Sextortion: what to do

Updated October 16, 2026 · every link checked that day

It happens more often than people say. Someone has a recording or intimate images of you, or claims to, and threatens to send them to your friends, your relatives or your colleagues unless you pay. That is sextortion. It is a crime in every country this site covers, and you are the person it is being done to. Asking for help will not get you in trouble.

The first thing, and the most important: do not pay. Paying rarely ends it. It shows the blackmailer that you can pay, and the next demand usually comes higher.

What to do right now

1. Don't pay and don't negotiate. If you already paid, don't pay again.
2. Stop replying. Every answer tells them the account is live and that you are worried. Send nothing more: no money, no images.
3. Keep the evidence before you block. Screenshots of the messages, the username, the profile link, any payment request or wallet address, with the dates. If you close a social account, deactivate it rather than delete it, so its data can still be retrieved.
4. Block the account and report it to the platform or app where it happened, with your screenshots.
5. Report it to the police or to the official service of your country, listed below. If you feel in danger, call the emergency number now.
6. Tell someone you trust. This kind of threat runs on shame and hurry. Saying it out loud takes most of its force away.

Where to report it

United States

• FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3): the FBI's service for reporting crimes committed online, extortion included, at ic3.gov.
• FBI: report at tips.fbi.gov or call 1-800-CALL-FBI. The FBI's page on sextortion explains how the crime works and warns against companies that charge victims to remove images.
• If the images were taken before you turned 18, the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children runs Take It Down, a free service that helps get them removed.
• In an emergency, call 911.

United Kingdom

• The police: call 101, or 999 if you are at immediate risk. The National Crime Agency's sextortion page sets out what to do: stop all contact, don't pay, keep the evidence.
• Revenge Porn Helpline: free, confidential help for adults living in the UK, webcam blackmail included. It helps report and remove images and explains how to go to the police. 0345 6000 459, Monday to Friday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., except bank holidays, at revengepornhelpline.org.uk.

Australia

• eSafety Commissioner: report image-based abuse, threats to share included, at esafety.gov.au/report. eSafety can help get images removed and the threats stopped. Its guide to sexual extortion walks through each move.
• If you are in immediate danger, call Triple Zero (000).

Canada

• Your local police, or 911 in an emergency.
• Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre: its extortion page describes sextortion and how to report it.
• Cybertip.ca, the national tipline for online sexual exploitation, keeps a guide to sextortion.

Wherever you live

• StopNCII.org is free. For intimate images taken when you were 18 or over, it creates a digital fingerprint of each image on your own device and shares only that fingerprint with the platforms that take part, so they can block the images. The images themselves stay with you.

Messages that only look like sextortion

• The email that says your webcam recorded you. It claims someone got into your computer while you watched adult sites, sometimes quotes an old password of yours, and asks for cryptocurrency. It is sent to thousands of people at once: the password comes from an old data breach, and nobody recorded anything. Don't reply, don't pay, and change that password wherever you still use it.
• Anyone who charges to "erase" images. No one can promise that, and the FBI warns that these companies often take advantage of victims a second time. The free services above do this work.

Keeping it from happening on cam sites

The big platforms keep shows and chat inside their own site, with a support team and a report button. Most blackmail starts when a conversation moves somewhere else.

• Keep the conversation on the platform. A request to carry on in a messaging app, by video call or by phone is the most common way in. You can simply say no.
• Stay hard to find. Use a username and an email that don't say who you are, and never give your full name, your workplace or your social accounts in a chat.
• Turn on two-factor sign-in wherever the platform offers it.
• With Cam2Cam, your camera is live too. Frame it the way you would be at ease with anyone seeing.
• Report and block any account that threatens you, on the platform itself.

This page has no paid link and recommends no paid service. A number that no longer answers, a resource we should add: grant@thecamverdict.com.