Parents are being asked to speak to their teenagers about the dangers of “sextortion”.

According to the Saskatchewan Internet Child Exploitation Unit, reported cases have been on the rise in Saskatoon and across the country. An offender will contact children, generally teenage males, on social media sites and pose as a young girl. They will then send what they claim to be suggestive photos of themselves and then request intimate images in return.

Once they receive the photos, they will use the images to extort the teen and threaten to send the images to their family and friends unless they receive money.

Suspects in these cases are usually in other countries therefore making them difficult to prosecute. There have been more than a dozen reports of Sextortion in the province in the past month.

–Curt Sanderson