The Schwarzschild spacetime is for electromagnetic waves like a nonuniform medium with a varying refraction index. A fraction of an outgoing radiation scatters off the curvature of the geometry and can be intercepted by a gravitational center. The amount of the intercepted energy is bounded above by the backscattered energy of an initially outgoing pulse of electromagnetic radiation, which in turn depends on the initial energy, the Schwarzschild radius and the pulse location. Its magnitude depends on the frequency spectrum: it becomes negligible in the short wave limit but can be significant in the long wave regime.

PACS numbers: 04.30.Nk, 04.40.Nr, 95.30.Sf