What is Blackmail?

I recently worked on a project where a designer directed me to work directly with a customer. In doing so, in the middle of working on the project, with it being 95 percent done, the Glass guy (AKA designer) says that the wrong color lighting is being applied. We were told to stop the job and the customer would advise. We had showed the customer the lighting (blue) color and performance of the light with dimming etc., and no one said a word about it being the wrong color. In fact, later, he and his wife were concerned about the brightness in the middle of the glass and asked if more light could be added. This was not our design, so we would have to add light to make it brighter. We had discussed with the designer about what color he wanted to use for a back splash, since the customer wanted us to ask him for that decision, and the designer replied, "use whatever you're putting in the counter."

We came back two different times to work on the project (one week of the customer using the lighting with the color we put in) and during the second week and finalization of project, the designer, along with his wife, (who we were told has nothing to do with the project). Earlier that day, the designer's wife called, saying that it was the wrong color, but she would not say anything to the customer, so they showed up unannounced, yelling this is the wrong color. We let the customer know that we would replace the lighting at cost. We were later told by the customer that the designer did not want to work with us, therefore we were not going to work on the job.

We later sent the customer the remaining balance due and a discount for work that we did not complete. The customer refused to pay and only wanted to pay $500 out of the $1900 he still owed us. We sent him a breach of contract letter and asked to be paid or we would take it to small claims court.

Today, we received a email from him, and this is what he said in part of the letter/email that we question as blackmail.

"I am still willing to discuss a settlement of this agreement that will satisfy all parties. The total difference of $1700 is not worth a prolonged dispute to either party. If we can reach an equitable settlement, I will refrain from any comments on social media about my displeasure with your service. I however will vigorously defend my position including damage claims if you choose to escalate this issue as well as share my displeasure in any forum available."

Please let me know you thoughts.

@anon187315; @anon181861; @anon181451: All three of you can sue. The blackmail which you are under is illegal! Make sure to make this clear to the other person who is blackmailing you that you don't want to do whatever they are telling you to do and it's illegal to do whatever they are doing.

@anon187315: Don't send anymore pictures or Skype him. It will get worse if you do so because he will use them to blackmail you further. Stay strong, and cut off all ties with him. Change your number and everything. He is now the past.

@anon181861: Firstly, he is not your friend, and don't walk away. Make it clear to him that you won't, and if he carries on, inform the other people that he has pictures of them as they have the right to know. Press charges against him because he not only has yours but other people's embarrassing pictures. Don't let it continue and affect your family life, and cut off your ties with him too.

@anon181451: Tell your wife. Confess. She has the right to know. Yes, it is your fault, but pointing fingers won't help. If you both love each other enough, you won't break up, but she needs to know as she's being unknowingly blackmailed too.

I know she won't be happy, obviously, but that's the first step to solving the problem. Make the other woman aware you have pictures of her. Don't blackmail her, but tell her you have the power to do so. She can also be charged, since she hacked into your computer to and saved inappropriate images. Make sure you don't contact her anymore, and tell her to not call you, etc., and build a stronger relationship with your wife.

@anon291699: Collect evidence against him immediately. Don't touch the bugs he has, but take pictures of them. Record phone conversations clearly stating that you don't want him as a part of your life anymore, and that he is not the father of your child.

Also, ask him why is he still holding on to you when you have refused. This shows that you are unwillingly being held back. You can also file a lawsuit against him and take him to court as his actions are, in fact, illegal and he should not be wire tapping you. Even though he is with the FBI, he is still not allowed to do whatever he wants. Remember: he is not only causing harm to you but his other wife and children. They should be informed in what is happening.

He will probably be kicked out of the FBI for using his power wrongly and he will leave you alone. Make sure to produce the evidence and don't take his money unless you seriously need it for your child. If there is a written agreement stating you need to pay it back, I suggest you don't take it unless the agreement goes along the lines of what you want. He can use the money to blackmail you. Good luck.

@bernadeth: So your husband is being blackmailed in a way? My first thought was leave him because he cheated on you for a pretty long time and it was not only the other woman who began all of it. Also, as it will only end in some sort of trouble, you have the option of not being dragged into it because you have done nothing wrong!

However, if you want to stay with him out of love and not because of guilt, and the fact that he's being blackmailed, then you need to talk to this woman. She is, in fact, ruining your life and your husband is also at fault, but it seems like she has taken control. It seems like the woman needs to see a therapist or psychiatrist as she seems to have problems, so don't hold it against her too much; she needs help.

Have a calm talk with her, show her the actual situation and look at it from her viewpoint. You also need to sort out your relationship with your husband. He needs to take the situation by the reins himself, since he was also a part of this from the beginning, and you shouldn't be relied on too much to sort it out,

Sort it out together and do it discreetly so it won't affect him or the woman at work. If you can't trust him again, I suggest you leave him. Of course, at the beginning, it will be hard but it would be necessary if you want to move on, to help him, although you would need to see this woman. You need to have a discussion between the three of you so you know who's lying and who's not. He might seem like the victim of this situation, but you are too.

@anon238918: Firstly, what is she threatening you for? If she's older than you and you're under 18, you can sue her discreetly for child pornography. I believe that you're from a respectable family so I can see where you're coming from. You need to cut all links with her asap and obviously not send anymore nude pics or videos. If you have any of hers, let her know.

@anon298966: To be honest, you already hurt your boyfriend by cheating on him, which you know is wrong and so forth and you should end the relationship with him unless you really do love him and confess.

However, I don't know if you're still with him. With the other guy, I suggest you cut off all contact with him if he actually tried to blackmail you, because it shows what type of person he is, and trust me -- you wouldn't want to be with that type that you would be cuffed to.

If he did it out of a moment of desperation, though, you need to think about it. I mean, why exactly does he want to stay with you? Does he really like you or is it for sex?

My ex-wife has filed harassment charges against me. She says she will drop the charges and case altogether if I pay her @2,500 dollars. Is this blackmail and how do I prove that she has made that offer to me. Will the judge consider this in my case.

@anon348950: Cut off all contact with him. If he posts the video, since you're under 18, it's considered child pornography, and the feds will bust him. If you're in the US, turn in his name to the FBI through the Child Pornography Victims Assistance division. And make sure your webcam is turned off before you start undressing.

There is a man who video recorded me (I was unaware) of me taking my shirt off. He then told me to touch myself and he wouldn't post the video so I did. I'm really scared that he will and I'm only a teenager. What do I do?

My sister and I had a disagreement, and "for my own good," she decided that she had the right to threaten to expose something I said in a moment of anger to my friends and associates. If the tables were turned, I would never have done that to her, no matter what the circumstances were, even if I felt she was wrong.

I swear, I think she needs her own TV show, with her playing the starring role, "*T Knows Best". She's just a regular Saint Therese!

Anyway, she is blood (for better or worse), so I can't cut her out of my life. I still plan to have a relationship with her, as much as possible, and I have no intention of letting our discord affect my feelings for, or relationship with her children. And if she needs help or anything, I'm there.

But I will never, ever, ever again share my private thoughts, feelings or moments with her. I will never ask her for anything. I will never trust her again.

My husband and his office mate were having an affair and I only found about it five and a half years later. Upon learning about it, I had a face to face confrontation with both of them.

In front of the woman, my husband apologized and reassured me of his love for me and my daughter and that he had no plans to leave his family. When I asked them both if there was love involved in their relationship, my husband said that he just cared about the woman and never said he loved her. However, the woman said she loved my husband. In conclusion, I got their commitment they would put an end to their affair. The woman even apologized for the pain that she caused my family. In fact, when it was my turn to talk to my husband privately, he said that he made moves to end their affair even during the early weeks of their relationship, but the woman was threatening him and assuring my husband that the latter was really capable of destroying him - his family, his very good image in the office and in the industry and his job. The woman really knew his weakness.

