The hackers coerced the company into paying a ransom.
Tips
usage
yāo is bound — it doesn't stand alone in modern Mandarin. You'll meet it almost exclusively inside 要求 (demand / require / request) and 要挟 (coerce / blackmail). The shared thread is forceful asking: insisting on something rather than simply wanting it.
mistakes
First-tone yāo, not fourth-tone yào. The everyday verb 要 (want / will / important) is fourth tone, but inside 要求 and 要挟 the reading flips to yāo. Mispronouncing 要求 as yàoqiú is a classic learner slip.
Top piece is the 覀 covering form of 西 and is the entry's indexing radical. Originally a drawing of a woman's hands on her hips at the waist, the top has visually converged on the 西/覀 pattern, which is how the dictionary now files this character.
Bottom 女 anchors the original meaning: a woman's body, with the upper hands-on-hips covering. From the body-part sense 要 extended to want, demand, must — the things a person grasps at the waist of their need.
