Predators targeting more Utah teens with sextortion scams, FBI report says

SALT LAKE CITY — Teen sextortion cases are on the rise across the nation and in Utah.

The FBI recently released new information and guidelines for parents and teens. The data shows a 20% jump in reported cases during a six-month period that ended in March 2023.

The data reflects more than 13,000 nationwide reports of online financial sextortion of teenagers between October 2021 and November 2023. The cases include at least 20 victims who died by suicide.

According to FBI Special Agent Curtis Cox, who serves on the Violent Crimes Against Children Task Force in Salt Lake City, most victims are boys, ages 13-17, who are targeted and groomed by online predators that pose as teenage girls on social media.

Offenders trick teenagers into sending them sexually explicit pictures and then threaten to release the material if the victim doesn’t pay up.

Cox said the Salt Lake City field office gets 10-12 new cases every week for the region of Idaho, Utah and Montana.

“Teens think that if they make the payments requested that this will just go away, but that actually only exasperates the problem,” Cox said. “If they initially start off by paying $100, and the kid is able to pay $100, the request then becomes $200 or $500. It eventually gets to the point where the kid is unable to satisfy the demands.”

Agents said the cases are difficult to prosecute because many incidents go unreported due to shame and fear. Also, extortionists are often overseas, in Southeast Asia and West African countries like Nigeria.

The Internet Crimes Against Children task force in Utah is seeing a similar trend, according to Michelle Bush-Upwell, an education specialist with the task force.

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Related: 

• New Meta platform aims to prevent sextortion of teens on Facebook and Instagram
• Gov. Cox expresses concern over social media impact on children