The woman would always have her sudden outbursts and my husband feared her so he fell into the trap, hence this prolonged the affair until I uncovered everything.

Anyway, after our face to face confrontation, I thought, everything would be O.K. with the woman's commitment to end the affair, until I found out recently that she started to threaten my husband again that she would destroy him if he wouldn't go back to her. She appeared obsessed with my husband with her constant threats. My husband completely lost out of control and agreed to go back to her just for temporary peace. The woman apparently pleaded that she needed him at least for emotional support.

My husband assured me there was no physical intimacy with her, only emotional intimacy, which she was asking for through constant phone conversations which was actually part of the pretense because according to her, when they broke up after our face to face confrontation, she felt so depressed and felt that she was dropped like a hot potato.

My question is: How do we handle this situation of blackmail without causing us any family scandal, damage to my husband's good image and his great job? Can I bring this case to court just enough to frighten her so she will stop her foolishness? By the way, my husband holds a high position in the company where they both work for so it will cause him more damage if the woman executes whatever evil plan she has in mind. As a wife of this man in trouble, what shall I do?

I am being blackmailed by my ex, yet am having difficulty getting the authorities to help. He stopped paying child support a year ago and is over $10,000 in arrears. He has tried to get a support modification, but the court rejected it. Now he is saying he will go to the IRS and state authorities and accuse me of tax evasion and wire fraud if I don't sign an agreement saying he doesn't owe any money and agree to reduce his support obligation by 75 percent. I have these demands in writing.

By the way, I am not guilty of anything but he claims to have evidence. He has been involved in two fraud lawsuits already and knows how to create documents. It would not surprise me if he has created false documents.

Previously, he was hit with an $80,000 judgment against him, and the other case was dismissed. I have been to the FBI (we live in different states) and after an initial comment from the investigator that if "he feels entitled to what he is asking for, it is not blackmail," he will not even take my calls anymore.

The DA said to contact postal inspectors as this was done via mail across state lines. I'm still waiting for them to call back. The local PD doesn't even seem to know what blackmail is. If it's not a threat of physical violence they are not interested. At least with them I got a report that I was there and complained. With the FBI, I got nothing. I don't know where to turn for help. Any suggestions?

I had an affair/relationship with another guy while I was still in a relationship with my real boyfriend. I decided to end everything between me and the other guy, but he threatened that he will let my boyfriend know, and he will send him our chats, emails and my nude pics. I don't want my boyfriend to get hurt. What shall I do? Please help.

My ex is an FBI agent and has plenty of money. I recently found out he is married with two kids. I broke up with him and moved states away but he still calls and insists on sending me money for my six month old baby who is not his. He also had a paternity test done which came out negative but has since altered paperwork to make it look like the test was a positive, which bothers me.

I called the company that did the test and they assured me the papers were, in fact, doctored. He does wire taps and has hinted to me in the past that he monitors me when I'm unaware of it and has bugged my house. He calls my parents' phones repeatedly, accuses me of being a whore even though I broke it off with him months ago,.and now is making threats and leaves messages to, in his words, use his power to make my life hell.

He knows things about me from my past that could be potentially legally damaging and can lie about anything he wants because he works for the government and I'm afraid for my daughter's sake. He's already gotten her father put in prison so I am alone and vulnerable to him. I don't know what to do. If anyone can help me, post here.

I was just writing to see what you guys think about my current (blackmail) situation. I hate that word. About February 2012, I was granted a section 8 voucher, so I moved into an apartment. The only problem is I think I moved a little too close to a crazy girl friend with whom I've been needing to end a relationship with.

So anyway, a couple of months go by, with her harassing me at my new apartment on a daily basis. She got evicted from her place, so she called me up and asked if she could stay at my house for two weeks. So me being the nice guy and feeling sorry for her 11-year-old daughter, I said yes, but told her she was not staying longer than two weeks, but just until she got her child support check to move into a motel or find a cheap place.

So the two weeks turned into four and a half months. This is all taking place because she threatens me with telling me she will tell the housing authority that she has been staying there and paying me rent money, which never once took place. Yeah, I borrowed money for a beer and cigarettes here and there but never any rent money. Do you think she can find a way to print fake money transaction receipts? I am 30 years old and just getting a start on my life. I am not trying to lose my apartment, but I guess I'll have to play the role of “if I can't have it no one can.” It stinks it has to be that way.

@hossamoto: I've said it before on here: telling the blackmailer the family or friends already know is the best way to cut the blackmailer off at the knees.

If your friend has even one encounter, then the blackmailer has all the power. They can then use that encounter to blackmail her into doing this again and again.

The way to stop it is to tell the truth to her husband, who probably knew she had a pill problem, anyway. She doesn't have to go into all the details, but if her husband loves her, he will support her.

She also needs to get an attorney, who will contact the blackmailer and put him/her on notice. People seem to forget blackmail is a *crime.* An attorney can outline much more painful consequences for distributing the photos for the blackmailer than your friend would suffer if they came out. If she's a prominent person in the community, she can afford a good lawyer, and she needs one, if for no other reason than to keep this scuzzwad from doing this to someone else.

I have a friend I used to work with, who traded pictures of herself for pain pills. Now the "other" person has about 40 pictures of her, totally nude, in some very compromising poses. This person is threatening to "tell" her husband and her father, who is a pastor, unless she possibly has sexual relations or does other "things" with this person.

She has two kids, a husband, and is a very prominent person in the community. She feels she "has" to do whatever this person says, or be ridiculed to death. I am not sure what to tell her. Maybe do something one time, if the person promises to do away with all the pictures in her presence?

@anon252570: First of all, addiction is addiction, and no one should hold it over your head. You need professional help, and until you get it, you will continue to find yourself in compromising and/or hurtful situations.

Secondly, if you can afford it, visit an attorney. Blackmail is a crime, and you need legal advice about your options.

Thirdly, you are understandably afraid of your wife and children being hurt by this. But, (and this is my non-professional, personal opinion), it sounds like you would be much better off if you share this with your wife. I say this because, your addiction already affects her, even though it may not seem to you that it does. Also, your ex's power over you is the 'secret' itself. By bringing it to light, she will no longer have that power. You will be done with her (and she can be prosecuted, to boot).

My suggestion probably terrifies you, because it's the very thing that's allowing you to be threatened by your ex: keeping the secret a secret. However, your wife may be able to get past this if you seek immediate help (counseling, therapy, etc.)

These are all things you will have to weigh for yourself, but just imagine no longer having the fear of being exposed. Think of the weight removed from your life when you're free of that bitter, vindictive woman who is your ex.

(This advice is coming from a woman, in case anyone feels the above statement to be misogynistic).

Whatever you do, please get help, for both your addiction and the situation you're now in as a result of your illness.

Peace and all the best to you and your family.

My ex wife has been posing as various women on Craigslist, knowing I have a sexual addiction. She now has a decade's worth of emails, photos, etc., and is threatening to go to my current wife with them, if I don't pay her some undetermined amount of money.

I've been divorced from her for over a decade, but with child support about to end, she is apparently ready to expose this information to my wife, kids, family, etc. Do I have any recourse?

@anon251653: So he's in the Army, huh? O.K., then. You've got him over a barrel, and he doesn't even know it! You tell him to mail you that USB stick and all your belongings, without saying a word to anyone, or posting any photos, *or* you're going to call his commanding officer and tell him or her that he's been threatening you.

