Social media apps that facilitate sextortion blamed for not doing enough to prevent it

Social media companies like Meta and Snap Inc. have been updating their security features throughout 2023 to combat sextortion facilitated through their apps as the number of cases in Canada is reported to be on the rise.

According to the latest data from Cybertip, reports of sextortion in Canada have reached new highs, with 4,952 instances reported between June 2022 and the end of September 2023.

Cybertip, a reporting tipline for online abuse operated by the Canadian Centre for Child Protection in Winnipeg, saw an average increase of 35 per cent from June to September this year compared with the same period last year. (Data from Cybertip goes back only to June 2022.) At the same time, police departments have been reporting even higher increases — including, for example, in Montreal and Calgary.

Sextortion is the practice of acquiring something, usually money, by threatening to expose a victim's nude or explicit photos or videos online.

"We've had a number of conversations with these companies over the years ... [but] they are not taking the necessary actions to ensure the safety of the individuals on their platform," said Cybertip director Stephen Sauer, who's been with the tipline since its inception 20 years ago.

While the efforts of social media companies have helped remove leaked photos and videos from the internet and provided some support for victims, experts say they do little to actually prevent the abuse from happening in the first place.

Cybertip also collects data indicating on which platform victims met their extortionists. Eighty per cent of the reports mention either Instagram or Snapchat, with complaints split in roughly equal numbers.

Of the cases Cybertip has received in the last 15 months, the victims are between the ages of 14 and 24, and nearly 90 per cent are male. Catherine Tabak, an analyst with Cybertip, said there's a reason for that.

"They are looking to gain quick access to money — boys would be sort of their go-to because they're more impulsive," she said, referring to offenders.

This means most of the victims in the database are much like "Kyle," who has asked CBC News not to reveal his real name and city for fear that his extortionist will come after him again or his loved ones will find out what happened to him.

Kyle, now 21, was 19 when he met his extortionist on a messaging app called Kik in 2020. It occurred during a period when the isolation of repeated COVID-19 lockdowns inspired him to download a messaging app to meet new friends. Instead, he met an extortionist posing as a young male love interest.

"They can create a fake email, make a fake age ... enter any group chat that they like," Kyle said. "So imagine how many people underage are using these apps and are being exposed to this."

He had been chatting and sharing explicit photos and videos with the scammer for months, until he shared one video that revealed his face. The conversation immediately turned.

Kyle said he initially sent the man $500 to keep his video private, but the extortionist was able to track down his Instagram and Facebook accounts to leverage more threats.