The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is warning parents about a rise in cases where sexual predators are pressuring teenage boys to share explicit images of themselves.
The crime, referred to as sextortion, happens when an adult contacts a minor over an online platform such as a game, app, or social media account.
According to WRC-TV, the predators pretend to be girls who ask the young males to engage in explicit activity on video or in a picture.
Then the adults will ask for hundreds of dollars or they’ll expose the victims by posting the sexual act online.
“They ask the boys to do ridiculous things,” said Special Agent Barbara Smith of the FBI’s Washington Field Office. “The more ridiculous the better because that’s going to be more humiliating, and the more humiliating it is, the more money they can extort from them.”
She said these criminals are motivated by money more than the type of perversion child porn users traffic in.
“They are looking for money,” Smith said. “They’re not our traditional child predators that are looking for additional images.”
She added, “This has been going on for several years. What’s new is the frequency, and more children are falling victim to this scam.”
If caught, offenders who coerce a child to produce Child Sexual Abuse Material (CSAM) can receive a life sentence in prison.
“The most effective way to disrupt these criminals is through awareness, education, and having important discussions with your children about their online safety,” says Wayne Jacobs, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Criminal/Cyber Division in Washington, D.C.
“We recognize victims may feel embarrassed and thus hesitant to come forward and report these incidents, but we are strongly encouraging victims to notify us so that these individuals are held to account for their actions and, most importantly, prevented from harming another child,” he explained.
The FBI offered parents and caregivers the following tips to protect children while online:
- Be selective about information shared online, especially personal information and passwords.
- Be wary of anyone during the first encounter. Block or ignore messages from strangers.
- People can pretend to be anyone online. Videos and photos are not proof that a person is who they claim to be.
- Be suspicious if someone asks to start talking on a different platform.
- Encourage children to report suspicious behavior to a trusted adult.
Take the following steps if a sextortion crime has occurred:
Contact your local FBI field office (contact information can be found at www.fbi.gov), the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) at www.ic3.gov, or the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (1-800-the-lost or Cybertipline.org).
Do not delete anything before law enforcement is able to review it.
Tell law enforcement everything about the encounters, even if it’s embarrassing. All information is necessary to find the offender.
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