Paying makes it worse

1Watch

Four paths, one fork

You get to walk all four here. Only one of them ends.

2The idea

Why paying never closes it

Paying tells them you will pay. Sending more gives them more. Deleting your account tells them you are scared, throws away the evidence, and they already have your friends list. None of those ends it, because ending it was never on offer.

Telling ends it because it puts the problem with people who deal with it every day. Police call it sextortion. They have a process for it, and so does every major app. Most of the time the sender moves on the moment it stops working, because there are easier targets and they are running a business.

3The idea

The four paths, honestly

Pay. The first number is small. The second one arrives the next morning and it is bigger, because now they know you pay.
Send more. Now they hold two things instead of one, and the demand doubles.
Delete your account. You are alone with it, the proof is gone, and they still have your friends’ names from before.
Tell. An adult reports it. The account comes down. The messages stop.

Three of the paths loop back to a bigger demand. One of them ends. And if the worst happens and something is posted before it is reported, the apps take it down, and the people who matter to you will know it was done to you. That is survivable. It is not what the sender says it is.

4The idea

Watch it work once

Amir pays fifty. ‘Promise I’ll delete it.’ Next morning: two hundred, or it goes to his school. He has no two hundred. He tells his older brother, who tells their dad. Dad screenshots everything, reports the account in the app, and rings the police non-emergency line, because that is what the app’s help page says to do.

The account is gone within two days. Nothing was posted. The fifty was not a price. It was a test, and paying was the answer they wanted. Amir’s only regret is the day he spent alone with it before he said anything. Telling took ninety seconds.

5Your turn

Walk every path

Play the bad ones too. Knowing why they fail is the actual lesson.

6Decide

They say: 'pay 50 and I delete it, promise'. What do you know about that promise?

7Look

The two names on the card

Two people, written down. Not in your phone, because the plan has to survive the phone being the problem.

8Find them

Which of these make it worse?

Tap the ones that count.

9Say it

The thing to say to yourself

You will need it at the exact moment paying looks like the quick way out. It is not the quick way. It is the long way, with more stops.

10Do it

Before you leave this page