What would you do if you received an email from someone claiming to have hacked your computer and recorded you via your webcam while you were engaged in watching porn, then threatening to send the video to everyone in your email and social media contact lists if you don’t pay a $260 ransom? Would you pay the ransom? Even if you’ve never viewed porn, what if they made the same threat to reveal the private details of all your emails?
This is exactly the situation some of our readers found themselves in recently, and they contacted us for help on how to proceed.
Here is an example of one the emails [grammatical errors left intact]:
Good Morning my friend. I represent the group of web criminals in Iran. I use this mail address because we think that you will check it. Few times ago my team put the virus on web-site with porn and as far as you clicked on a play button your system started shooting your screen and activating camera to capture you self-abusing. Eventually I mean you understand what compromising evidence Ive earned. Moreover, this software made your device act as dedicated server with plenty of functions like keylogger, parser etc. To sum up, my software picked all data, especially all your contacts from messengers, e-mails, social networks. If you wanna make me silent you must make a transaction of 260 dollars with bitcoin. 1K2auXQEKz7Ro8cRa2xr3bAPV2n6KT5vi1 You must use it as usual credit card number. If you send bitcoins nobody will see your shame. Watch youtube manuals about methods of buing BTC... I can offer you this exchanger: localbitoins.com. If you have a problem with this, you can search comfortable ATM for bitcoin at coin atm radar. I give you no more than twenty four hours since you read our message to pay. You can complain cops, but they can not find us I use bot network, and of course we live abroad. If you want us to show proofs we will share it to seven mates from your data after that you will be given their contacts. So you will ask them if something strange was received about you. For some questions just reply. Dont be fullish, AmAZinGcRackeR$.
Scary, right? And there have been instances where victims’ computers were hacked, they were filmed in various states of undress (or worse) and then blackmailed that may make this threat seem all too real. But there are several indications that this is nothing more than a phishing scam, hoping to rope in active porn watchers with false threats (an easy demographic to target via mass email given that the world’s largest porn site, Pornhub.com, gets 75 million visitors PER DAY).
First, there is nothing in the email that demonstrates they know anything personally about you: it’s not addressed to you by name and there’s no detail about what site you supposedly visited and when. Nor did they supply a screenshot of the “self-abusing” they allege to have captured. In fact, they are explicitly discouraging you from asking for proof, by threatening to share said “proofs” with your “mates” if you ask. That is completely contrary to how we would expect a real hacker/blackmailer to act – if I wanted to scare the bejesus out of you to get you to pay, the first thing I would do is show you a compromising screen capture to prove that this is very, very real.
Another red flag is that when our readers ran scans using antimalware tools, no malware was detected. Antimalware tools aren’t perfect, but the better ones should have picked up the type of remote administration tool (RAT) described in the email.
Searching the web, there are reports of people receiving similar email scams, going back at least to last fall. The wording of the email varies, including where the scammers claim they’re from, the nature of their threat and the amount of money being demanded. Some people are falling for them, but fortunately not many. I researched a selection of the bitcoin accounts used in these scams and none of the emails had duped more than a handful of victims.
Unfortunately, these scams will likely continue and morph into new threats as the ubiquity of bitcoin makes it easier for scammers to hide behind these accounts and for victims to pay. In fact, while this article was originally written in March of 2018, Sophos security recently released a new study, based on millions of porn blackmail emails that were sent between September 2019 and March 2020, demonstrating this to be the case. During that period, sextortion emails made up 4.23% of all spam observed by Sophos. The study also showed scammers are using new methods for obfuscating email content to evade spam filters, enabling them to collect nearly a half million dollars in payments from victims during the same period. Fortunately, despite some payouts, potential victims seem to be becoming wise to the scam, as only half a percent of the Bitcoin addresses used in the spam messages received any payment, according to Sophos.
So, if you get one of these emails, should you pay the ransom before all your friends find out what you’ve been up to?
The answer is no, don’t be “fullish”.
[EDITOR'S NOTE REGARDING PASSWORD APPEARING IN THE EMAIL SCAM 7/12/18: A number of people have posted in the comments that they received a version of the email which includes a real password they've used in the past. Does this mean that they should be concerned? The answer is No and Yes. No, you shouldn't be concerned that your computer was hacked and you were actually filmed watching porn - it's still a scam. But, yes, you should be concerned that your password has been leaked through a data breach. Security researcher Troy Hunt has uncovered more than 500 million passwords leaked through these breaches. That password in the email was likely one of them.
If it is still an active password for you, the scam email should be a big wake up call that you need to ensure you are using unique and secure passwords for every one of your accounts. We strongly recommend a password manager like Dashlane or 1Password , which will automatically check your passwords to see if they have been revealed in a breach and help you create unique, secure ones for every site.]
