These young men were being blackmailed. Then, they lost more money.
One college student remembers the exact moment he realized he'd been scammed. The 24 hours that followed happened in slow motion. He can recall pieces: pulling into a gas station as the panic set in, texting a friend that he wouldn't make it to their freshman-year geology class.
He was 19 at the time, and the girl he had been texting − the one to whom he had sent nude photos − was actually a predator who was now blackmailing him, threatening to release the pictures to his family and friends.
He frantically Googled "sextortion help" and came across a company that purported it could get the images taken down. He signed up, agreeing to pay $1,500 for the service. But he says the company, Digital Forensics Corporation (DFC), didn't deliver. DFC maintains sextortion help is a legitimate, successful area of its business, though a Paste BN investigation has found more than 100 complaints that the company aggressively markets its services to victims in a fragile mental state.
This man's story isn't an uncommon tale, legal and sextortion experts say. As the crime of sextortion grows in the U.S., so does the prevalence of individuals or companies that charge a fee to retrieve intimate messages or photos and then may fail to do so. It's such a prevalent secondary problem that the FBI has issued a warning about it, calling some assistance services "scams" and urging the public to avoid them. The FBI did not name any company but instead encouraged victims to work with law enforcement and nonprofit agencies that offer free assistance.
The mental health implications of being scammed, then taken advantage of again, can be grave − especially for young men, who are most frequently preyed upon. Ninety percent of financial sextortion victims are teenage boys.
The man, who like others we spoke to requested we not print his name out of fear his blackmailers may find him, says his experience with his predator paled in comparison to what happened when he tried to fix the problem.
“They are far worse (than the sextortionists). They are far worse," he says. “I don't think that anybody could have gotten that amount of money out of me for any object or product if I wasn't in that state of mind, and they knew that.”
Sextortion support groups are plagued by recovery scammers
When one Georgia man was sextorted when he was 18, he turned to the largest online support forum for sextortion survivors, r/sextortion on Reddit, for advice. Recovery scammers quickly flooded his inbox − users claiming they could hack into the predators’ accounts to delete the explicit content for an upfront fee of $150.
He didn’t follow through with their services, but the messages only added to his emotional distress. He wasn’t sleeping and could barely eat, and he contemplated suicide in the days after he was sextorted.
Recovery scammers often pop up on sextortion victim support forums and YouTube channels. Jessica Smith, president and founder of ClickSafe Intelligence, a nonprofit company focused on countering child exploitation, says recovery scammers comment on her YouTube sextortion-related videos every one to two weeks.
In some cases, cybersecurity experts say, recovery scammers may be part of the same group of organized criminals who preyed on the teens in the first place.
Part of the problem is that even when they’re blocked, scammers can create new accounts on social media platforms in a matter of minutes. Smith says she has seen recovery scam accounts that use the same profile picture across four accounts or have only one numerical difference in their usernames.
On Reddit, the r/sextortion group sends an automated message to new posters: "Beware of recovery scammers … These parasites will try to convince you that they can 'hack' the scammer and remove your files from their devices. It's a scam."
The thread’s main moderator says the group was “completely overrun by recovery scammers” when he took over in April 2021. He says the group has banned thousands of users in the past two years, but even a banned user can send private messages.
Getting rid of recovery scammers on these platforms is akin to a game of whack-a-mole. For every comment someone posts, there might be three or four recovery scammers who send direct messages.
“The victims, they're in such a panic state that they're willing to do anything to get out of it,” says the moderator, who requested we not print his name because of his own experience with sextortion.
Claims of scare tactics, manipulation and preying on victims
Scammers have no intention of helping the victims. But there are also for-profit companies like DFC that purport they may be able to get victims' explicit images deleted for a price − but even then it's a nearly impossible task that experts say is unlikely without access to the predator's physical device or logins.
It's something for which the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children has created a free service − Take It Down, which is listed by the FBI as a resource − but even so, the service extends only to taking images off social media platforms, not private text messaging platforms.
It works by assigning a digital fingerprint called a hash value to a reported sexually explicit photo or video from a minor. The hash values allow platforms to remove the content, without the original image or video ever being viewed. Once the service provides the hash values, participating social media companies take it from there.
Victims over 18 can use StopNCII.org, a similar free platform, to work to remove images.
Those who purport to be able to do more may be overpromising their services and taking advantage of victims’ desperation and fear, says Mike Prado at the Department of Homeland Security's Cyber Crimes Center.
A 25-year-old from Texas says he called DFC’s hotline sobbing two years ago after he was sextorted. He had already complied with his blackmailer's demands to send $500 − everything in his bank account − but the predator came back asking for more.
He says the DFC representative told him criminals are known to photoshop underage girls next to the naked images they receive before sending them out. The man had just started a job and was looking forward to being able to financially support his 1-year-old daughter. He says DFC told him he would likely lose his position if the materials were released.
DFC says it “feels obligated to inform client of potential possible outcomes and how their sensitive data may be used to pressure them into paying perpetrators."
The 25-year-old says, “The way they made this situation look was that the (sextortionist) held all the cards to my future. They took advantage of a really bad situation.”
He signed up for a $7,840 expedited "Phase I" plan from the company, using a loan from his parents. The service, in the best-case scenario, was supposed to result in confirmation the criminal deleted his private information from their devices. DFC took over the logins of his social platforms and communicated on his behalf to pressure the scammer. They sent a tracking link, which located the predator in Nigeria.
