Online blackmail. Read this first.

[Wayne]

[XXXXXX]Before continuing, go to http://www.blackmailscams.com - a link that will bring you to a page on our site specifically for these types of scam. It's the most up to date source of help and information we have.[/size]





























Firstly a warning. If the person told you they were underage before the blackmail incident occurred and you continued to talk to them, we CAN NOT and WILL NOT help you. We will not assist people in anything illegal. If we discover that the person told you they were underage and you proceeded to talk to them in a sexual way, your account will be closed and we may seek advice from law enforcement.

Before you start to do something about your scam, read THIS TOPIC. We do not want free scammer emails or online profiles like FB or Skype closed down, so do not flag those accounts for abuse or closure!

From this point on, we have everything you need to know about protecting yourself. There's a lot of information here, but we have tried to explain it as simply as possible. Here's where the real reading comes in!

It's important to note at this time that some fake camera software allows a level of interaction, so the person in the video appears much more real. A simple "blow me a kiss" or "hold up four fingers" is not enough to prove the person is live on webcam.

Reporting your scammer's details will help warn others. If you want to share their details, but don't want to post them yourself, you can fill in the form HERE and we can post them for you anonymously. You will have to give your name and email address, but they will not be posted on the site. They are only for our own records.

People often talk about using netstat to locate where the scammer is. All that will give you is a general location. It's just as easy to tell where they are from the details they use in their profile. It also saves confusion, as many people assume their scammer is from the USA after doing this. What they're actually seeing is the IP address of Skype's server and not that of the scammer.

Podcast 11 has an interview with someone who was blackmail scammed. It's worth listening to.
Click here for our podcasts page. The next question everyone has is "Will they send my video to my friends and family now I've blocked them?"
We can never say 100% that it won't happen, but in the approaching 2000 cases we've dealt with here, the number of times it's actually happened can be counted on the fingers of one hand. The main reason why is that homosexuality is illegal in the countries that mainly do these scams, and being caught with "video evidence" would land them a jail sentence. Not for the scams, but for having homosexual material on them. You can read more about this later on in this thread.

Scammers have been known to pretend to be the "YouTube police". This is completely made up. YouTube do NOT charge people to remove their videos. Anything illegal (as these videos are) will be removed after being flagged, usually within 10 minutes.

If you worry your scammer may have put a nasty on your computer, then I recommend and personally use these free programs:

ZoneAlarm firewall
Spybot anti spyware checker

If this helped save you from sending money to a scammer, please consider donating a few dollars to go toward the running of this site. We rely on your donations to keep us online. You can find a link at the bottom of this page.

[Wayne]

So let me explain how this works. Firstly, copying a person's webcam is very easy. It's a trick that I've been using for 4 or 5 years now and involves nothing more than some screen capture software. For the scammer to pretend to have a webcam too, all that's needed is some footage of someone on a webcam and another piece of software to act as a "fake" or "virtual" webcam.

Remember that, even if the person appears on webcam, it may not really be them. To be 100% sure they are live and on the webcam, get them to do something unusual such as hold up a copy of that day's newspaper, point their webcam at your chat window on their monitor or jump up and down holding a cucumber in one hand and a live toad in the other. Of course, this only shows that the person is actually on the other end of a webcam and not that they're not looking to blackmail you.

The obvious answer to preventing this is to tell everyone to "keep it in your pant(ie)s", but we're adults here and we know this is the sort of thing adults do online. This doesn't mean that we need you to post up any sex talk you had. In fact, we really don't want you to post it. The only part we're interested in is the blackmail. Anything up to that point can and should be left off the forum. Any sexual related talk posted will likely result in the person being warned or even banned from the forum.

For the most up to date steps on what to do if you were caught up in this scam, visit http://www.blackmailscams.com

[911]

THIS IS THE LINK TO MAKE THE GOOGLE ALERT

http://www.google.com/alerts

This is now you fill it in. Click on the image for a larger version. Be sure to put your name in "quotation marks" so it searches for the name as a whole. Do a Google search as well for your name as the alert will only show things posted after it's been created. Anything posted before won't show up, so you need to do a manual search that first time.

[firefly]

If someone who try to blackmail you online telling you he/she posted the recorded web-cam session on Youtube, the most important thing is to report the video for offensive content and it wil be deleted. You dont need to be registered to flag one record there, if the record is public. If one video is reported for offensive content, usually, Youtube need less than few minutes to delete it.
Using the flag tool alone will not result in any action taken for that option. You must file the linked legal claim form before staff can investigate your claim. That´s mean you must use the Flag function with"invades my privacy" option. Open the video, click the flag icon beneath it, and choose Infringes My Rights > invades my privacy.

If the video is set on private, only the original poster and up to 50 other users who the original poster invite to view the video will be able to see it. The video will not appear on the user´s channel, in search results, or in playlists.

