Online extremist groups exploiting, blackmailing youth: Winnipeg police

Children as young as preteens are being targeted by violent online extremist groups who want “the destruction of society,” according to the Winnipeg Police Service.

Young people are being targeted on social media and messaging platforms, such as Discord, Snapchat, TikTok and the e-gaming platform Steam. Online gaming spaces, including Roblox and Minecraft, as well as other sites frequented by children and teenagers, are also used as spaces for predators to find their young victims, police said.

Nihilist violent extremist groups, including the Com Network’s 764, MKY and O9A groups, as well as the True Crime Community (TCC), “are deliberately targeting vulnerable children and youth online. Their stated objective is not ideological change, but the destruction of society,” Const. Claude Chancy, a Winnipeg Police Service (WPS) public information officer, told reporters Friday.

Any kid willing to do what the predators tell them to is allowed to join, but some are more likely to be sought out.

Chancy said predators look for vulnerable kids who feel insecure and share those feelings online. Specifically, youth posting about body image issues, mental health struggles or being neurodivergent are targeted.

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“Predators exploit these voluntary online disclosures by fabricating shared experiences to build false trust, then systematically introduce victims to increasingly violent and disturbing material, including child sexual abuse material, animal torture and gore, as part of a deliberate desensitization process,” the constable said.

The youth are eventually taken into private online spaces. Once alone, predators intensify the grooming to collect blackmail, Chancy said.

Those materials can include videos of the young person hurting themselves, their siblings or their pets. Children are also being asked to vandalize areas with hate-driven graffiti, police said.

Sometimes this abuse is livestreamed, Chancy added.

“Extortion here is not used for financial gain. It is a tool used to extract more material and ultimately push victims towards taking their own lives or the lives of others,” Chancy said.

Const. Andrea Lefort, the WPS expert in the field of violent extremism, said it is important to take the threats seriously as they are occurring everywhere, not just in Winnipeg.

“We are seeing acts of violence that are happening in real life that are originating in online spaces, sometimes involving people locally,” Lefort said.

Police said some Winnipeg kids have been victimized but did not provide further details on the ongoing investigations.

“We can’t arrest our way out of this problem,” Lefort said.

No specific gender is sought out more often, but what the predators ask for varies. Girls may be asked for intimate images, whereas boys are targeted for money, she said.

“It’s the thing that they hold over the kid’s head to force them to keep committing these acts that they don’t want to do,” Lefort continued.

Police say they have identified some signs to differentiate between typical teenage angst and the emotional turmoil of dealing with violence and online pressures.

“This isn’t just a child that’s maybe breaking curfew or that seems a little sad or a little bit down. We’re talking about children that are having a complete change in their behaviour,” Lefort said.

Parents might notice their child’s emotions intensify. Others may show an unusual desperation to reconnect to the web, where the extremist groups exist, she added.

Police said they will continue working with emergency services, school districts and the HSC Children’s Hospital to share information and work to stop the online abuse.