Security News > 2024 > July > Meta Removes 63,000 Instagram Accounts Linked to Nigerian Sextortion Scams

Meta Platforms on Wednesday said it took steps to remove around 63,000 Instagram accounts in Nigeria that were found to target people with financial sextortion scams.

In cases where some of these accounts attempted to target minors, Meta said it reported them to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

Separately, Meta said it also removed 7,200 assets, including 1,300 Facebook accounts, 200 Facebook Pages and 5,700 Facebook Groups, based in Nigeria that were used to organize, recruit and train new scammers.

Meta attributed the second cluster to a cybercrime group tracked as Yahoo Boys, which came under the radar earlier this year for orchestrating financial sextortion attacks targeting teenagers from Australia, Canada, and the U.S. A subsequent report from Bloomberg exposed sextortion-fueled suicides, revealing how scammers are posing as teenage girls on Instagram and Snapchat to lure targets and entice them into sending explicit photos, which are then used to blackmail victims in exchange for money or risk getting their images forwarded to their friends.

Back in April, the social media giant said it has devised new methods to identify accounts that are potentially engaging in sextortion, and that it's enacting measures to prevent these accounts from finding and interacting with teens.

"Financial sextortion is a horrific crime that can have devastating consequences," Meta said.

News URL

https://thehackernews.com/2024/07/meta-removes-63000-instagram-accounts.html