The state-owned broadcaster said “it is understood he was attacked on Sunday in his cell at Full Sutton Prison, near York, with what was described as a makeshift knife”.

A Prison Service spokesman confirmed to the BBC that Huckle had died but would not comment further while a police investigation into his death was ongoing.

Huckle, a photographer from Ashford, Kent, had admitted to molesting children aged between six months and 13 years from 2006 to 2014.

His admission was uncovered by BBC journalist Bronagh Munro, who made a documentary about the former poster boy for the British Council in Malaysia.

She obtained the diary for BBC Three’s Gap Year Paedophile during a year-long investigation into the 33-year-old child sex abuser.

It was reported that Huckle was a 19-year-old gap year student when he arrived in Malaysia in 2005 and was teaching in Southeast Asia.

He remained in the region for nearly a decade.

During that time, he infiltrated impoverished communities, targeting care homes and orphanages, filming himself raping babies and children and awarding himself “Pedo Points” for his depravity.

He boasted about his crimes on the hidden “dark web” and compiled a 60-page manual, “Paedophiles and Poverty: Child Love Guide”, on how to select victims and avoid detection. He wanted to create a “Paedo Wiki guide”.