A 17-year-old boy died by suicide hours after being scammed. The FBI says it’s a part of a troubling increase in ‘sextortion’ instances.

Within hours, the 17-year-old, straight-A student and Boy Scout had died by suicide.

"Anyone reached out to him pretending to be a lady, and so they started a dialog," his mother, Pauline Stuart, instructed CNN, combating back tears as she described what happened to her son days after she and Ryan had completed visiting a number of colleges he was considering attending after graduating highschool.

The web conversation shortly grew intimate, and then turned prison.

The scammer -- posing as a young girl -- sent Ryan a nude picture after which requested Ryan to share an explicit picture of himself in return. Immediately after Ryan shared an intimate picture of his personal, the cybercriminal demanded $5,000, threatening to make the picture public and ship it to Ryan's family and pals.

The San Jose, California, teen told the cybercriminal he couldn't pay the full quantity, and the demand was ultimately lowered to a fraction of the original determine -- $150. But after paying the scammers from his school financial savings, Stuart mentioned, "They stored demanding more and more and placing numerous continued stress on him."

At the time, Stuart knew none of what her son was experiencing. She discovered the small print after regulation enforcement investigators reconstructed the events main as much as his loss of life.

She had said goodnight to Ryan at 10 p.m., and described him as her normally completely happy son. By 2 a.m., he had been scammed, and taken his life. Ryan left behind a suicide observe describing how embarrassed he was for himself and the household.

"He really, truly thought in that point that there wasn't a solution to get by if those footage were truly posted on-line," Pauline said. "His notice confirmed he was absolutely terrified. No little one ought to have to be that scared."

Law enforcement calls the scam "sextortion," and investigators have seen an explosion in complaints from victims main the FBI to ramp up a marketing campaign to warn parents from coast to coast.

The bureau says there were over 18,000 sextortion-related complaints in 2021, with losses in excess of $13 million. The FBI says the use of child pornography by criminals to lure suspects additionally constitutes a serious crime.

The investigation into Final's case is ongoing, Stuart and the FBI tell CNN.

"To be a legal that specifically targets kids -- it is one of the extra deeper violations of trust I think in society," says FBI Supervisory Particular Agent Dan Costin, who leads a workforce of investigators working to counter crimes in opposition to kids.

According to Costin, most of the sextortion scams reported to the FBI are decided to be from criminals on the African continent and in Southeast Asia. Federal investigators are working with their legislation enforcement counterparts around the globe, Costin mentioned, to assist identify and arrest perpetrators who're concentrating on youngsters on-line.

One problem for the FBI: many victims of sextortion do not report the incidents to legislation enforcement.

"The embarrassment piece of that is probably one of many larger hurdles that the victims have to beat," said Costin. "It can be rather a lot, especially in that moment."

But investigators urge victims to quickly contact legislation enforcement, both on-line or at their local FBI field office.

Medical specialists say there's a key reason why younger males are particularly vulnerable to sextortion-related scams.

"Teen brains are nonetheless growing," said Dr. Scott Hadland, chief of adolescent drugs at Mass General in Boston. "So when one thing catastrophic occurs, like a personal picture is launched to people online, it is laborious for them to look past that moment and understand that in the huge scheme of issues they're going to have the ability to get via this."

Hadland said there are steps parents can take to assist safeguard their youngsters from on-line harm.

"A very powerful factor that a mother or father should do with their teen is attempt to understand what they're doing online," she said. "You need to know once they're logging on, who they're interacting with, what platforms they're using. Are they being approached by people who they don't know, are they experiencing pressure to share info or photographs?"

Hadland mentioned it is also crucial that parents particularly warn teens of scams like sextortion, with out shaming them.

"You need to make it clear that they'll speak to you if they've performed one thing, or they really feel like they've made a mistake," he said.

Ryan's mother agrees.

"It is advisable talk to your youngsters as a result of we have to make them aware of it," Stuart said.

Nonetheless grieving the lack of her son, she is channeling her household's pain into action, and honoring Ryan by talking out and telling his story. She hopes that doing so will help save lives.

"How may these individuals take a look at themselves in the mirror understanding that $150 is extra vital than a toddler's life?" she says. "There isn't any other word but 'evil' for me that they care way more about cash than a child's life. I do not need anyone else to undergo what we did."