He will probably say, "Oh, you can't do that," but I assure you that you *can* do that. And tell him if he threatens you in *any* way, or contacts you, that you will call his CO. And then *do it* if he threatens you or hassles you in any way. You can even tell the CO that the USB stick has some compromising photos of you on it. I can absolutely guarantee you that will solve the problem.

When the ex asks you who told you about calling his CO, tell him a smart American chick told you, one who doesn't like to see her tax dollars pay the salary of a blackmailer and abuser, and sure doesn't want a jerk like him representing her country. He is a disgrace to the uniform and you can tell him I said that, too.

I was dating a guy on and off for a year and during the year he convinced me to take a few nude photos of myself in compromising positions. This was done all with my camera and was put on a USB stick, which I left at his house accidentally, and before I could return to collect it we split up.

He has that and my belongings and is refusing to give any of it back and threatening to show these to his friends and post them around base (he is in the army). What are my rights? Threats were verbal on the phone as well.

While searching for a part time job in one of the freelancer sites, I got an invitation letter from one of the employers for a VA job. For that job, he told me that I must show off myself completely to get that job, but I didn't show off myself even tough he asked me many times.

After a few days of having a regular chat, I asked him for any new jobs. He said he had one modelling job which had a high pay of $3,000, but for that I must give him a sample photo shoot of me wearing lingerie, so I thought for a while, thinking about my financial status and told him I was ready to do the job.

After giving him the photo shoot, he told me he would pay $100 for a sample photo shoot and I did it. After that, he said that he wanted to see me naked and for that he would pay me $4,150 more. I didn't accept at first, but later after thinking about my poor financial status, I decided to do and after that he didn't pay me any money and instead he said that he will post my pics on the web and all those places.

Is there any possibility to get my money?

Can I lodge any case against him?

I was fired from my job. However, I have a contract that says they would guarantee one year of employment, and if I were terminated from the position, they would pay the remainder as severance pay without any exclusion.

Can I use social media to tell my story, just my story based on the papers I have? I've already sent several emails for months to my former employer, without any response. My idea is to post my story on social networking sites. Is that illegal?

I believe that I was used for research by my university. I asked several times for information regarding this, but was denied acknowledgment.

I have accumulated enough data to write a book with my perspective of this time frame. I do not wish to make trouble for them, but at the same time am upset about things. I want them to know that I have put the pieces together and that I am not happy about what they have done, because I am a real person.

If they continue to refuse me and I say I will write my book (not using the school's name), which could possibly affect them on some level, is that a crime?

A very bad comment about my friends' profile pictures went to them from my account through messages, which I did not type with a link. Whey think that it's me who sent those messages. What if they suicide? It really was not me.

@amypollick: Thanks for the reply and giving me advice. I just want to ask if he is blackmailing me because he said that he will sue me if I don't give back the money he sent to me when I was still in my country.

Now I'm in the country of my husband already and doing my papers for the immigration. If he sues me is it a big problem for my immigration status? I haven't replied to him since he sent me that pathetic message.

@cool3588: Since this guy is from the U.S., and so am I, I may be able to give you some insight. Having a receipt that he sent you cash means precisely *nothing* under U.S. law. It means he sent you cash. It could have been for a birthday, to pay *you* back for a loan, to get your car fixed, to give to a mutual friend in your country, etc. It could have been for any number of things.

If you never signed any paperwork agreeing to pay this money back, then it was a gift, not a loan, under U.S. law, and you are in no way obligated to pay it back. If, however, you ever said, "Oh, I'll pay you back" and he can produce the chat logs or whatever, saying you did, then it might be a different story, but he's still on the hook for an attorney and if you're still in the Philippines, or anywhere not in the U.S., he would have to hire an attorney from that country to bring the case. Good luck with that project.

My guess is he got married to an American girl, which is why he cut off communication with you, and she found out he gave you this money, and she wants it back. Just my opinion.

He's banking on the fact you don't know anything about U.S. law, and that you'll be intimidated into sending him the money. Tell him to go right ahead and spend the thousands of dollars he would have to spend in attorney's fees to get that money back, and tell him you'll be glad for a judge to let him know that money was a gift and not a loan, since you never signed a thing.

Then, as I've advised people to do over and over here, change all your profiles and e-mail addresses and do *not* have any more contact with him.

I am not an attorney, but in all likelihood, this is just his pathetic attempt to get some money from somewhere.

I met an american guy in a chat in 2008. We got to know each other along the way. He was nice. He asked and wanted to know everything about me and I told him. Part of that is he wants to send me money to help me. At first I was hesitant to accept that because I told him that I was afraid of what he wanted in return for being nice and sending me that amount, but he said it was for me to help me a little.

At that point, I was so down in terms of my financial situation, I accepted it. Since then, he sent me a little amount every week, and part of that I pay for the internet cafe, sometimes in a private place to do things which I didn't want to do in the first place. Then several months went by quickly. In the middle of the year, he didn't respond to my messages and then there came a time that even if he was online when I sent him a message, he would go into offline mode. I even asked him what he wanted to do, go on with the relationship, or stop and we would move on with out lives, but still he didn't respond to it so I assume we are over, and we didn't have any more communication from then on.

I met a nice man recently and am married to him now. He wants me to join him in his country, but yesterday this other guy sent me a message wanting to get his money which he says I "borrowed" from him. He said he still has the receipt of the cash transfer to the Philippines and if I fail to give that back to him, he will sue me and my immigration status will also be affected. What can I do? Can he can really sue me? Please give me advice.

I am a guy. Yesterday night I was in chat with a lesbian girl and showed myself nude including my face. She is blackmailing me that she would post the recorded video on you tube and other stuff. What to do now? How can I protect myself? I am in a very respectable position in an organization and also from a respectable family. Please give me some suggestions.

@anon227299: If I read your post correctly, your aunt deserves your everlasting thanks. Keep her on this situation and have her tell him (whoever he says he is), that she is going to call his parents right away if he so much as twitches in your direction.

People do this for control. Don't allow them to have the control. Take it back. You have a trusted family member acting on your behalf. Sounds like she's doing the right thing. However, if the temptation becomes too strong, and this creep does contact you again, your aunt *must* follow through and tell his parents. He probably deserves whatever they would do to him, just for threatening to do this to you.

My story is almost similar to @anon215355. I have recently cut all my conversation with him. As a result of this, recently, he sent me a blackmail message. My aunt got involved when tried to threaten me and she gave him a certain type of warning and he asked her not to inform his parents.

He spoke as a third person (as a friend of the person I am referring to). He said that his friend is scared of his parents, so he is willing to leave me alone. He gave his assurance that is friend will not message or call or mail me, but the person who spoke with my aunt is the one who is actually blackmailing me, but he manipulated the whole situation and acted cleverly.

Can you please tell me if what all I'm doing is correct or not? Should I continue my ignorance in the same way? Does that really work, or should I take some other action. Please let me know. I am also from india and from a good family.

I was replacing my CEO's computer and found several compromising photos of her in a picture folder. I was not snooping but I was looking for her background photo she had on her desktop and came across these along with some videos.

Needless to say, I am going to have to have an uncomfortable conversation with her. This could destroy her career or put her in a very bad position if someone found these. This is someone who makes 200k or more a year. People need to be really careful and a bit smarter!

I was camming with a girl and we were both completely naked. Then out of nowhere she just got offline completely. I'm afraid she is going to post it on the internet and people will see it. I know this isn't blackmail, but I could use some advice.

I was being blackmailed. He had info on me threatened to tell my mother, my school, and social services. He wanted to have sex with me. I didn't want to at all. He found my info everywhere on the web and told me my own address.

