The other day, my Beloved opened his email to find a bit of weirdness that he read aloud to me with delight, not to say relish. The gist of it was that the sender had photos taken through my Beloved’s computer camera, and these photos would be Very Embarrassing if they got out. The sender also announced that (s)he had my Beloved’s entire contact list and passwords and would send the photos to five random contacts if my Beloved did not cough up $2,000 in bitcoin and send it to the address given.
Nothing says “times are hard” like spam blackmail, y’all.
Fun Fact: “Blackmail” originated in Scotland, where local chieftains had to pay a monetary tribute to other local chieftains in exchange for not burning down the village. Again. If you didn’t pay up, the chieftains had no problem setting fire to everything, which a.) added some teeth to the threat, and b.) resulted in a blackened circle of earth where your house used to be.
Of course, our random sender is counting on Guilty Conscience syndrome, coupled with people’s tendency to overinflate their own dignity and threats thereunto. The trouble is, my Beloved isn’t guilty of the alleged behavior, and anybody who thinks he suffers from overweening dignity doesn’t know him very well.
Oh, and his computer is a Linux system that doesn’t have a camera.
Random shot-in-the-dark extortion must work, at least occasionally, and at $2k a pop, it doesn’t have to work too often to be profitable. It makes me a little sad to think of the person who is, even now, trying to figure out what bitcoin is so that his dry cleaner won’t get pictures of his navel lint. But listen, spam extortion is lazy and inefficient. Real extortion takes work. I’m only trying to help here.
First, a genuine blackmailer has to sound like they have a brain and that it’s possibly better than yours. They take pains to make sure their threatening letter sounds like it came from the office of a lawyer who specializes in exquisite evil. Extortionists who write like they don’t know which end of a pencil to hold would not have the brains to find your snail-mail envelopes from Bronycon or draw any conclusions from them, much less hack into your whole virtual life. A criminal who confuses “their” and “there” repeatedly is no threat.
Second, genuine extortion is specific with the intimidation. “I know or have (insert explicit information here) and I’m going to send it to these people, who are being listed here by name and email address.” The list will include your mom, your minister, and someone you knew in high school and forgot you had in your contacts. Look, a lot of people forget that they have cameras on their phones and computers and that these can (for real) be hijacked by hackers. Most of us cannot be blackmailed by the threat of distributing the faces we make in Zoom meetings, though. The idea that someone, somewhere, is watching my incredibly boring life through my laptop is hilarious. I wish them well.
An extortionist who does not have the time, brains, or access to come up with anything real is not worthy of your $2k. “Plausible” doesn’t cut it.
Hint: No, it really doesn’t. This is 2020 in America. The world is on FIRE. Nobody cares what anyone is doing in the privacy of their own homes, because we are all pretty much stuck in our own homes, watching the news and holding our breaking hearts. My Beloved is repairing 118-year-old plaster. I am drinking before five, because Zoom. If someone wants to blackmail us, good luck. We will absolutely pay them in ancient labradoodle byproducts. We have lots.
Lastly, and most importantly, successful extortion requires someone who is close enough to the victims to know what the latter are really afraid of. Sending pictures of me changing shirts to my contact list? Except for causing some unexpected hysterical blindness, that worries me not at all. Fire ’em off and let the reader beware. Sending me a box of spiders? Now there’s a threat. I might pay up to avoid having a crawling, seething mass of arachnids in my mailbox. Of course, someone has to catch them all and prevent them from eating each other in shipping, because a box of dead spiders is just free food for my sister’s accidental pet grackle.
Anyway, if the Internet extortionists are after you, here, for free, is the response you need to send them:
“Thank you for helping me promote my tanning business. I would appreciate it if you would send the photos to ALL my contacts, not just five, and if you would include my business phone number along with them. I will be donating my $2k to my community bail fund in your honor, and I hope that someday soon you need to avail yourself of it.”
Now, go take those sticky notes off your cameras and do a fan dance.