A teenager from New York had been a victim of cyber-bullying and online intimidation, a situation that led him to commit suicide.
The family of 15-year-old Riley K. Basford says their son was tricked into sharing “private” photos of himself on social media. The teenager thought he was sending the photos to a girl, but he was actually the victim of a scammer.
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After receiving the photos, the scammer threatened to post them online and send them to Basford's family and friends. To avoid this, the teenager had to pay him $3,500.
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The victim's family says Riley was "bombarded" with threats via Facebookbefore deciding to end his life in Potsdam, New York, on March 30.
"I start to cry when I think about the panic and the pain my baby went through to make this decision and when I think that someone out there in the world doesn't even care about what he did to him," Basford's mother, Mary Rodee, said. "It's so sick and I want everyone to know that."
Basford's family said that the teen's last morning was a typical breakfast. The young victim fed the family's animals, spent time with his relatives, and visited his dentist.
But at noon, the teen began receiving threatening messages via social media. Within a few hours, he was dead.
"They kept bombarding him and bombarding him, and finally he snapped," said Riley's father, Darren Basford. "He thought it was the only way out, because he didn't want to be embarrassed."
Basford's mother said her son had shown no signs of mental illness before his suicide. She described his actions as the result of "a moment of madness, in a young brain that couldn't process the final outcome of the decision he made."
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Basford's father warned parents to keep a close eye on their children online and on social media. "You need to talk to your kids about all the social media, know who they're talking to and teach kids to understand who they're talking to," he said.
Source: Infosecurity Magazine
