Internet Extortation

[Gregory Matthews]

Most reading here are probably aware that there are criminals who will attempt to obtain information about you that will allow them to attempt to extort money from you.  The basic information that they need is your name and an e-mail address.  This information can be obtained in a number of ways.  One way is from what appears to be a news item.  You click on the website and read that   news item.  What you may not know is that the website will send information about you, such as your e-mail address and possibly your name also to the scammer who will then attempt to extort money form you.

The criminal may then send you an e-mail which will inform you that a split-screen video has been made of your access to a pornographic website.  One side of that video is a record of the hard-core porn you were watching and the other side of the video is a video of you engaging sexual activities while watching the porn.

You will be told that the criminal has a listing of your friends along with their e-mail addresses.  They will all be sent a copy of this video of you watching the porn, unless you make a payment of X amount of money within a stated number of hours.

So    what can you do to report this effort to extort money from you?

The following websites are available to you:

www.ic3.gov       This is a general website where you may report such attempts.

www.fbi.gov        This is for the FBI

uce@ftc.gov       You may forward the e-mail that you received to this address.

NOTE:  I am attempting to obtain additional information and will report it here as I obtain it.