Sextortion was a relatively unknown term until 2012 when it was launched into public awareness by the suicide of 15-year-old Amanda Todd. Today, it is the fastest growing crime targeting children in North America. The issue is growing exponentially, more than 1000% in the last 18 months. Additionally, from 2021 to 2022, NCMEC reported a 7,200% increase in financial sextortion targeting children.

Those numbers are mind-boggling.

Over the last decade, and especially in the last few years, those seeking to sextort have changed their tactics. In addition to the rapidly growing incidence of sextortion, recently, the focus has shifted from targeting female victims to almost exclusively targeting male victims, with up to 98% of sextortion schemes aimed at teen boys.

In 2019 the FBI, scrambling to get a handle on the tidal wave of sextortion reports, published a warning about a growing number of reports of sextortion targeting teens, particularly boys 14 to 17. They also launched a public awareness campaign in schools called Stop Sextortion in an attempt to help students avoid being victimized and teach them how to ask for help if they are being exploited. 

The FBI’s actions have in fact, helped to drive awareness for, and prevention of, the crime of sextortion; but much more needs to be done. Education efforts alone seem a seriously negligible response to what the Network Contagion Research Institute is calling a digital pandemic. 

Here’s the unique and fascinating thing about sextortion as a crime. It is formulaic. The vast majority of incidents of sextortion follow a similar step-by-step process.

1. Perpetrator reaches out to a target on a popular social media platform, often Instagram
2. Perpetrator moves the conversation to Snapchat
3. Victim is enticed to send a nude image
4. Perpetrator blackmails the victim by threatening to expose images to others in the victims circle (family, friends, school officials, etc.)
5. If the victim sends money, the perpetrator demands more money
6. If the victim can’t pay, the perpetrator makes the situation seem hopeless and may even encourage suicide

That’s the process, and it’s happening over and over again. The benefit of it being formulaic is that it is relatively easy to recognize if you know the red flags to look for.

However, further complicating the sextortion issue is the fact that sextortion crime is a crime primarily targeting minors. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, sextortion cases “tend to have more minor victims per offender than all other child sexual exploitation offenses.” 

Because teenage brains are still developing, and their prefrontal cortexes are not fully functioning, teens have a harder time judging whether something is dangerous. So a sextortion scam has a better chance of succeeding with a teen than with an adult. On top of that, the teen brain, particularly the male brain, is impulsive and prone to pushing boundaries and taking risks, all characteristics that make them especially vulnerable to sextortion.

Then there’s the fact that many of these teens are trying to handle this problem on their own. Only one third of those who experience sextortion tell their parents about it. So when it does happen, most victims are kids who don’t have the skills to navigate this very scary, very overwhelming, shame-inducing issue alone. 

While sextortion is a global problem, its primary source is surprisingly localized. The vast majority of U.S.-targeted sextortion schemes originate from a cybercriminal group in West Africa that uses apps popular with teens, like Snapchat and Instagram, to identify and target potential victims. This group has shared a series of sextortion instructional videos on TikTok and YouTube, which has contributed to the rapid increase in cases. 

And these videos seem to be disturbingly effective. According to recent research conducted by Snap Inc., the parent company of Snapchat, of teens who are targets of sextortion, about one third (31%) end up sharing explicit images. 

In other words, parents, if your child is targeted, there’s a one in three chance they will be coerced into sending images to a perpetrator.

Meanwhile, the U.S. government and tech companies continue to argue over who is ultimately responsible. Social media companies refuse to take responsibility for the crimes being perpetuated on their platforms, and the U.S. Congress is attempting to hold them responsible while simultaneously being stuck in the procedural mud on putting legislation in place to be able to take action when sextortion does occur.

In the absence of federal regulation, states have taken action to various degrees to address the risks of children on social media. However, the speed of legislative action pales in comparison to the rapidly growing problem.

With the rate at which sextortion is occurring and the shame and secrecy involved when it does occur, the chance that your child could be a victim is increasing as well.

No parent thinks it will actually happen to their teen. 

There are a hundred reasons why you might think your child won’t be vulnerable to sextortion:

You don’t recognize the significant reality of the risk of sextortion.
You think you’ve adequately equipped your teen to navigate the digital world safely.
You have enabled parental controls and trust they offer adequate protection.
You believe your teen will come to you if they have a problem.
You think you know how your teen spends their time online. 

You trust your teen to be able to discern what’s safe when it comes to their digital life.

While you will certainly not get everything right as parents, being wrong on this issue can have tremendously harmful consequences or may even be a matter of life and death.

Here’s how it happened last year for one family in Canada:

14-year-old Robin Janjua, from Surrey, B.C., played defense for the Valley West Giants hockey team, finding so much success he joined the prestigious Delta Hockey Academy. He was well-loved, known by teammates as a kind-hearted friend and good student. He loved hockey and was a gifted player.

Robin had been contacted over Instagram and Snapchat by someone he thought was a teenage girl. In reality it was a 26-year-old man named Adedayo Olukeye in Nigeria. Posing as the young girl, he fostered a relationship with Robin, eventually convincing him to send intimate images of himself. Upon receiving them, Olukeye began to blackmail Robin, demanding that he send him gift cards if he wanted to prevent him from sharing the images with Robin’s friends and family.

Following the blackmail and a very short online interaction, Robin took his own life.

Incredibly, this story is happening over and over again. 

Jordan DeMay (Idaho Falls, MI)

Tevan Tobler (West Point, UT)

Walker Montgomery (Starkville, MS)

Ryan Last (San Jose, CA)

Gavin Guffey (Rock Hill, SC)

Carson Cleland (Prince George, B.C.)

Their names are different, but the story of their exploitation is nearly identical. Each of these teens connected through a social media platform, usually Snapchat or Instagram, with an individual they thought was a young teenage girl. They developed a relationship through likes, comments, and DMs, and eventually were convinced to send intimate images. Then they were extorted, and when they were unable to pay, they were encouraged to commit suicide.

These are just the ones that have made headlines. However, the FBI alert makes it clear that sextortion is affecting thousands of young people each year.

Sextortion is happening. That’s the bad news. It may be tempting just to insist your teen get off social media completely, but often that’s not a realistic option. The good news is you are not helpless. There are things you can do to protect your teen from sextortion.