Clear and Present Online Danger for Boys
With the recent death of a 14-year-old Surrey, B.C. teen everyone needs to be more aware of how predators are sexually extorting youth—especially boys in 2023. RCMP in Surrey posted this press release in March 2023 to further educate the public.
Over the last ten years, the patterns of online sexual exploitation (also known as ‘sextortion’) have shifted radically from a long slow grooming and luring process targeted at young girls over a long period of time to predators viciously extorting teen boys immediately after they have sent an explicit image or video to a new ‘hot chick’ they met chatting online. Cybertip.ca reports that 79% of sextortion occurs on newer apps like Snapchat Instagram and TikTok.
The goal of these new online perpetrators is not to get sexual images or videos; their goal is to extort money. As soon as the ‘hot chick’ gets the incriminating image from the teen boy, they immediately threaten to distribute the sexual image to friends and family unless the boy pays money. Perpetrators usually demand $1-5k in pre-paid cards, payment apps or anonymous online cash-exchange services.
The boys, faced with peer and family embarrassment (a particular vulnerability for teens) and unable, developmentally, to assess the risk, project into the future or see outside the present moment, panic. Boys do their best to bargain with the predator and try to send money but sometimes, in despair and desperation, they take their own lives to avoid the distribution of their images. Many Canadian boys have taken their own lives within hours of being approached by these predators.
What to do?
PARENTS:
Talk with your teens about this issue, the recent deaths and current trends in online sextortion. They probably know more than you think and are sure to have opinions about it.
Make the rules in your home say that everyone has to abide by age restrictions and requirements for all apps, games and platforms. This ensures younger children aren’t exposed to too much, too soon. They are a good place to start in making decisions about which apps, games and devices your child has access to.
Provide children and pre-teens with links to medically and academically reliable sexual health information by bookmarking them, creating shortcuts on home screens or otherwise highlighting them. When they start to get curious about sex the internet is a natural place to look. Provide them with some safe and age-appropriate material for when they start to look online for information about sex.
TEENS:
Do not take sexual images of yourself prior to age 18!
Don’t let anyone else talk you into sending sexual images of yourself to them no matter who they seem to be.
These images are considered child pornography and are illegal to possess under federal law
If someone threatens to distribute your images and is blackmailing you for money
Screen capture the threats sent to you,
Turn off your device
Seek out either a parent or trusted adult school resource to talk to
Report it online to cybertip.ca.