Who is Muhammad Zain Ul Abideen Rasheed, a Pakistani-Australian man jailed for global sextortion?

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A 29-year-old Pakistani-Australian man, Muhammad Zain Ul Abideen Rasheed, has been sentenced to 17 years in prison for posing as a teenage YouTube celebrity to exploit children and young adults online.

Rasheed posed as a 15-year-old social media influencer with a large following, targeting children in Australia and internationally. He pleaded guilty to 119 charges relating to 286 victims from 20 countries, including the UK, US, Japan and France, with two-thirds of his victims under the age of 16.

Australian Federal Police Assistant Commissioner David McLean described Rasheed’s actions as “appalling” and highlighted his complete disregard for the misery, humiliation and fear he caused his victims. He called it “one of the most appalling cases of sextortion ever prosecuted in Australia.”

Rasheed would use photos of the alleged celebrity to approach children online, gaining their trust by first asking them simple questions. If they did not engage in increasingly intense sexual activity, sometimes involving pets, younger family members or other young people, he would threaten to share screenshots of their responses with friends and family.

During Tuesday’s sentencing hearing in the WA District Court, Judge Amanda Burrows noted that there was “no comparable case… that I can find in Australia” due to the sheer number of offences, as reported by ABD. Rasheed had threatened to share screenshots of the children’s reactions with their friends and family unless they complied with increasingly extreme sexual demands.

Judge Burrows described the offences as “of a degrading, humiliating nature… particularly horrific.” Rasheed was convicted of 665 offences committed over an 11-month period, involving 286 victims.

A psychiatrist’s report presented in court detailed Rasheed’s background, noting that he moved to Australia from Pakistan at a young age. His parents were described as “traditional, conservative and strict” and he attended an all-boys private school where he and his brothers were the only Muslim pupils, leading to social isolation. Rasheed began accessing child exploitation material in 2018, escalating to direct child offences in 2019 after the material “became ineffective”.