Hackers are hunting for your private photos, FBI warns: 6 ways to avoid a sextortion nightmare

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ZDNET's key takeaways

• Hackers are stealing and selling explicit photos from social media accounts.
• The hackers use social engineering and other tactics to gain access.
• Avoid posting any such images and watch out for potential hacking attempts.

Storing sexually explicit photos of yourself on social media or personal accounts is never a great idea. That's especially true now as the FBI is warning about hackers stealing and selling such images.

In an advisory published on Monday, the FBI said that sexual exploitation hackers are targeting both adults and minors by illegally hacking into their social media and personal accounts to grab explicit images. From there, the attackers sell the images on the dark web, often accompanied by personal details such as the victim's name, date of birth, email address, and phone number.

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