How to Identify a Predator on Snapchat
Social media platforms geared toward children and teenagers, like Snapchat, are often hubs for adult online predators looking to interact with, groom, and exploit children. Snapchat is currently facing numerous lawsuits from parents and state Attorneys General nationwide for failing to protect young users from predators and failing to adequately warn parents of the app’s potential for child sexual abuse.
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Author: Kathryn Kosmides
Survivor Advocate
- Snapchat, a photo-based social media platform popular with children, teenagers, and young adults, has come under fire in recent years for a lackluster safety system that allegedly failed to protect minors from online predators.
- At least two states have sued Snapchat, in addition to dozens of parents and families, for enabling online grooming and extortion.
- It’s crucial for parents to speak with their children about appropriate social media interactions and the warning signs that online users may not be who they seem.
Snapchat is a social media app with nearly 1 billion active monthly users, including over 100 million in the U.S. Nearly half of those users are between 15 and 25 years old, with some even younger. Unfortunately, the platform is popular among child predators because it enables them to contact minor users and exchange sexually explicit messages and content. Because Snapchat photos and messages disappear after a certain time period, it can be difficult for investigators to gather evidence when grooming or extortion occurs.
Parents often miss the signs that their children are being groomed or sexually abused, even in seemingly harmless conversations. For this reason, it’s important to understand the warning signs of online grooming and sexual exploitation.
If your child has been groomed or otherwise sexually exploited on Snapchat, you have legal rights and options for holding the responsible parties accountable.
How to Identify A Predator On Snapchat
In most cases, predators on Snapchat reach out to a child to begin grooming by setting up a fake account and posing as a child or teenager of a similar age. They then get to know the child by chatting about innocuous subjects, then move to more personal information before beginning a sexual conversation. They may then coerce the child into sending sexually explicit photos and videos of themself.
On social media, children and parents should know that safe people will not ask for personal information, share or request inappropriate images, start sexual conversations, threaten or blackmail you, ask to meet in person, or ask you to keep secrets. The following are some common signals that a user is a predator.
Using a filtered or edited photo—or no photo at all—to appear younger
Adult predators looking to groom children online often pose as a child or teen of a similar age. On Snapchat, users can create a digital avatar, or Bitmoji, that can look vastly different and much younger than the user actually is. Adult users posing as teens may also use language that seems to be above or below the age they claim to be.
Asking questions and using excessive flattery to build trust
Conversations with online predators may start innocently but quickly turn to probing questions about the victim’s life, such as whether they play sports, what grade they’re in, family life, and more. These conversations may lead to excessive compliments, flattery, boundary pushing, and making the minor feel guilty for attempting to set boundaries.
Offering gifts
Online predators may offer a child gifts as grooming begins, including gifts that may be inappropriate for the child’s age.
Asking for photos
While such exchanges may begin innocently, if the child complies with the predator’s initial request for photos, the predator may begin asking for photos of a more intimate or overtly sexual nature.
Extortion or blackmail
Predators may use the information provided to them by the victim to extort or blackmail the victim for further photos or videos. They may also tell the victim to keep the nature of their relationship a secret.
Unfortunately, sextortion is all too common on social media sites like Snapchat. In February 2026, an adult man from Georgia pled guilty to computer fraud, extortion, and cyberstalking after tricking hundreds of young victims into giving him control of their Snapchat and Instagram accounts. He then accessed their private images and videos and threatened to release the content if the children did not comply with his demands for sexually explicit material or money.
Signs From A Child That They’re Being Groomed
Online grooming occurs when someone builds an emotional connection with a child or teenager through the internet, often to exploit them sexually, emotionally, or otherwise. Signs of online grooming include the following:
- Being secretive about online conversations
- Isolating themselves and pulling away from friends and family
- Downloading new messaging apps
- Receiving unexpected gifts
- Not telling you where they went or who they were with
What Can Parents Do To Help Keep Their Child Safe?
Parents are the first and most important defense in protecting their children from online predators. They must understand what’s happening in the online environment and monitor their children’s social media accounts.
It’s critical for parents to know what to do if their child is targeted by a predator on snapchat. First, it is important for parents to talk to their children early and often about the dangers of talking to strangers on Snapchat and other social media sites, as well as giving out personal information like school names, home addresses, and frequent hangout spots. On Snapchat, use parental controls to privatize your child’s account and disable location sharing.
Steps To Take After Identifying A Predator On Snapchat
After identifying a predator on Snapchat, you can report messages or users in the Snapchat app by pressing and holding on the message or user and tapping “Report.”
Additionally, you can report the predator to law enforcement by calling 911 or the Know2Protect Tipline at 833-591-KNOW.
Hiring A Child Sexual Abuse Lawyer
If your child was groomed, sexually exploited, or otherwise abused on Snapchat by an adult online predator, you may have legal grounds to file a lawsuit against Snapchat for failing to protect your child.
Speak with an experienced child sexual abuse attorney about online grooming lawsuits as soon as possible to understand your options.
Statistics About Predators On Snapchat
In 2024, internal Snapchat documents revealed that the company ignored internal concerns over the app’s potential harm to minors, including sextortion, exploitation, and more. One internal email showed that the company received about 10,000 reports of sextortion per month, and one account had 75 complaints against it, but was not taken down. Snapchat allegedly decided that addressing child grooming would be too expensive and create privacy issues.
As early as 2017, law enforcement identified Snapchat as the pedophile’s go-to sexual exploitation tool. According to the F.B.I., over 50 percent of the victims of online sexual exploitation are between the ages of 12 and 15. In over a quarter of all reported exploitation incidents, the online predator will ask a child for sexually explicit photos of themselves.
According to one study, U.K. police reported that Snapchat was used in nearly half of the offenses involving communications with children.
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