Michigan authorities warned parents after a 17-year-old boy took his own life over private pictures of him hackers succeeded to get and threatened to publish despite him paying $300 last week.
The boy was tricked to send the photos to the cybercriminals before they started harassing him and extorting money he couldn’t provide.
“They told him they had all of his Facebook contacts, and more from other social media, as well as his photo,” Sheriff Greg Zyburt said.
“Then they said they’d start to send the picture out. He said he couldn’t pay them any more money. He said you win, and that he was going to kill himself, and they said go for it.”
Shortly after he took his own life, a female friend of the teen alerted Police that the blackmailers sent her the private photo and asked her to pay instead of him.
“She told them he killed himself. They said GOOD, then she hung up and called the police.”
