Including Annex A, the condensed Part One for staff who do not work directly with children, and Annex F, the summary of changes for 2025.
In 2026: the annexes are cut back to three. Annex A is withdrawn entirely, so every member of staff reads Part One in full, and the homestay guidance moves into Part Three. See the structure of KCSIE 2026.
What This Means for DSLs
The core of the role carried over from 2024 without change. The 2025 edition added expectations in four areas.
Online safety
- Make sure the curriculum covers misinformation and conspiracy theories.
- Review the online safety policy against the widened Four Cs.
- Keep track of what AI tools pupils are actually using.
Technology governance
- Work with the DPO to assess generative AI tools through a DPIA.
- Use the DfE's Plan technology for your school tool to audit against the filtering standards.
- Check filtering and monitoring covers pupil devices on the school network.
Attendance
- Treat persistent or patterned absence as a possible exploitation indicator.
- Refer to MASH where absence follows a county lines pattern.
- Keep children missing education reporting up to date with the local authority.
Training
- DSL refresher training at least every two years.
- Part One briefing for all staff annually, at induction, and whenever KCSIE is updated.
- Safer recruitment training for at least one governor or trustee and one member of staff.
In 2026: volunteers and safer recruitment become the pressing item, and early help splits into universal support and targeted Family Help. See what KCSIE 2026 means for DSLs.
KCSIE 2025 Compliance Checklist
Online safety policy
AI and technology
Training and records
Filtering and monitoring
Working towards September? Use the KCSIE 2026 checklist instead. It covers the volunteer DBS re-audit, the single Part One reading record and the mobile phone policy, none of which appear above.