@anon215355: First thing: tell the creep that your fiance knows about the photo, that you told him, whether you did or not. That takes the power out of his hands.

Second, tell the creep that, if he doesn't leave you alone, you will tell *his* parents he's been bothering you. If he's that scared of his parents, this will probably work.

Third, cut off *all* communication with him. Change your cell phone number, your e-mail address, your social networking profiles -- everything. Do not contact him in any way, or allow him to contact you. If you aren't apt to see him on the street or something, cut the ties. Simply ignore him.

Sounds like there's nothing to blackmail you with anyway, and if the man you're marrying is any kind of good person, he will not want some crazy idiot bothering the woman who is going to be his wife.

Having said that, if this nut is threatening you with physical harm, call the police. If he's that crazy, he might decide to carry out his threat, and it won't matter about your marriage if you or your future husband don't live long enough to to get to the wedding.

I had a nice friend at the beginning. Later she agreed to become my girlfriend, but later I found I cannot get married to her because she wants me to help her family to buy a house and pay for tuition fees. She used to get mad when I sent some money to my parents for medical treatment and always trying to damage my family members' reputations.

Now she is blackmailing my parents, saying that she is pregnant and she will report me to police and arrest me. Previously, she used to threaten them that I would commit suicide and put my name on it.

I have been requesting her to get the proper medical test report for a pregnancy and she denies all the things until I marry her. She says marry me for two days and give a divorce. She is trying to manipulate everything to damage me and my family. Please advise me what will be the consequences of all this.

I'm from India. I have a friend who is very immature in his feelings. One day I told him about my marriage to a guy and from that day he started telling that he loved me very much, he cannot live without me etc etc. He said he wanted to commit suicide. He wanted to run away from his house, etc., etc. I consoled him for a few days and later on started avoiding him. Then he became violent.

He was telling me that he logged all the messages I sent him to his phone. He has 1600 messages, which are a very causal kind and some were with a little affection. One day, out of affection, I gave him a hug. His friend took a photo, and now he says he has that photo with him. I had no other relationship with him other than a hug with affection. He also has a few messages, with me saying him that I like him. Now my marriage is fixed with this guy and he starts comparing himself with him. He also started hurting me by saying that I used him, I cheated him and made my career successful, and I'm just acting in front of him.

I'm totally frustrated with this kind of behavior. I know this guy is very timid and doesn't have the guts to hurt me physically. And he sometimes. without reason threatens me that he will disclose the pic and messages to my parents. He is very scared of his parents, himself. He is just demanding me to be with him in a friendly manner as I was previously. But he is so crazy that if I talk to him instead of talking, he just fights with me, telling me that he loves me very much and I'm getting married.

He reminds me of all the words I used on him out of anger. He used many words. But when I say it, he gets serious. He has a serious mental illness I guess. He doesn't understand what he says. He starts crying, saying that he likes me.

He is scared of his parents as well as my parents. He is very timid, but keeps on blackmailing me that he has that picture and messages. He is not of a kind to show those to my people, but he reminds me of them. Sometimes, he tells he will show them, and even if his life gets spoiled he doesn't care. He wants me to learn some lesson. He calls himself as an animal if I don't talk to him. He says he will turn cruel.

Can someone please help me how to get rid of him totally? He is so immature he says whatever comes to mind and takes all the words I tell him to be in a negative manner. I hardly met him but three or four times in one year of my friendship. I don't want to file any cases or seek the help of cops as my marriage is settled. I'm worried if he really spoils my life? can he dare to do that. He has been doing this for five months. Instead of me avoiding him, please help me and give me your valuable suggestions.

@anon213902 (diya): So turn the tables on the sucker. Tell him if he uses "records" to tell anyone you had sex with him, you'll e-mail photos and letters concerning the two of you together to his wife and his mother-in-law. That should take care of the problem.

My name is diya and I am unmarried. I had sex with a married man. I didn't know that he is married. Once I came to know that he is already married, I rejected him, but he is blackmailing me with records.

I need help. I have been married for 25 years, and was in an abusive relationship due to my overly suspicious wife. She had all my email passwords and FB passwords. I never have been unfaithful but all the time, she was abusive to me, saying I have had extra marital affairs with more than 200 girls.

Last year, a friend told me there were some strange messages on my wall in FB. I changed my password and gave it to my wife too. Until August of this year there were no inbox messages or conversations in my inbox but she has discovered some romantic messages and conversations in my inbox between me and some of the friends from our community.

Now she is blackmailing me, saying if I don't live according to her abusive behavior (not doing what she wants me to do and go where she wants me to go and obey her) then she is going to hand over this to those families and then to my family and my church as I am a minister of religion. Is this blackmail? If yes, then what can I do to get out of this? She checked all my phone bills and emails there is nothing in it but the FB messages were there. She printed it and deleted them too. I need help.

And the moral to many of these stories is: Don't *ever* send anyone anything via e-mail or social networking sites that you wouldn't want on the front page of the newspaper.

If anyone ever asks you to send explicit photos or videos, *don't do it!* Delete that person's profile, e-mail, phone number, whatever, from all your sites. Change your e-mail and block his/her number.

Be smart, folks. Don't send sexual stuff via e-mail. It will invariably come back to smack you in the face.

This dude said he liked me, he played with my feelings. He made me feel so secure and then he talked sexually with me. I agreed because he said it was between me and him only. I trusted him and then he blackmailed me into sending him nude pics. He said he'll make everyone read the messages. I was scared so I sent them. He continuously asked for them, and I sent in fear of them being leaked!

Then after a month, he asked for a video. I sent it out of fear, but I said it was the first and last. He accepted, but then he said send more. I thought this is the limit, but then he leaked all of them, and my reputation is tarnished. but it wasn’t my fault!

But now I'm finally free from this, and feel better. Yes people are saying stuff about me, but still I'm not imprisoned. to all those blackmailed. Leave them, face the consequences but climb out of the abyss. I'll cost you but if you were forced to do so, then it doesn’t matter!

I am a construction manager and now working to investigate a blackmail case that happened at work and need some advice, please.

Five laborers from a labor supply company came to my office complaining that one of my supervisors got money from them to keep them at the site as long as possible, but I know my supervisor. He is honest and would not do it. I need help on how to deal with this situation.

A few months back, I met a Pakistani girl named Amber in a forum. She said she living in Dubai. Then she added me to her friends list.

She got a lot of of my family and personal details and when she found out I am a widowed UK national, she offered me to marry with her sister. Every time, she told me about her sister. When she sent me some pics of her sister, I saw she was too old and I told her I was unable to go ahead with her for a serious relationship.

So, she edited fake inbox messages from my side and used a lot of racist terms and posted them to various forums where we were together with a lot of friends.

In response to her posts, all of my friends stopped trusting me and used rough and insolent language against me. I wrote a complete paragraph to take my friends into confidence but all in vain.

She blackmailed me severely and still I am scared of her acts and techniques she used against me. So as I experienced on fb, please don ot send inbox messages to the people you not know personally, as the same messages can be re-edited by blackmailers and posted and you have no chance to explain your position. Thanks. Ahmed, Bradford UK

To anyone being blackmailed: Anything involving threatening someone's life or threatening, "If you don't do this I'll post this pics/videos/report this" is 98 percent always blackmail. Report it to the police, or anybody you can. Blackmail is illegal!

I made a bad choice, and got sexually involved with a boss years ago. Present day, sent pics of myself and an ex (with the ex's consent) to the former boss last year.

