Scams · October 26, 2026 · 4 min read

The FTC says a “sextortion help” company charged victims thousands and did little

A U.S. court has halted Digital Forensics Corporation. If someone is threatening to share your images, the real help is free, and here’s where to find it in Canada.

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Sextortion is blackmail: someone threatens to share a nude or sexual image of you unless you pay or send more. It’s frightening, and people in that moment often search for help and pay whoever promises to make it stop. On October 13, 2026, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission said one of the best-known paid “sextortion assistance” companies had been taking advantage of exactly that.

If this is happening to you right now, skip to “Where to get free help” below. You haven’t done anything that can’t be dealt with, and you don’t need to pay anyone.

What the FTC alleges

The FTC sued Ohio-based Digital Forensics Corporation, its owner Dmitry Belkin and a group of affiliated companies, and a federal court temporarily halted the business. The FTC’s consumer alert names websites the company ran, including BlackmailHelpline.com, DigitalForensics.com, CyberBlackmail911.com and SecurityBreach911.com.

According to the complaint, as described by the FTC:

Victims paid between $1,499 and $20,000 for a “Phase 1” package that was supposed to track the blackmailer, talk to them, produce an investigative report and report the crime to police. In many cases, the FTC says, those services weren’t performed.
The company then pushed “Phase 2” monitoring, which the FTC says it also didn’t deliver.
Instead, it often just blocked the blackmailer on the victim’s accounts, something you can do yourself, made up chat transcripts and investigative details, and didn’t contact police.
It told victims not to block the blackmailer and to let the company keep talking to them, which the FTC notes is the opposite of the FBI’s advice.
Sales calls used fear tailored to each person, and the company suppressed bad reviews and generated thousands of fake positive ones.

The FTC says victims paid at least $60 million. These are allegations; the case will be decided by the court. USA TODAY, whose 2025 investigation the FTC cited, reports that the company has offices in several countries, including Canada.

The pattern to recognize

This is a cousin of the recovery scams that target people who have already lost money. The warning signs are the same: someone you found through an ad, promising a guaranteed fix, asking for a lot of money quickly, and telling you not to talk to anyone else. Real help doesn’t charge you to be safe and doesn’t ask you to keep it secret.

Where to get free help

The advice from the FTC and from Canada’s Cybertip.ca lines up:

Stop replying, and don’t pay. Cybertip.ca says that in the thousands of cases it has seen, responding makes the harassment worse. If you’ve already paid and the money hasn’t been collected, try to cancel the payment.
Save the evidence, then block. Screenshot the messages and the account, then block and report it on the platform.
Tell someone you trust. You don’t have to handle this alone.
Report it. In Canada, contact your local police. If you’re under 18, or worried about someone who is, report to Cybertip.ca and go to NeedHelpNow.ca for step-by-step help. Cybertip.ca forwards sextortion reports to police and says it often contacts platforms like Instagram and Snapchat to get the blackmailer’s accounts shut down.
Get images taken down for free. In British Columbia, the Intimate Images Protection Service (1-833-688-4381) helps with sextortion and image removal. USA TODAY points adults to StopNCII.org and minors to Take It Down, both free.

If you’re thinking about a paid service anyway, the FTC suggests searching the company name with words like “scam,” “review” or “complaint,” and scrolling past the paid ads.

Sources

Federal Trade Commission, FTC Sues Operator of Sextortion Relief Scheme for Misleading Consumers into Believing it Would Identify Criminals and End Sextortion Attacks, October 13, 2026
Federal Trade Commission, How to avoid deceptive sextortion assistance services and find real help, October 13, 2026
Federal Trade Commission, Digital Forensics Corporation, LLC, et al., FTC v. (case page)
USA TODAY, Young men were sextorted. Feds shut down firm exposed by USA TODAY, October 13, 2026
Cybertip.ca, Online Harms: Sextortion
Province of British Columbia, Protect your images

New posts, by email.

About once a month. Plain-language privacy notes, nothing else. I never share your address.

What the FTC alleges

According to the complaint, as described by the FTC:

Victims paid between $1,499 and $20,000 for a “Phase 1” package that was supposed to track the blackmailer, talk to them, produce an investigative report and report the crime to police. In many cases, the FTC says, those services weren’t performed.

The company then pushed “Phase 2” monitoring, which the FTC says it also didn’t deliver.

Instead, it often just blocked the blackmailer on the victim’s accounts, something you can do yourself, made up chat transcripts and investigative details, and didn’t contact police.

It told victims not to block the blackmailer and to let the company keep talking to them, which the FTC notes is the opposite of the FBI’s advice.

Sales calls used fear tailored to each person, and the company suppressed bad reviews and generated thousands of fake positive ones.

The pattern to recognize

Where to get free help

The advice from the FTC and from Canada’s Cybertip.ca lines up:

Stop replying, and don’t pay. Cybertip.ca says that in the thousands of cases it has seen, responding makes the harassment worse. If you’ve already paid and the money hasn’t been collected, try to cancel the payment.

Save the evidence, then block. Screenshot the messages and the account, then block and report it on the platform.

Tell someone you trust. You don’t have to handle this alone.

Report it. In Canada, contact your local police. If you’re under 18, or worried about someone who is, report to Cybertip.ca and go to NeedHelpNow.ca for step-by-step help. Cybertip.ca forwards sextortion reports to police and says it often contacts platforms like Instagram and Snapchat to get the blackmailer’s accounts shut down.

Get images taken down for free. In British Columbia, the Intimate Images Protection Service (1-833-688-4381) helps with sextortion and image removal. USA TODAY points adults to StopNCII.org and minors to Take It Down, both free.

If you’re thinking about a paid service anyway, the FTC suggests searching the company name with words like “scam,” “review” or “complaint,” and scrolling past the paid ads.