And, finally, are the unlisted videos...
An unlisted video is a different type of private video. Unlisted means that only people who know the link to the video can view it (such as friends or family to whom the original poster send the link). An unlisted video will not appear in any of YouTube's public spaces (such as search results, user channel, or the Browse page). An unlisted video is different to a private video in these ways:
Even though the video will not appear in any of YouTube's public spaces, links to the video could still appear elsewhere on the web if anyone who knows the video's URL shares it. It is therefore up to the original poster to maintain the privacy of the video and the unlisted URL. The original poster can further restrict the video at any time by returning to his account and marking the video as Private.

The good thing is only YouTube Accounts in good standing have access to create unlisted videos. If one Youtube account is not in good standing and has a Terms of Service violation or a strike for copyright infringement, the option to make the video unlisted in the scammer Account settings is not available. In another way of speaking, by reporting one video on Youtube for offensive content, registration is not only gone, but the account holder is included on the list of those who have violated the rules of use and he/she will not be able to use the unlisted video option.

That´s mean you can be safe by telling your friends/family not to click on links sended by unknown person, because the link is not public and no one can see the record without to have the link.

For this reason, if you find any record on Youtube similar with the one used in your case for blackmail, report it for offensive content. Some victims have records online without to know it and without to have any idea how to deal with this problem.

Yes, the scammers can made another Youtube account. But, so long they have no idea why the videos are gone, if they notice the videos are no more posted, they can run in circles, waisting time. That´s why is important to keep them out of the communication without telling them what you do to protect yourself. The action will not stop the scammers in this type of scam, but, with little luck, it may slow them down.

For those who need one good tutorial about how this action can be done: http://howto.cnet.com/8301-11310_39-20074496-285/remove-embarrassing-youtube-videos-untag-facebook-photos/.

The main problem are your personal life details posted online. Even if you use one fake name to play arround, but you use personal details on your online profiles, some scammers are able to find them and to use them. For this reason, if you are victim or not in this type of scam, avoid to post real life information about you online. If you have done it try to remove it. Are alot of Internet sources to help you with this action. You have here just one of those: http://www.lewrockwell.com/rounds/rounds28.1.html

[Wayne]

FaceBook shows how to make your profile private at http://www.facebook.com/help/privacy/basic-controls

(edit) It's now easier to change your privacy settings, as you can see by this image. Just look for the privacy shortcuts button.

You can also deactivate your account and reactivate it at a later date if you can't block the scammer until 24 or 48 hours. Check out http://tinyurl.com/ca9eq6q

[SlapHappy]

Removing your personal information from Google searches

Go here and follow their procedures.
http://support.google.com/webmasters/bi ... er=1663688

Remove content from someone else's site

Content can be removed from Google’s search results either by the webmaster of the site or by Google.
Remove content for legal reasons

If you want to report content that you believe warrants removal from Google's services based on applicable laws, use this tool to send a legal removal request.
Remove personal information

If you have other concerns about your certain forms of personal information appearing in Google’s search results, use this tool to find out how to remove personal information from the web.
Remove content that’s not live

If the page, site or image has already been removed from the site in question, it may still show up in Google’s search results if we have not crawled the page recently. While you wait for our search results to get updated, use this tool to request Google not to show the outdated content from the page.

May 27, 2013

[SlapHappy]

You may flag video and have them removed from Flickr by reporting them here while on the page you want reported:
http://www.flickr.com/abuse/

"For us to review your report efficiently, you must click the "Report Abuse" link from either a profile, photostream or individual photo or video page."

The link is under the Community section, "Abuse," on every page on the Flickr website.

Click on "Intimate content posted without my consent. Post the URL of the offending video(s). Post the link to our website where the scammer's information is posted here. Tell them they are committing crimes of webcam blackmail, extortion, and money laundering.

After doing that:
Flag as violating community guidelines.
Go back and also flag as content "makes me uncomfortable."
You could also make a third report as a "phishing attempt," as it is criminal activity but not exactly the strict definition of phishing.
Doing all this seems to grab their attention quicker at Flickr, and it may be taken down faster.

Note: It make take hours or days to be removed. You will just have to be patient, and stay off all your profiles, no matter what happens. Do not let scammer contact you anywhere.

[Wayne]

Let's get this out of the way. Some scammers claim to be a "professional hacker". They're as much a "professional hacker" as I am a supermodel. All they need is the free software to fake and record webcam footage, some webcam footage they likely Googled and a lot of bravado. They are NOT hackers, they're just following what others have been doing. There's no hacking involved. It's purely a case of "monkey see, monkey do". The only caveat is to be very wary of any photos that were sent to you during the discussion. If you have accepted it, run a scan with good antivirus and spyware programs. Other than that, the scammers are using methods I could teach anyone in 15 minutes flat. Any claims of being a hacker are in all honesty complete and utter bullshit.

[beenscammed11]

Hi everyone!