To make a long story short, my ex boss sent me an email the other day saying that he was going to send the pics from last year to my job because I wasn't sending him any more pics or sitting on skype while he commanded me to do various things to myself for his personal jollies. I was supposed to be on skype this morning but backed out as the whole thing sickens me and now I don't know what I can do. Anyone?

my wife's ex husband, who was a friend of mine, threatened to publish some embarrassing pictures of me and others from the past among my community.

He did not asked for money but because I have a custody case with my ex, he is pressuring me to walk away. Can someone tell me what i should do? I'm married now and have kids.

I am a married man who stupidly had an affair with a woman for over a year. I accidentally left my computer at her house where she hacked into it and stole some revealing and embarrassing pictures of me and my wife and put them on her computer and showed them to some of her friends.

Now that I have broke up with her, she is threatening me with sending the pics and videos to my friends and family. She is not asking for money or anything; she just wants to destroy my life and embarrass me in my community. What recourse do I have? By the way: she has sent me naked pictures of her on her own free will and I would never show them to anyone, especially to her family and friends. Nor have I ever threatened to. Isn't it against the law?

my ex fiance in canada has pictures of me in a compromising position which i had posed for. we have broken up and he is now threatening me to showcase the pictures to our families, friends and on the web. is there any law against such blackmail? i am in india.

@anon173227: See the advice I gave in post no. 52 and modify it to fit your situation. If you will do this faithfully, and make sure you lock down your FB profile and admit it for friends only, then you should be able to shut this guy down. If you're in the U.S., tell this guy you've reported him to the FBI and FCC for harassing and threatening communications, and to the attorney general in your state for stalking, blackmail and harassing communications. What he's doing is a crime --really.

If nothing else, delete *all* your current e-mail accounts, profiles and FB or Myspace pages. Start over completely and if this jerk contacts you in any way, don't respond.

And don't take your clothes off in front of a camera, O.K.? As I said to the other person, don't post anything online, *ever,* that you wouldn't want on the front page of the newspaper. That way, these creeps don't have this kind of access.

Okay so I met this guy from a website. I added him on facebook and msn and got to know him a little more. so one day he asked me to cam with him, so i did for a little while that day but he didn't because he told me his cam was broken.

he asked me to pull up my shirt which i did (stupid me) and well, he told me to show him more but i didn't want to. that was when i found out that he took pictures of me that time. he told me that he would show it to my friends on facebook if i didn't show him what he wanted. so from that day on, he kept threatening me if i don't do what he wants then i will be in deep trouble.

after that i cammed with him again for at least 30 minutes, and he always ended up telling me alibis that he didn't see very well and that i should turn my light on etc., etc so i could show him again next time. i told him that i wanted to stop but he just keeps threatening me. so help! it was stupid of me to do that but now i learned my lesson. Anyone here help me out? i want him to stop so bad.

@anon116153 Post #59: I'm not sure what country you live in, but here in Canada pictures of drugs/paraphernalia is not enough to have someone charged. Pictures do not prove anything, not even ownership. In the law's eyes anyone could have brought that over to your place and taken pictures of it and claim it's yours.

My advice is to quietly get rid of all that you own that you feel may incriminate you, then ask her to leave again. If she refuses and threatens to go to the cops, tell her to go ahead.

If (and that's a big if) the cops decide to pursue this they'll have to produce a search warrant to look for the stuff. If you've gotten rid of everything, there will be nothing to find.

Remember, they must find you in possession of it themselves and not through a picture. At that point, you can explain to the cops what is going on and ask her to leave right in front of them. Trust me, the only one who will look stupid here will be her.

So today, I was on a chat thing and i fell into the same trap as anon138129. What do I do? i even paid her $180 and i don't know what to do. I don't know if she will stop or continue. I have done everything necessary to report her to the police but i don't know if I should go with it. Can someone please help me and tell me what i should do.

I've been having an affair with a man for over a year. He was married when we first got together and now he is divorced. He was in a lot of trouble and I loaned him money.

While he has given me a little of what is owed, I have to chase after him weekly for payments. He is now threatening to show my husband pics and tell him of our affair! What can I do to protect myself and my family?

This may sound really dumb but I'm not doing well in history at school. My favorite teacher (let's call him Mr.X), well Mr.X was my favorite teacher and we have this homework thing that he counts as a quiz.

I haven't handed in the past two of them because I lost them. Well now we have a project that's going to be counted as a test. Mr.X called me after class and said that he took pictures of me when I was talking to my friends and that he would send them to my parents as proof of me doing nothing.

He also said I don't know what game you're trying to play but I'm not buying it. I have no clue what he's talking about. I'm not playing any game and I was doing my work. I actually got a lot done and finished the first part of the project(only like five people finished the first part). I told my best friend and she said that this is blackmail. Am I really being blackmailed?

@anon138129: Chances are, she's just trying to get money from you, but you can do a couple of things. Report her to Facebook for violating the Terms of Service. They might shut down her account, which would solve the problem.

Also, immediately unfriend her and lock down your profile to "private" so she can't see anything else. Next, send an IM to all your family members, asking them to unfriend and block her. You don't have to give specifics; just say she's a scammer, which she is. That should do the trick. Good luck.

I was on a chat line and starting talking to this girl. She added me to msn and we started webcamming and clothes came off. Then she closes the video, opens it up again and it's of me. She wants $400 or will send the video to everyone in my facebook friends list. What do I do? I'm from canada and she's from philippines. She linked to all my family's facebook accounts too.

I have looked at various types of pornography on my personal computers at home. My boss at work was able to find out using some method. She and another one of my bosses are blackmailing me so that I do not go to management about some of the things they have been doing at the organization. In addition to blackmail, they have made threats that they would "burn my house down" and "kill me and my family." What do I do?

i, a stupid person, was having some fun on a site and sent naughty pictures to this guy. He is now wanting me to go round to his place to have sex with him. i don't want to but he keeps saying remember i have those pics. is that blackmail or not? please help don't know what to do

A friend of mine work for an owner of a company and over a seven year period he got sexual favors by making her feel that her job depended on it. She had to leave her job because she became pregnant by her husband. She called later and wanted to return, but he refused her employment.

Can she recover financially without it being considered blackmail? Is there any recourse legally. It has been over five years since this happened.

i moved my girlfriend in with me and it has been nothing but total hell. we fight all the time and for the past month or so, I have told her to move out and asked her many many times to please leave and because of this she has started using threats of showing police pictures of my weed and pipe and scale in order to stay. it's really beginning to become a bit too much for me to live with and i want to know what to do.

I signed my estranged wife's name on mortgage loan modification documents. i got the loan mod approval from the mortgage company using only my financial info, not hers. i did not sign the docs to profit, only to save the house, which we are upside down in. my hope was to save the family home, reconcile the marriage, and harm no one.

Well, she has caught wind of this and is threatening to charge me with forgery. probably to facilitate a favorable custody ruling in the case of any forthcoming divorce proceedings. Blackmail? yes or no?

one of my kids were said to throw rocks at a mobile home. it is her word against the kids and she is a known drug user and has said to give her 100 dollars or she will contact the police, she said.

a couple of days later, she called and asked for a contractor's estimate. a friend of mine made an attempt to do the painting but she refused it and one of her friends told him all she wants is drugs, and she won't fix it.

i said to her get me a written estimate but she hasn't provided that and gave us a deadline to pay or she will call the police. the damage in question is a couple smaller than one-inch dings -- not even dents. She also said she wanted the extra paint. i really don't like that she is threatening a 9 year old and a 13 year old. is this illegal in some way or extortion or bribery? please let me know. --Mark

If a person does promotional services, then in the normal course of his past time also reviews products online, can he, for instance, let the company he did the services for know he is going to review them, (without informing them if the reviews would shed good or bad light on the products) and that they would have a chance to "buy any and all rights to his reviews." Would that be legal or would it be some form of "blackmail"?

my brother has a liquor store and he is the owner.

