The first in the series for March – Fraud Awareness Month, we’ll highlight the first of common online scams – Blackmail and Extortion Scams. ⬛ 📨 💰
Some scammers will claim they have embarrassing personal information, including your own photos or videos, to lure you into a trap. They will typically threaten to make the information public, but with the promise of keeping your information private if you do what they want. Their demands always seem to be the same — you can make the problem disappear if you send them a crypto transfer right away. Often pointing to bitcoin ATMs as the way to make payment, or simply transferring to their crypto address. 💸
Always report these to the authorities, do not send the thief money, do not communicate with them at all. Even if you do see payment, it’s not likely you will stop the action you are trying to prevent. 👮♂️ 🚓 🚨
Photo artwork generated by DALL-E 3 AI 🙂
