Extortion complaints nearly doubled while losses did not

Why this case matters

Extortion has one of the strangest shapes in the whole dataset: enormous volume, tiny average loss.

Nearly 90,000 complaints in 2025 — putting it among the largest categories the FBI tracks — with an average reported loss of about $1,374. The all-category average that year was $20,699.

What that shape tells you

It is what a bluff at scale looks like.

A large share of sextortion demands are sent to people the sender has nothing on. A leaked password from an old breach is quoted to make the threat feel specific; sometimes a photograph of the recipient’s house pulled from a mapping service is attached. The message goes out in volume, and the economics work if a very small fraction pay.

The 2025 figures are consistent with that reading in an encouraging way: complaints rose while losses fell 14%. More people are receiving these messages, and fewer of them are paying.

The uncomfortable corollary

The low average also means the reported dollar total is a poor measure of harm here. Extortion’s damage is not primarily financial, and its worst outcomes do not appear in a loss column at all — the FBI’s own reporting on financially motivated sextortion of minors connects it to suicides.

A category that looks minor on a chart of losses is not minor. It is the clearest case on this site of why the charts need reading alongside the pages rather than instead of them.

What it tells you about the scheme

If you receive one of these messages, the base rate is strongly in your favour: most are bluffs, and the falling loss figure suggests more people are recognising that. Paying is what the small profitable fraction is made of, and it reliably produces further demands rather than ending them.