Last weekend the unthinkable happened to me - I was scammed on Chatroulette which followed onto Skype. I was recorded on webcam nude without my knowledge which was uploaded onto a porn website and YouTube. I was threatened and blackmailed if I didn't do what the scammer asked (send money), they would send the list to all my of Facebook friends/family. Fortunately, I managed to get the video from the porn site off almost immediately because it was public by just clicking on the "report" button. However, the video on YouTube wouldn't delete because there was no "flag" option to report the video as inappropriate (this is because it was set as PRIVATE on YouTube by the scammer). I was nervous that this private link would be sent to all my facebook friends still. I know that this was very unlikely, but it is still in the back of your head and won't go away.

Is this you? Do you want to know how to delete private YouTube videos uploaded by other users that was first thought as of impossible? Read on.

Step 1: Follow this link (Other Legal Issues) - http://support.google.com/youtube/bin/a ... &ctx=topic

Step 2: Click the blue "Continue Button" another page will come up. Click "Continue" again.

Step 3: A page will come up listing topics on blue. See below:
Defamation
Copyright
Trademark
Counterfeit
Other Legal Issue (including Circumvention of Technological Measures)
CLICK ON OTHER LEGAL ISSUE OPTION

Step 4: A legal form will be brought up. Fill out every single detail ACCURATELY with your real name in full. Have the private YouTube link ready that the blackmailer sent you and copy and paste it into the legal form where it says Video URL(s).

Step 5: This part is essentially important when filling out the rest of the form. Read carefully...
- In the section of the form where it says: Please cite the specific law that the content is allegedly violating, or the area of the law from which you believe your claim arises:
TYPE IN: Blackmail
- Please provide a hyperlink to the specific law: In this section Google "blackmail law". Find a legal site that states what blackmail is in relation to your country. E.g. http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/ ... chapter-41
- Please describe how content in question is allegedly violating this law: This is where you go into detail what happened. Tell YouTube you were blackmailed, threatened, how it's affecting you, your family, how the video is inappropriate for content on youtube (nudity) and how you can't "flag" the video because the user/blackmailer set the video as PRIVATE (IT IS EXTREMELY IMPORTANT YOU MENTION THIS OTHERWISE THEY WILL SEND YOU AN AUTOMATIC EMAIL TELLING YOU TO CLICK ON THE "FLAG" BUTTON). Also politely ask you would appreciate a personal response, not an automatic email.- Finish the rest of the form and click Submit.

Step 6: Wait patiently, breathe. Make sure you have completed ALL the steps in this topic on this forum: http://scamsurvivors.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=20&t=580
It took about 5 days for me to get a response from YouTube. They personally replied to me, apologised and removed the video completely. They reassured me that the video will know longer be available on YouTube and that it may take up to a couple of days for any thumbnail pictures to be completely removed from searches. You might even get a thank you from them...like I did. Not only did they delete my video which was set on private, but 25 other videos of other men like me who were scammed/blackmailed.

I really hope this guide helps other people who were scammed, and like me thought deleting private YouTube videos was impossible. You now know that it is possible!!! Goodluck!!!! Just make sure you learn your lesson. I can tell you, I certainly have!!!

Thank you to this website/forum and all the users and moderators who helped me through this difficult time. It is very much appreciated. Without you all, I wouldn't have survived! I'm a survivor YAY

Moderator Addition:

This procedure has worked for me to have private videos deleted. It also usually results in the scammer's account being terminated, which will also delete any other victim videos he may have stored on the account.

Go to the scammer's private video link.
In the bottom right of webpage, click on Help.
Then click on Send Feedback in lower right of window.

Copy this in the Feedback form:

This account holder has been committing crimes of Blackmail, Extortion, and Wire Fraud using this account to scam innocent people. They are collecting naked videos of their victims, and threatening them with exposure to the victims' family and friends. They store their videos here in Private Mode , or sometimes show to the victim then quickly delete them, and send links to their victims. Please delete this YouTube/Google+ user's account. Proof of the scamming activities of this user is posted here:

[ Put the scamsurvivors topic address for the scammer here. ]

Thank you for acting on this ASAP.

[Wayne]

Some people, when they come to our site are reluctant to post their scammer's details. Let me explain why it's so important to get those details posted and in the search engines as quickly as possible. We've seen instances of a scammer posting up a dozen videos in the space of 24 hours. The longer you wait to post the scammer's details, the more people they have the opportunity to scam. "I want to wait a few days to be sure I'm safe before posting" means the scammer has had time to scam another 50 to 100 people, and that number rises the longer you take to post their details. Here's the deal. If you post your scammer's details, so long as you don't post your name then the scammer won't know it's you. They use the same script, use the same photos and video and ask for the same amount of money from everyone. The faster the details are posted, the more likely others are saved and the less people who have to go through what you did when you found out you were scammed. Remember, you likely found us because of an online search. Help others to be able to do the same.