Half of UK 10-year-olds own a smartphone
Fifty per cent of the UK's 10-year-olds owned a smartphone in 2019, according to a report by media regulator Ofcom.
Fraudsters are attempting to scam victims through 'Webcam Blackmail' also known as a 'Sextortion Scam'.
This is generally known either as “webcam blackmail” or “sextortion scam” and the email should have been diverted to your spam folder.
While it’s generally safe to ignore spam emails like this, some people will want reassurance. Random spam emails probably don’t have much success, so the would-be blackmailers have been trying to personalise their attacks in various ways. The most common ones are email spoofing, including a password, and including all or part of a phone number.
Most email services have no way of authenticating the From: and Reply to: fields in email messages, so spammers can fill these fields with anything they like. Your attacker simply made the From: address the same as the To: address, so it looked as though you had sent the email yourself. You hadn’t.
Top Tips:
Every Report Matters – If you have been a victim of fraud or cyber crime, report it to Action Fraud.