A rising number of Australian university students are being targeted by sinister scams known as “sextortion”, where cybercriminals threaten to share intimate images or videos of a victim unless they pay up.

A series of intimidating emails land in students’ inboxes, warning that if they don’t transfer money to certain accounts their sensitive data will be shared online.

10 News+ speaks to Garrett O’Hara, a cybercrime expert who says students are seen as “soft targets” because of their weak online privacy protection, and Wayne Holdsworth, the founder of SmackTalk, a charity focused on educating teens and parents about sextortion scams.

Holdsworth began his advocacy after losing his son, Mac, to suicide in October of 2023. The 17-year-old took his own life a few months after being sexually extorted by a middle-aged man purporting to be an 18-year-old girl.

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