And when I went on Twitter later in the day, I saw that a bunch of people I follow had also been hit up by this sextortion email. On the personal side, two of my best friends - one who lives in DC and one who lives in Europe - also received the email. Instead, I shared the email with my group chats, both personal and professional. It’s called a “sextortion” email and it’s almost always a phishing attempt filled with false threats.

I work for a security company and know that this type of email is common.I take precautions with the webcams on my laptops.Now, obviously, I didn’t click on the included attachment. He demanded I pay him in Bitcoin within “forty-eight h” to “save your prestige in the sight of men.” He also threatened that if I “neglect” his demand, the video tape of me would be “world heritage on the internet.” The sender claimed that he’d been watching me “by means of ur camera” and that he had images and intimate videos of me. I clicked on it and the text was…explicit. Usually emails like that go straight to my spam folder, but this one didn’t - so I was intrigued! What could have gotten past the (usually very good) Gmail spam filter? The subject line was my name, including my initial, with improper capitalization. I received an email a couple of months ago from an unknown sender.

But I’m going to come clean, here, to you - the Avast readership - so that the blackmailer will no longer have power over me. Plus, what to do if you receive a sextortion email yourself (hint: don't pay the ransom)

Extortion emails