In the first six months of the year, the Saskatchewan RCMP stated they received 105 reports of extortion. This was nearly a 200 percent increase in the number of reported cases, with police being notified of just 36 in the same six-month period in 2022.
"It is a startling increase, and I think it’s fair to say that number probably should be even larger,” explained Staff Sergeant Evan Gordon with the RCMP. “I think this is something that is a sensitive issue for some, and you know, can be traumatizing and embarrassing, and I think that not every incident that happens is likely to be reported to police.”
At the same time, Gordon noted people could be getting more and more comfortable with reporting these types of scams, which was the reason for the drastic year-over-year increase.
“Regardless, the numbers are too high for our liking.”
The majority of the scams fall under what the RCMP classed as sextortion. These come about when the victim meets someone on social media, a gaming app or a dating site. The suspect starts communicating with the victim, and then the conversation moves off the platform to something that isn’t as monitored, such as texting or various messaging apps like Snapchat or WhatsApp.
“The suspect or the scammer will inevitably ask to share some sort of intimate image, whether they're the first one to provide an image and the victim reciprocates, or vice versa,” S/Sgt. Gordon explained. “Quite often, there is that sharing of images or compromising information and it’s important to realize that for folks, that information, or that image, that video chat that they’re receiving, may not even be the person they’re speaking to – very, very likely that it’s not the person they’re speaking to.”
Once the photos are received by the suspect, the tone of the conversation changes. The suspect will then demand money, gift cards or credit card information with an ultimatum that if the victim doesn’t go along with the request, the images will be shared with the victim’s contacts, or will be published to the web for anyone to find.
Gordon explained there are also a number of instances where there is no sharing of intimate images, but the scammers will still try anyway, telling the victim via e-mail or text that their computer has been hacked and it now contains compromising information, and threaten to share that information with the demand of payment for not spreading it.
With the reporting of these crimes, S/Sgt. Gordon noted the situation can be traumatic for victims.
“Not just the trauma of losing valuable money, or gift cards, or cryptocurrency or anything like that, but even just the stress that comes along with it, the self regrets,” S/Sgt. Gordon added. “You know those aren’t always easy things to overcome when it comes time to reach out for help.”
S/Sgt. Gordon recommends people reach out to their local police if these sorts of crimes arise.
There are also a few steps he recommends people follow if they are the victims of this sort of scam, or if something like this is starting to develop.
“Make sure that you immediately stop talking to that person, remove them from any of your social media platforms, but make sure that any information that you have, any evidence, any conversations, things like that, are screenshotted or retained so that it can be provided to the police of jurisdiction for an investigation,” Gordon elaborated. He added that people should also not send money or gift cards.
“This report should show that this is something that’s happening to a lot of people, and again, even if there is no compromising information shared, you can be the victim of this sort of crime,” S/Sgt. Gordon concluded. “But, if you have been the victim, come forward. We need to know about it so that we can try and limit the damage, and hopefully prevent other people from going through the same sort of thing.”