London member of ‘Com’ network convicted of making indecent images of children

Richard Ehiemere, 21, an East London member of a “Com” network linked to the blackmailing of young teenage girls, was convicted Tuesday on charges of fraud and making indecent images of children.

According to the United Kingdom’s National Crime Agency (NCA), Ehiemere appeared on their radar after they received a referral from chatroom platform Discord back in 2021, when he was 17 years old.

The NCA said Discord was concerned about a group calling itself CVLT, which Ehiemere was linked to. The group was described as “a form of 'Com' network, which are typically made up of young males who share harmful and misogynistic content, and commit a range of online offences.”

Com networks generally operate independently from some of the more established and commercialized cybercrime ecosystems — although as the FBI warned last year, some groups have coordinated with Russian ransomware gangs. Some law enforcement agencies refer to the culture as “The Com.”

CVLT members “targeted girls on social media platforms such as Discord. They used online monikers to communicate and persuade them to send intimate photos of themselves. Members threatened to 'dox' their victims, which involves revealing real-world identities and publishing other personal information online, in order to coerce them into complying with their demands,” stated the NCA.

“CVLT victims would often be targeted by one member of the group who would persuade them to send intimate images of themselves, either by coercion or consent. This material would then be used by the wider group to blackmail the victim into sending increasingly extreme content.

“Girls were forced to join group calls, where they would be instructed to carry out sexual acts and acts of self-harm for their audience. In severe cases, vulnerable victims were encouraged to kill themselves on camera,” said the NCA.

According to the agency, an account using the moniker #Retaliate#1337 had “disclosed stolen email addresses and passwords, known as  ‘combo lists’” to CVLT channels in more than 380 separate log-ins that were traced back to Ehiemere’s home address, where he was arrested in April 2021.

Police seized his mobile phone and a computer tower, discovering 142 “combo lists” as well as 29 indecent images of children alongside conversations “relating to hacking, selling unlawfully obtained material and how to avoid detection.”

Steve Laval, the senior investigating officer at the NCA's National Cyber Crime Unit, said Ehiemere “was a key enabler for this harmful online group, providing stolen data which they could use to defraud hundreds of victims.

“The NCA and policing are committed to reducing the threat caused by Com networks through working with industry to identify groups, pursuing their members or those linked to them, as well as raising awareness with parents and educators to help them spot deviant behavior,” said Laval.