Last Updated on July 7, 2023
Do Sextortionists Follow Through on their threats? It’s a common question if you faced with online sextortion. In this article we’ll tell you more about sextortion and what to do if being sextorted . It is a harrowing situation to find oneself in.
This particular form of cyber-crime has been gaining more traction over the last decade. But become more voluminous since the shutdown of 2020. Many people were more frequently active on social media and other online platforms that these types of criminals lurk on. One of the most frequently asked questions our organization receives ‘Do sextortionists follow through?’. To answer that question, we’ll dive into the perceived psychology of these scammers.
Do Sextortionists usually follow through?
Attempting to get inside the head of a scammer may sound easier said than done, at first. There are many factors to consider what may personally motivate an individual, which is true of anyone, and keep in mind that sextortionists are still human. This human factor of interaction is always present in sextortion scams. Too much is left to chance to rely on chatbots or auto-text generators. Because of how targeted their operation is and how widely variable their interactions with victims might be. Given all this, from inference, we can begin to understand the makings of the mind of this type of criminal.
Do Sextortionists usually follow through on their threats?
The first and most obvious factor to consider is motivation – this is a question with an overall very simple answer, and that answer is money. Most sextortionists at a base level have no desire to actively try to ruin your life. If you faced with online sextortion, it was essentially luck of the draw that you are one of their victims, not a special circumstance that targeted you specifically. Subsequently, this also means they couldn’t care less if the situation destroys your physical or mental well-being, forces you from a job, or wrecks your relationships – it’s all just business for them.
Another consideration to take into mind is who to imagine who these people are when they are not sitting in a dimly lit room underground, possibly surrounded by peers, being pressed by their handlers and overseers. Most sextortionists are based out of eastern locals; Nigeria, The Ivory Coast, The Philippines, and Morocco are popular hotbeds of this kind of criminal activity. These are cultures wildly different from most modern western civilization – to generalize, of highly varied lifestyles and means, aside from beliefs. This is all to say, you aren’t dealing with an e-girl a few counties over, or the neighborhood smart-aleck playing a “harmless” prank.
This is all to say that you are dealing with people who both:
A.) Do not fear legal repercussions due to their distant locale, and
B.) Purely driven by avarice and the desire for more money. How though will these realizations tell if sextortionists follow through with their threats?
How do you get rid of a sextortion?
Taking into consideration the motivators and lack limiters in the mind of sextortionists, the tool they employ the most in their business is fear. The source of that fear is of course the content they hold and the threats that levy – so long as they have the content and the undivided attention of a sextortion victim, they control the situation.
This typically means that:
A.) They will want to keep your material as long as they can. To drain you of the maximum potential funds that they can.
B.) they very likely won’t post that content to your friends, family, colleagues, or to the public internet too quickly, for the sake of the profit they could gain. This, at least, was how these scammers operated for quite some time: in recent history, our analysis of the situation has shifted.
Sextortionists nowadays are less predictable as their operations proliferate to more locales overseas. While some might cut their losses if ignored, opting to put their effort in where there’s money to be made, we have also observed the opposite to be true as well, with an expansion of their content holding strategies.
Many more sextortionists now than ever before will double down and become more aggressive with their methods. If they feel they are ignored, and do not hold themselves to originally agreed-on timeframes or demands.
To force their victims’ hands, they will even begin to send out the content piecemeal to individuals among their victims’ contacts or change their threats mid-way from private group release of the media to full online public release. The ultimate goal of this tactic is to keep a victim off-balance. By attempting to occupy the victim’s attention, they steal time away from potentially finding alternative solutions. This places many sextortion victims into a state of panic, and mental unrest.
In any case, there is no way of predicting which situation or strategic call may be employed by the sextortionists
Endgame – How to deal with sextortion
We finally circle back to our original topic’s question – do sextortionists follow through on their threats? The ultimate answer is a very firm maybe. The fact is, there’s no real way of knowing what sort of person lurks beyond the online blackmail on the other end of the connection. Schemes like these along with the criminals that perpetrate them grow equally. It is truly impossible to fully predict how any situation will turn out. The strongest advice we can give is to look for help from experts.
We recommend of course doing your research. There are many companies, like ours, who also specialize in assisting victims with online sextortion and blackmail scams. Cyber Investigation has an over 90% success rate when it comes to mitigating and ending online sextortion. We’re available 24/7 to hear your case – chat with us online or give us a call at 1-888-210-2373 today. For now, though, we hope we’ve answered the question of ‘Do Sextortionists follow through?’ If faced with online sextortion – seek professional help. Contact our sextortion helpline 24/7. We’ve helped thousands to stop cyber sextortion
