The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s CyberTipline

Sextortion

The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s CyberTipline receives reports regarding suspected crimes of sexual exploitation committed against children. Recently, a growing number of reports concern incidents of “sextortion”. Sextortion is a relatively new form of online sexual exploitation in which non-physical forms of coercion are utilized, such as blackmail, to acquire sexual content (photos/videos) of the child, obtain money from the child or engage in sex with the child.

What are the effects of sextortion?

In 18% of CyberTipline sextortion reports, it was indicated that the child victim had experienced a negative outcome as the result of the victimization, such as hopelessness, fear, anxiety and depression. In 28% of these reports with negative outcomes (5% of all sextortion reports), the child had engaged in self-harm, had been suicidal, or had attempted suicide as a result of the victimization.
There was no difference between male and female children in negative outcomes of sextortion, or how commonly they were indicated in the CyberTipline reports.
In reports that indicated that the child had experienced a negative outcome, it was common that concern was expressed for other potential victims of sextortion; caring about others and wanting to prevent others from the same victimization was a common reason for making a report.

http://www.missingkids.org/Sextortion

For more information, visit our website at www.missingkids.org or contact us at 1-800-THE-LOST® (1-800-843-5678).