Extortion syndicates targeting boys in South Africa

Security awareness group KnowBe4 AFRICA has warned that online extortion syndicates are becoming more prominent in South Africa, with teen boys in particular at risk.

The group noted that there has been a significant rise in financially motivated ‘sextortion’ around the world, with victims in South Africa also at risk.

“An increasing number of children and young people have been subjected to financial sextortion attempts over the past few years, and while criminals target all genders and age groups, boys between the ages of 14 and 18 are typically targeted for this type of crime,” it said.

Sextortion is a form of online blackmail where perpetrators threaten to release private and sensitive material unless their demands are met, which can include money, additional explicit content or other forms of exploitation.

The rise in these crimes has been attributed to the increasing use of social media and online communication platforms by young people, making them more accessible to cybercriminals.

“While sextortion is by no means a new crime, financial sextortion is turning it into a massive, organised scam, aimed at teenagers and executed at scale. Financial sextortion is a form of organised crime that targets teenagers around the globe.”

Anna Collard, a content strategist at KnowBe4 AFRICA said that criminals target minors because they are easier to manipulate and coerce than adults.

“Scammers will typically pose as attractive girls on social media and target a high school or sports club, specifically befriending prefects or sports captains – ‘good’ boys who have something to lose,” she said.

“These organised criminal groups usually impersonate teenage girls, using fake accounts on Instagram and then move onto other chat platforms to trick victims into sharing explicit images or videos of themselves.

“Once the scammers receive an image, they will immediately extort the victim, typically demanding a few thousand rand,” she said.

Collard warned that under no circumstances should victims pay, as this will only focus the criminals’ attention on them, and payment demands will simply escalate.

“When victims refuse to pay, the scammers often move on to another of the hundreds of fake social media accounts they operate simultaneously in search of a more malleable target.

“More often than not, these are empty threats that never materialise. These cybercriminals don’t actually want to waste time and resources posting compromising content on social media, they simply want to find a victim who will pay up when threatened,” she said.

Collard said that sextortion is more than just a financial crime and can have devastating consequences for victims and their families. It can lead to severe emotional and psychological distress, including anxiety, depression and, in extreme cases, suicidal thoughts.

“This is a violent crime that has already led to about 40 teenage suicides so far. Raising awareness and educating young people about the dangers of sextortion is crucial.

“We must empower them with the knowledge and tools to protect themselves online,” she said.

Risk experts note that the best way to avoid falling victim to sextortion scammers is not to share private content.

However, children may still engage in this behaviour. In the event that they fall victim, the experts said that the key is to recognize that many of these attempts are often empty threats.

If private content is shared publicly, there are other tools at a victim’s disposal, including the takeitdown tool provided by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), which can be used to remove content from the internet.

“We all make mistakes, but it really isn’t something that should ruin a young person’s life.”

Read: Warning over exploitation scam targeting young people in South Africa