He had an affair with a 20 year old female employee

for one month. of course they had sex two or three times during the affair.

one day her mother found out that she had an affair with her boss. She got caught by her mother because she left her email open so her mother read all about the affair between them.

Now her mother is blackmailing her boss. She stated that her daughter is so clean and a virgin and she's a good, pure asian girl and she never had sex before.

Her daughter loved the boss so much she e-mailed her boss to say he did nothing wrong. She was demanding her boss to divorce his wife and if not, she will run away from home, so she did. Now her mother is trashing the boss.

One week later, the boss, mother and daughter sign an agreement that they will not meet or see each other

and the store owner gives the mother $10,000 for agreeing that they will leave him alone.

After they got the money, the daughter keeps on texting her boss "i love you" and so on and so on,

and she ran away again because she can't stand her mother.

Her mother is calling the store owner trashing him again, and if the daughter doesn't come back she will take him to court and tell his family.

I think her daughter and boss are victims of the mother.

Is this blackmail by her mother demanding money and threatening, or are she and her mother on the same team, trying to get more money out of him?

I met this guy online and i stupidly sent him a pic of me after I thought he was a nice guy. Well he now keeps sending the picture to my cell threatening to send it onto some website newbie or something if I don't send more. How do I get him to stop? Please help.

Is this blackmail?

I feel better in an odd way knowing I'm not the only one who is in this type of situation.

@Anon94789: In all probability, he told you this to scare you into posing nude. He's full of crap and is a total jerk.

If you run into this character again online, tell him you've contacted the cyber crimes unit at your local police station, and they've been in touch with Scotland Yard and Interpol, and they're cooperating with the FBI to look for him. If he really is in the US, that should keep him looking over his shoulder for a while. Might give him a sleepless night or two, anyway.

Then, tell him he can post anything you've chatted about and even your photos online, that you're proud of your body and maybe you could find a better guy than a loser like him if he did.

Lastly, and this is just some personal advice: if you get cozy with another guy online, don't tell him anything you wouldn't want on the front page of the newspaper. Delete all your old accounts and start fresh with new e-mails, new social networking pages, everything. It's a pain, but if jerkwad contacts you again, you can just block him straight away and shut him down.

I have been talking to a guy of the internet In the US, and I am from the UK. I discovered that he had been logging our conversations and he said he would post them around the net unless I got naked on cam for him, so stupidly I did. This guy took cam shots and he is now threatening me that he will go in all the english chat rooms if I don't continue and post the shots.

He has also told me he is an ex marshal and he is able to find where I live.

I told him if I didn't go on the net again would he leave me alone. So I closed all of my accounts but I am scared he will do something. Can someone please help?

I think that stories of blackmail among family members is particularly troubling and that Stuart Ross, although in dire financial straits, deserves to be punished for his actions.

Blackmail is an interesting legal entity, particularly because it is often a private settlement and thus something we, as the public, never hear about. That being said, I am all for transparency and appreciate celebrities coming forward with the circumstances of the blackmail and hope that this courage will serve as a deterrent for other individuals hoping to prey on people’s vulnerabilities.

A department of a college wrongfully committed racial profiling against my friend by asking the college police to interview her on campus for false reasons.

The police concluded that there was nothing wrong with my friend, but wrote a not-so-great note on her case and stored it in their system. If we find out from the police record that this college department has committed so many other instances of racial profiling in the past seven years, can we pressure them to drop the not-so-great note about my friend or else we will reveal the fact that they have committed racial profiling to the world. I think this is not blackmail, is it?

My friend is a convicted sex offender because a girl lied about her age. Now his ex girlfriend is threatening him, saying that if he doesn't do exactly everything she says, she will claim that he raped her and get him thrown in jail, which will cause him to lose his job, and pretty much end his life.

I know this is blackmail. How can we stop her without getting him thrown in jail?

If I have information about someone that would discredit them, can I use this to make them return money that someone else gave them even though that other person in a partner of mine? I will in no way receive any money or anything of value from this, only the satisfaction that this person has been brought to justice.

The information that I have is public information, news articles.

Would this be considered blackmail?

Thank you, Phil

My mom says that if I don;t "behave" she'll call my dad. Is that blackmail. She also tells me she'll beat the crap out of me when she comes home. Is this blackmail.

okay so my mom says that If I don't "act good" then she will kick me out of the house. Is that blackmail? She also tells me that if I call it blackmail she will ground me. So, what's your opinion? Is it blackmail, or not?

I was dating this guy for a while and out of generosity gave him a cell phone of mine to use. he also has the service in my name. He has one or two lewd videos of me on the phone and now that we are broken up, he is demanding $250 and a brand new cell phone or he will post the videos on the net. Do I have a legal case against him for blackmailing/extortion?

My dad found out that Ive been smoking marijuana, and he made me sign something saying that if I smoke weed again or drink booze he will call the cops and send me away. Is this considered blackmailing?

Amy, from one Amy to another: tell this jerk that you will call the police if he threatens you or your husband in any way. Also, even if you haven't told your husband about the affair, tell jerk boy that you have. That takes the teeth out of his threats to burn the videos to CD. He only has power over you if he thinks your husband doesn't know about the affair. I doubt he would go that far, anyway. It would put him at risk, and he doesn't want to do that.

Also, tell him your friends and family know about the affair and if he gives a CD to them, they'll throw it in his ugly face.

Then, tell him if he kills himself with his gun in front of you, you'll applaud because it means this uber creep is out of your life and can't bother you anymore!

Change your cell phone number, e-mail and any other internet accounts, get a restraining order against him, get away from him as fast as you can and don't look back. He only has power over you as long as he thinks you're afraid of him.

Then, Amy, get some marriage counseling. You need to understand why you felt compelled to cheat on your husband.

I have been married for eight years now without a baby yet. I love my husband, but I somehow feel that our relationship is getting dry with regards to sex and time.

He's always busy and I started to long for some affection, attention and care until I met someone from work. We had an affair. Until one time he shot a video on me while we're having sex, using his cellphone, and there are three different videos.

He said he would erase them after doing it and he showed to me and erased them in front of me. I was fooled by him. It was never erased because the copies are automatically saved to his cellphone's other memory.

When i realized that I didn't want to continue that affair and wanted to do the right thing with my husband. He started to burn those videos into cds and threatened me five times now that he will post this to youtube and will scatter my cds to every person he meets and to my husband and family and friends any many more.

He's a physco and a maniac, and I don't know else what to do. He said he will leave and go abroad after posting my videos. I don't want him to do that. He also threatens me that he will kill my husband if i will leave him and and also threaten to commit suicide using his gun in front of me. Please help me. I don't know what to do. I want him to stop. Sometimes I wanted to tell these secrets to his parents. Help me please. - Amy

i don't know how to say this but i met this guy on the internet and did some things on cam for him. He took pictures of me in the process! and now he is saying that he will post these pictures all over the internet if i don't keep going on cam for him. how do i make him stop? please help!

My ex-BF is being accused of child abuse. I have personally witnessed his angry outbursts, grabbing his child by the throat, etc., and him slapping my son.

The police have contacted me to turn in evidence against him, but implied that if I did nothing at the time I could be guilty of child endangerment (though I never felt they were in life-threatening harm - he's just a big angry jerk).