When the blackmailers didn’t comply with DFC’s demands to delete the photos, the Texas man says a representative contacted him and told him that though the company says it's successful 90% of the time, he was in the unlucky 10% and had a particularly skilled sextortionist. The only way to remain safe would be to purchase DFC’s "Phase II" plan, which provides continual internet surveillance on plans between six and 18 months.
“I really didn't feel like they did anything they had promised,” he says, adding he didn’t move forward with purchasing another plan. “I could have accepted this a week earlier and just blocked (the blackmailer) and just accepted the outcome for what it was going to be.”
Others Paste BN spoke with told nearly identical stories.
One 27-year-old says he was pressured to sign up for a Phase II plan. He says a DFC representative told him that in the past, scammers had released clients' content a year after sextortion.
Experts say that if a predator is going to send out images, it will typically happen within two weeks of contact. Once the images are sent out, the blackmailer loses their leverage and usually moves on, according to Lauren Coffren, executive director of the Exploited Children Division at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC).
Jeromy Simonovic, in-house counsel for DFC, said a majority of the 1,000 customers a month who sign up for the service leave satisfied. He provided internal feedback from more than 2,700 customers since January 2024 and provided contact information for clients he said were pleased with the service. In total, Paste BN spoke with nearly three dozen customers, many of whom came from DFC's list. But even among those satisfied customers, many complained about the high prices of the plans, and several said they would have used a free service, like the StopNCII.org, had they known it was an option. All the customers on DFC's list paid for Phase II plans; some said they most appreciated DFC's rapid response to the situation.
"I don’t blame (DFC). They weren’t guaranteeing they would be 100% successful," said one 24-year-old in Texas who said a cybercriminal was bluffing about releasing his nude photos. "I just wanted him to leave me alone. Everything else was secondary."
In a statement, Simonovic added “we cannot guarantee outcomes for online investigations because there are factors outside DFC’s control. That is to say, DFC engages with a blackmailer with unknown motives and unpredictable habits. Please keep in mind that identifying cybercriminals in third world countries is not a perfect science.”
Teenagers are 'desperate to get that imagery back'
Psychologically, victims of sextortion scams are more likely to be vulnerable − especially if they're young adults.
“These young adults and teenagers are so desperate to get that imagery back that after they experienced sextortion, there’s a very high likelihood that they are going to fall for a recovery scam,” says Smith, who runs ClickSafe.
Because the human brain doesn’t finish developing until about age 25, young people respond to stress and decision-making differently from adults, which affects their ability to navigate these situations.
Victims may develop anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder and are more prone to future experiences of online abuse.
The man who was sextorted during his freshman year of college says the experience impacted his ability to pursue healthy romantic interactions. It took four years for him to enter a relationship.
“I came from a small town and I didn't really talk to a whole lot of girls, and then you get attention from something like that and it just turns into the darkest moment of your life,” he says.
The 25-year-old from Texas says he vomited frequently, had panic attacks and relapsed into substance abuse in the week that followed his sextortion and interactions with DFC. He had overdosed on methamphetamine in the past but says the fallout over his sextortion was the scariest period of his life.
What to do if you're facing sextortion
In April 2023, the FBI issued a warning about possible "assistance scams": "These companies charge exorbitant fees, whereas law enforcement and non-profit agencies will provide assistance at no charge to victims." The FBI did not name any company.
Victims of sextortion can work to remove the images from the internet through NCMEC’s Take It Down service or StopNCII.org if they are over 18.
“There is danger that is inherent in turning over additional data to companies that may be unscrupulous, not fully vetted and are operating on behalf of a victim for profit,” says Prado at the Department of Homeland Security's Cyber Crimes Center. “We do not work with any of these for-profit companies.”
The bottom line? You shouldn't have to pay for help, cybersecurity experts say.
If you or your child is being sextorted, remember be B.R.A.V.E
Victims should block the predator and report the account on its platform and the abuse to authorities at report.cybertip.org, tips.fbi.gov/home or the Know2Protect Tipline at 833-591-5669. Ask for help from a trusted adult, like a relative, teacher, coach, counselor, mentor or someone in a religious organization. Parents and communities should validate victims’ experiences − remember, the criminal is the only one at fault − and work to learn the signs of sextortion and how to prevent it to educate others.
If you need immediate mental health help, you can call or text the 988 suicide hotline.
This article is part of an ongoing Paste BN series investigating a surge in financial sextortion and its mental health impact on teenage boys. The first article in the series discussed online terminology that should raise red flags to teens and parents, and another focused on suicides of teenage boys who were sextorted. Click here for advice on what to do if you or your teen is sextorted.
If you'd like to share your experience with sextortion, cybercriminals or recovery assistance services, please contact us here.
Rachel Hale’s role covering Youth Mental Health at Paste BN is supported by a partnership with Pivotal Ventures and Journalism Funding Partners. Funders do not provide editorial input. Reach her at rhale@usatoday.com and @rachelleighhale on X.
Nick Penzenstadler is a reporter on the Paste BN investigations team. Contact him at npenz@usatoday.com or @npenzenstadler, or on Signal at (720) 507-5273.