Reported financial sextortion cases are rising and are often difficult to detect due to evolving tactics, limited content signals, and the cross-platform nature of the crime.
Through the Tech Coalition, industry leaders are coming together to reduce risk, improve response, and design safer tools and platforms to better protect children from financial sextortion.
A rising threat for children and platforms
Gaming environments often encourage real-time interaction between players, making platforms vulnerablGlobally, cases of financial sextortion involving children are rapidly increasing. Offenders exploit the entire online ecosystem—including messaging apps, social media platforms, dating sites, email services, gaming networks, file sharing, and cloud hosting platforms, as well as payment systems and digital currencies—to identify, contact, and blackmail victims for financial gain. Perpetrators are typically strangers pretending to be teenagers, often operating internationally and linked to organized crime.
The impacts for victims are severe, and some cases result in tragic outcomes. Perpetrators employ a range of methods to pressure their victims to pay quickly without reporting them or seeking help.
This urgent issue demands a coordinated response across sectors to prevent harm, support victims and disrupt offenders.
Getting started against financial sextortion
To get started preventing and responding to financial sextortion cases, companies can:
- Establish an internal policy that clearly defines sextortion and reflects how perpetrators might use your platform—whether to find victims, make threats, share images, or facilitate payments.
- Provide a clear, easy, and shame-free way for users to report abuse, with supportive language, access to resources, and transparency about what your company will do next.
- Take action when abuse is identified by reporting cases to local authorities, acting on involved accounts (e.g., content removal, account termination), and flagging any signs of suicidal ideation in your report.
- Prepare for follow-up from law enforcement. Reports to local authorities may lead to investigations; be ready to respond to legal requests that can help protect victims and enable law enforcement to collect the necessary evidence against the perpetrator.
For more information, please see our Pathways Financial Sextortion Toolkit.
Industry collaborating to combat OCSEA in gaming
Our members are collaborating to improve the detection and prevention of financial sextortion. Together, we’re creating an ecosystem where safety by design, threat intelligence, and cross-sector collaboration drive real impact.
Sharing and testing solutions
- Our Financial Sextortion Prevention Toolkit, exclusively for Tech Coalition members, highlights perpetrator tactics and recommendations for policy, detection, and prevention.
- Tech Coalition members meet regularly to discuss emerging trends, challenges, and solutions in our dedicated working group on combating financial sextortion.
- Lantern, our signal-sharing program, has been expanded to include a pilot initiative to help financial institutions better identify and prevent financial sextortion through cross-industry collaboration.
Convening stakeholders across sectors
- We have hosted two multi-stakeholder summits on combatting financial sextortion to build shared understanding and collaboration among sectors.
- Our member-exclusive webinars have featured global experts to discuss new threats and online safety solutions.
Producing practical resources
- We developed guidance for members on improving the actionability of financial sextortion cases reported to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC).
Resources and support
For those experiencing or witnessing a suspected case of financial sextortion, support is available across the world. The following resources provide additional information and tools for responding to and reporting instances of financial sextortion:
- Know2Protect is a U.S. Department of Homeland Security initiative that provides children, teens, and parents with information about recognizing and reporting online enticement.
- INHOPE provides global information about sextortion as well as access to hotlines across the world where cases can be reported.
- This Stop Sextortion campaign by Meta provides guidance and resources for responding to sextortion for teens, parents, and educators.
- Thorn’s Sextortion resources contain detailed information for parents about preventing and recognizing sextortion and tools for children and teens if they or a friend are targeted.
Why join the Tech Coalition?
No company should have to face these threats alone. Our members benefit from:
- Access to industry insights and shared learnings
- Opportunities to collaborate through working groups
- First access to new child safety tools and resources
- Collective influence on safety standards
Join our global community of child safety professionals from tech companies – big and small – working together to tackle financial sextortion of children.
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