The ex is extremely wealthy, angry, and controlling, and I am scared of him. I want him to pay me the money he promised me long ago and am asking for that in writing. Does that make this blackmail in light of the charges against him and evidence I have? Will I be in trouble when he's the one who is the bad guy?

one of my friends is threatening me and she's saying that she will post inappropriate photos of me on facebook and she said that she was going to make a new facebook in my name pretending to be me. is this blackmail?

i recently started up a llc partnership. we took a job that has apparently turned out to be shady with illegal activity, and my partner got mad at me because i was trying to help run the job since it was 50/50 and quit.

That's when i found out what was really going on with the other company we were working for and i am trying to finish the two buildings we started so i can get out of this situation.

In the meantime my partner has come back and told me that i have to tell these people that they either let him take over or he is going to the solicitors office and if i don't side with him then he is going to try to get me in trouble.

Although when i realized what was going on i quit. Isn't my partner now committing blackmail and extortion?

For over a year i was going out with turkish kurdish man, who actually was married and had a child with an Irish woman and i never knew about it.

He lied that he owns three shops in Belfast and i was there (in these shops) many times. Suddenly, a year before, he told me that the business is so bad and could i help him with some money. I gave him 11,000 that year.

While we were together he made a video and he threatens me now that he will send everything to my family. I have 4,000 messages stored on my nokia phone and also i have the last history from our conversation where he mentions everything. He has bad intentions.

Also via private detective, i found out that he was in this country for three years and he used actually a fake name while he was my fiance. I have at least five witnesses, his previous bosses and they can confirm everything. From my conversations with him i know that he is married to the poor woman just for his papers and this proves his bad deeds.

I am scared to go to the police and i try to talk to him to get my money back. If someone can help please do.

Is Alcoholics Anonymous a meeting to exploit its members so they become honest and trusted friends? A.A. should help people but they become selfish because of a felony? Anonymity is sacred but A.A. still talks about its members' secret past. Sponsors talk to other sponsors about their pigeons' past problems. is this bad karma to join and seek help?

i am also a victim of blackmail. my ex boyfriend use to threaten me through text messages that if i'm not going to give him our son he will no longer give financial assistance to our son and he will file charges on me to be able to get my son. we are not married. i'm no longer living with him. please help me.

is it wrong for even a parent to keep their adult child living with them against that adult child's will? if the adult child wants to leave the house and move out, is it wrong for the parents to use threats and blackmail to keep the child still living there? thank you. P.S. please help asap. thank you.

anon48028 - It is unclear to me the statement "what I do." If it means you are gay and sleep with different people - you should let your parents know. However, it sounds like you are not sure if you want to leave this guy or not.

If not and you do not wish to inform your parents, I guess you are going to stay with this guy. You are an adult and I guess you have a decision to make here.

i don't know if this is blackmail or not but i broke up with a girl and she has information about me and she is saying that she doesn't want me back. She just wants to see me hurt and is threatening to tell my parents this information if i don't fix things. is this blackmail?

My ex boyfriend pestered me for three years, trying to get back with me. I was at a party walking home when he stopped me (he was cruising about in his car). I could hardly see as I was so drunk, so when he offered me a lift I got in.

He drove me into the woods and parked up, he tried to force himself on me then gave up when I slapped him. He offered me a joint and I stupidly took it! :(

Now he says I owe him £850 for taking it! I have two choices, sleep with him to work off the debt or he is going to get debt collectors to my parents' house. This was all going on when I was with my current boyfriend (I'm scared he will split up with me! )

What do I do?

My sister worked for me, helping me with my handicapped adopted children. I had a foster home. At the time she slapped a foster baby who found his voice and was happily screaming. I fired her and reported it to cps. cps did not do anything because she is not a parent. Since then she has called cps on me eight times and made horrible complaints to my brother. I was not raised with my younger siblings and do not know them well. cps has cleared me but the foster care agency has not. my sister told them I grew up in a juvenile justice facility and lived on a unit called a pod for the mentally ill. she said so many things and the foster care agency wants me to prove otherwise. I can't. I was 18 years old 31 years ago. there are no records either way. they want to send me for a psychological evaluation. my sister has told me she is going to have all my kids removed and prove adoption fraud. she won't stop. she has gotten others involved. my brother is even forcing me to take over his $600 per month van payment and charges me $199 monthly for insurance and he stated if I don't he will hurt me worse than my sister ever can. Every time I try to tell my agency what they are doing they also said if I give them $5,000 dollars they will stop. my agency treats me like I am crazy. they are really criminals and the more I learn about them the more I realize that I made a horrible mistake letting them work with my children. i have a restraining order on my sister and I am scared to death to tell on my brother.

I know someone who is out of jail on probation that witnessed a local officer enter a premises without permission. The officer now wants him to testify against my other friend and lie and say that the officer had permission to enter. otherwise, the officer says, he will send my friend back to jail by telling his probation officer that he was found drinking when the officer entered the house. No breathalyzer was taken. Is this blackmail? Is blackmailing illegal when police do it?

I am with a guy and every time I try to leave him he says he is going to send nude pictures to my family and friends. My parents don't even know I am with him. I am 19 and afraid that they will find out. what do I do?

we still see each other as he was threatening me. i decided a hundred times and i told him a hundred times that i don't want him as i love my fiance. but stil he insists. please help.

anon47204, if your boss is threatening harm to you or your family, call the police. This is worse than blackmail--it's harassment and threatening behavior. Tell your fiance you had a relationship with your boss that ended before you met him. That takes the teeth out of that part of the threat. But the fact your boss is threatening bodily harm to your loved ones needs to be brought to the attention of law enforcement. Good luck.

i'm really desperate now. last year, i was hired by a company in canada. the owner of the company i am working with now went to the philippines for a vacation. he asked me to have dinner together. (i was hired already and my papers were being processed.) the second time he asked we slept together. he went back to canada, and i was still in the philippines waiting for my papers. when we were apart, we sent emails, we talked online, we had an affair. when i came here last in 2008, we were happy because we were together now. he's in his 50's and i'm 26. i was so stupid i let him take pictures and videos while we were having sex. we were intimate for three months and he went back to the philippines for a vacation early this year. i met a guy in january and i'm in love with him now. we wanted to get married. i told my boss to move on, but he wouldn't. he's blackmailing me to send my naked pics and videos to my fiance if i won't make love to him. he always gets mad. and when he gets mad, he threatens to send those to my family and fiance. he said he wants to ruin my life and kill my dad. please help. i really need help now. i have a lot of his crazy messages.

So if i am being blackmailed by an ex boyfriend, what type of lawyer do i contact? Criminal, family law or what?

anon45345, yes what your ex-boyfriend is doing could be construed as emotional blackmail. He is most likely using the *threat* of those incriminating photos in order to maintain control over you, but I'm not sure he fully intends to reveal those photos to your family and employers. You may want to find a way to diminish the power of his threat by approaching your family yourself and explaining how you have made some errors in judgment in the past, but you have become a different person since that time. If you minimize the threat, you minimize his power to harm you emotionally.

Anon46504, I'm afraid your argument concerning blackmail doesn't hold up well. In the first place, you and your friend violated a classroom rule about passing notes. The fact that your written note called your teacher a racist and a vulgar sexist term would make it libel. Accusations such as this could damage your teacher's good name and reputation. You're lucky she didn't get even more offended. You should write the report as requested. Your teacher's decision to withhold the referral in exchange for a writing exercise is not an example of blackmail, but more of an example of leverage. You don't want to face the consequences of that referral, so it's in your best interest to show some respect for your teacher and do what she asks.