[EDITOR'S NOTE WARNING ABOUT ATTACHMENTS 7/20/18: One reader reported receiving an attachment titled "Invoice" with the porn scam email. If you get an attachment, DO NOT OPEN IT. Email attachments are one of the primary ways hackers use to install malware on your computer, which could turn this fake malware scam into a very real one.]
[EDITOR'S NOTE ABOUT EMAIL SPOOFING 10/19/18: Many readers are commenting that the porn blackmail email appears to be sent from their own email address, causing added concern the hacking claims may be real. But don't be fooled. Email spoofing has been around for a long time and is relatively easy to do. Usually the message headers will reveal the true sending email address. Here's how to tell if an email has been spoofed.]
[EDITOR'S NOTE ABOUT WORK VS PERSONAL EMAILS 1/21/19: A number of people are expressing concern in the comments that the blackmail email is coming to their work email, instead of their personal email (or both). It doesn't matter — an email address is a email address as far as this scam goes. Billions of emails have been leaked over the years, many of those from business-focused services such as Dropbox, LinkedIn and Adobe. If I check to see which of my email addresses have been involved in breaches, my work email has been breached many more times than my personal email.
Originally published 3/12/18. Updated 4/22/2020 with new data from Sophos
[Image credit: Man in a dark room at a computer via BigStockPhoto]
From Eler Bener on May 17, 2018 :: 5:36 pm
It started by saying my first and last name which I’m not gonna write here.
At the time when you have been jerking in front ofnotebook screen when you visited porno web site your notebook was infected with badware because of vulnerability the browser.
The virus records all the actions at your computer and amongst other things it is informed about coockie of the resources which you browse.
But the key advantage of the mentioned virus is that it could plug in WebCam and upload all the contact numbers from your mail box.
As well I have login to your out box and social networking sites.
So I have at my disposal video content and photos on which you toss and buck-naked.
If you do not wish the files to appear and to be sent to all your mates near and dear I suggest you the following alternate solution.
You should pay to my Bitcoin money bag 1AhsjpZijhPfyUaDmCqGeuZguzjxCcGSfP 450 U.S. dollars in BTC.
After receipt of money I will remove sensitive information about you and you would never again heard about all this.
Otherwise in a case if I don’t receive that money within 23 hours after reading the mail I will dispatch all the dirtysensitive information about you to your relatives and co-workers and as well across social media platforms to estimate of your actions.
P.S. My my English knowledge isn’t very good as I am not native speaking in any case you could to understand me.
Can you be so kind and and don’t reply to this outbox I should never have an access to it again.
I’m kinda worried do you think it’s a scam ?
thank you for your help
Reply
From Eler Bener on May 17, 2018 :: 5:52 pm
and that’s the title of the mail. Compromising picture of you ID bbLRS
Reply
From Josh Kirschner on May 17, 2018 :: 6:09 pm
This is exactly what the article above is describing.
Reply
From George on May 05, 2022 :: 3:33 am
Hey.
The following is your very last notice.
I broke into your operating-system using the Wireless network modem you were connected to.
Some time back, I entered the machines that you utilized to get on the web.
All of the information from your own gadgets and devices has been quickly duplicated to my servers.
I get access to all of your mobile device messengers, social networks, e-mail, chats, and contacts. My trojan repeatedly changes its signatures (driver-type), for that reason it stays unnoticeable to anti-virus software.
I assume right now you realize, the reasons why I stayed unnoticed until this present day
Whilst gathering data about yourself, I discovered that you are a major follower of adult web pages & even more.
You really love to go to porno web pages and look at dirty videos while having an orgasm.
I have actually made a cam shooting videos of you wanking off.
The croping and editing of the videos you were viewing at that moment & your masturbation.
Your own face is distinctly seeable. I don’t believe this type of information will be great for your personal status.
I can certainly forward this footage to everyone who realize who you really are.
I additionally have no problem with rendering all of your confidential information public on-line.
I do believe you understand what I mean.
It would be an absolute failure for you.
I’ll wreck your life for a long time. I really feel you don’t want this to happen.
Let’s fix it this fashion: you transfer me 1400 $ (dollars) via Bitcoin equivalent at the time of payment), & i’ll immediately get rid of all of your information from my machines. And then, we’ll disregard one another.
My btc address for transaction: bc1qqwu3xcdnk50vdtdyzh4uljcy4rlvcar4e63fva
If you don’t know how to transmit money and what btc is. Then type in the google search engine “Get btc”.
I present you with two days to transfer money. The timer launched monitoring instantly after you opened up this letter.
I’ll receive a notification when this letter is opened.
Do not try and search for aid, as the payment address cannot be traced, address the letter is originating from & cannot be followed also & created automatically, therefore there isn’t any reason for texting me.
Do not try to contact the police and other protection solutions, and if you do, your info will undoubtedly be published.
Replacing passwords online in social network sites, electronic mail, & devices will not help you, since all the information is already downloaded to my servers.
All the best . & do not do anything stupid. Carefully consider your own future.
Reply