UD issues crime alert following social media extortion incident – ​​First update from the state

The University of Delaware has alerted its community to a serious incident involving social media extortion, identified as a stalking case under the Jeanne Clery Act. The extortion occurred on the evening of July 15, 2024. This report is part of a broader trend affecting colleges and universities across the United States, where there has been a significant increase in extortion cases due to social media interactions, according to the report.

In these incidents, the victim typically shares compromising photos of themselves with someone they met online and is subsequently blackmailed into paying money to prevent those images from being published. With this in mind, the University of Delaware Police Department (UDPD) is urging all community members to exercise extreme caution and not send any sensitive information or images unless they have thoroughly verified the identity of the person they are communicating with.