"I called the Corp. headquarters and demanded that I be paid severance or I would report their violations. Is this considered blackmail or fair?" That is blackmail. I wouldn't call it unfair but it *is* illegal. A better strategy would have been to say something like this in your exit interview *before* any mention of severence pay: "I know x, y, and z about this company and I'm quite prepared to report these violations to the appropriate authorities." (period. say no more than that) Then let *them* do the math and offer you severance pay. Do not sign anything agreeing to abstain from reporting the violations - you could be signing your way into a blackmail charge. It's an unenforcable contract anyway - there is no more or less threat to them if you don't sign it.

To all of you who are being blackmailed: You need a lawyer, not the police. A lawyer is bound to confidentiality whereas the police are not. The lawyer can tell you your options. It could turn out that the police station is where you want to go - but not until you've spoken to an attorney. @anon8844: No the scenario you describe would not be blackmail. Blackmail requires a threat that the blackmailer is going to do something. That threat can be explicit ("I'm going to give these pictures to your wife")- or implied ("Your wife wouldn't like these"). But merely saying "I really enjoy the pictures" isn't an explicit or implied threat. @anon46504: Write the essay. No, it's not blackmail. Your teacher has the authority to punish you and that's what she is doing. She also has the authority to escalate the punishment by sending you to the principal. She is giving you an easy out. Take it.

At school i was passing a note back and forth to my friend and we were talking about the teacher. i called the teacher a racist b----. she got the note and wrote me and my friend on a referral. She didn't turn it in. She said that if we write a five-page typed essay on a college we want to go to she will void the referral and she will forget all about it. My friend is going do the essay but i said i won't because i felt like that was a form of blackmail. If i don't do this report by monday i will get kicked out of the school and return to my homeschool which is a very bad school. Help! P.S.- Me and my friend are freshmen.

please help. my ex-boyfriend is threatening to send pictures of me smoking weed to my parents and/or my work. he doesn't want anything but to see me suffer because i broke up with him. what do i do? is this blackmail? can i report him for anything?

@anon43056. Ignore this joker. If your name isn't on the cyber posts, don't worry if he posts them all over the net. Big deal. And he cannot hack into your computer if he doesn't know your passwords or anything. He just told you that to get you to do exactly what you did, which was to cyber with him. He's a manipulative jerk.

Here's what to do now. Sign on to your account and when he shows up, act like you are your Dad. Ask him what the blazes he thinks he's doing by forcing his underage (whether you are or not) daughter to "cyber" with him, and would he like the FBI to pay a visit to his house, since they're already on the case to find him. Then, block his name and account from everything you're doing, change your username on all the sites where you post, get a new e-mail account to use to register and enjoy the fact that the little twit will probably be spending some sleepless nights, hoping the Feds don't show up or that he doesn't end up on one of those "Dateline" 'catch the perv' episodes. Good luck!

P.S. And don't fall for that line again. If anyone approaches you about it, tell them to jump in the lake and block their username from your computer immediately.

i was on a site talking to this guy and he said that i have to do "cyber" with him or else he would hack my computer or if i reported him he would hack it so now half way through the messges with him he said that if i don't keep doing it he would post our conversations all over the net. i reported him twice, and still nothing. i don't know what to do. it is really embarrassing to even tell this story, and i didn't want to do anything with him but i also don't want our conversations posted or my computer hacked.

i had an ex-boyfriend from another country always tried to threaten me to post my private photos in the internet if i won't come back to him. how can i report him? i don't like him.

I was recently let go from a job in which they took my last days of pay & vacation pay. Their reasons were for lack of sales, when the company gave no support or training to help. I was also not licensed in which was illegal for me to perform my position (something of which I was not aware of until I was let go).

I found out from the Dept. of Agriculture that there are numerous violations that would cost the company more than a half a million in fines. I called the Corp. headquarters & demanded that I be paid severance or I would report their violations.

Just three weeks earlier I had a conversation with management not to put me in a situation of being unemployed like I'm see happening to several people already & they assured me that my position was solid & they would do whatever possible to support my efforts.

Now I'm kicked to the curb with no income or pay.

Is this considered blackmail or fair?

I asked for 3 months pay due to the conditions discussed weeks earlier being assured I'd stay employed.

Blackmail is blackmail, and if a man should surrender the information or tool he used to blackmail you. It must be destroyed and not used in evidence against you.

i have a question about blackmail. okay so i was at this party, and it turns out that this kids laptop was stolen along with a GPS radio out of his car. He thinks i did it because i was the only person there that he didn't full know. he's now threatening me to pay him 300 dollars or else he is going to call the cops and file a police report. i was wondering if this is actually blackmail and was also wondering what action i should take to protect myself in this case?

does a letter have to be signed for it to be used in blackmail

I was engaged in a affair with a married woman. It was only one time that we had sex. We are both in the military and according to the military we both have committed adultery. She has some information on me about another situation that does not evolve her from months ago. She has threatened to turn me in for my previous actions and for sleeping with her unless I pay her money. She asked for 5000 dollars for pain and suffering. when I told her that I do not have that she dropped the price down to 1900 dollars for now and i could give her the rest when tax season comes. I really do not have this money and plus I do not want her to have control of my life. She also has threatened to tell my girl friend about what happened between her and I. I have sent all the text messages to my email so that I can print them for evidence. What exactly should I do.

For those who are being blackmailed...No matter what you've done, wouldn't it be better to take your chances with the police? At least when you are done probation, or your time, you are done. When you let someone have control over you like that, it goes on indefinitely. Go to the police, and get the blackmailer out of your life. Whatever you might think, the police don't have a personal stake in what's going on, so when it's over, it's over. Doesn't that sound better than being under the yoke of some controlling person for the rest of your life? It will get so bad with the blackmailer that eventually you will think that what the police have in store for you isn't so bad. Take responsibility, and do the right thing. It won't hurt as much as you think it will.

One of my friends was in a female homosexual relationship.

Her ex-partner took detailed nude photos of herself for her at the time. My friend still has these photos. Now, it just so happens that her ex is showing up in the same places as my friend with her new husband.

We think she's doing this on purpose by reading my friend's online journal of events she's going to.

My friend wants to tell her ex "I still enjoy those pictures you sent me."

Would this be consider black mail, considering it is a possibly threat that she may expose those pictures if she doesn't stop antagonizing her?

blackmail is a crime. i would call the police. document the threats-- i.e., taping the person, getting them to put it in an email. you may have to get clever to do this.

I just read this post after doing a google search for black mail. I have never posted anything before but I am at a loss of what to do. I am being black mailed by my "current" boyfriend only because he is very good at using every weakness against me to keep me in a relationship that isn't working. When I leave I get threats. Finally when I thought I had left him peacefully he filed an injunction against ME and my SON who is already in Jail for something unrelated. He has a tape he has been using against me and when I broke it off he took it to the state attorney with the injunction. I had originally purchased a recorder because he had threatened to kill me and himself. Unfortunately the tape in now being used against me as it has incriminating statements that can hurt my son. He stole the tape from me one day and every time I try to leave he threatens me with it. He knows that my youngest son is my weakness. I told him that my son has real hatred towards him and I cannot be with him. That is when he did take the tape to the state attorney. If I give in to him he will still use it again the next time he does not get his way.He wants to get back together and says he will drop charges etc. but will not give me the tape.

I was dating this individual and committed a crime against the him. I forged his signature on some checks. He found out about it a couple of months back. Now he controls me with threats of going to police. If i try to leave his house he threatens to call the police. When I am not there he will call me hundreds of times a day and threaten the police if I don't answer. He is even physically violent. Is he black mailing me? What do I do to solve this?