What does blackmailer mean?
A blackmailer is a person who extracts money, property, or obedience from someone by holding a threat over them — most often the threat of revealing secrets, but sometimes the threat of physical harm or other damage. The term derives from 'blackmail', an older word for payments extorted under menace, historically associated with Scottish border raiders. Blackmailers are universally viewed with disapproval: the word carries strongly criminal and predatory connotations and is used in law enforcement reports, legal discussion, journalism, and fiction alike. Typical collocations include paying off a blackmailer, exposing a blackmailer, and falling victim to a blackmailer. The word is useful precisely because it names the agent of a specific kind of coercion, distinguishing the perpetrator from the act itself, which is called blackmail.
nounA person who obtains money, goods, or compliance from someone by threatening to reveal damaging information about them or to harm them in some way.
- A person who extorts money or favors from someone by threatening to expose embarrassing or damaging information about them.
- More broadly, anyone who coerces others through threats of harm, exposure, or retaliation.
"The journalist refused to be intimidated when the blackmailer threatened to publish her private correspondence."
"Detectives finally tracked down the blackmailer after months of anonymous threats."
"In the novel, a cunning blackmailer squeezes money out of a politician by threatening to leak his letters."
Regular countable plural; used when referring to multiple individuals engaged in blackmail.
"Investigators believe two blackmailers were working together."
The word comes from the 'black mail' — rent once extorted from Scottish farmers by reivers who demanded payment not in silver ('white mail') but in cattle or grain.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Etymology of blackmailer
Blackmailer is formed from 'blackmail', which emerged in 16th-century Scotland and northern England to describe rent or tribute extorted from farmers by border raiders — so called because payment was made in goods such as cattle rather than in 'white mail', or silver coin. The suffix '-er' simply denotes the agent who commits this extortion. Cognate formations using the same '-er' pattern appear throughout English for agents of named practices.
Related word forms
How blackmailer is actually used
Always negative in connotation; the word implies deliberate, ongoing coercion rather than a one-off threat. It is standard in both formal and informal contexts and appears frequently in crime fiction, legal reporting, and journalism.
Easily confused with blackmailer
'Blackmail' is the practice or the act itself (or the money extracted), while 'blackmailer' is the person who carries it out.