My anti-scam sisters and I put together these tips for you. They are based on our collective experience with romance scammers.
Every single day, romance scammers claim more and more victims. It is a horrendous crime. It affects men, women, and all age groups. It is safe to say that no one is immune. Anyone can be lonely or situationally vulnerable.
How to Avoid Becoming Prey to Romance Scammers
Romance scams are the most common form of fraud today. While you can’t always pinpoint whether a person is one or not, in the beginning, you can do a few things to avoid becoming a victim.
Be Aware of What You Share Online
These days, we share our lives with such details online. Unfortunately, this has become the norm, but there are dangers to doing so. Here’s what you should not share online, even if it is your private account.
1- Do Not Share Personal Information
Avoid sharing your email address, phone number or your home address with anyone.
- Do not share photos of your street with a signpost exposing the street’s name.
- Do not share photos of yourself with a name tag or uniform that has your full name on it.
- The same goes for your children. Do not share photos of your children wearing school uniforms with the name of their school.
Scammers may put the two together and use this against you.
2- Don’t Post Too Much Personal Information Online
Limit public information about yourself to help deter a potential scammer.
Romance scammers will carefully study your profile. They will learn about your likes and dislikes and ensure they sync perfectly. This is called ‘mirroring’; they will use it to gain your trust.
This is just one of the common tactics they use; by providing too much information about yourself, you essentially help them with their homework.
3- Never Give out Financial Details
If your online romance interest is incessantly asking about how much money you make, whether or not you own a house or how much money you have in your savings account, there is a good chance you are dating a romance scammer. Never, ever share financial information with anyone.
4- Keep Your Social Media Accounts Private
If your social media accounts are not set to private, you may be willingly handing over personal information to a potential scammer. Even if your accounts are private, it is a good idea not to share too much personal information. Don’t accept friend requests from people you don’t know.
5- Do Not Share Personal Photos or Videos
Scammers blackmail their victims by threatening to post their private photos or videos online to extort money. This is called sextortion, and even children can be victims of this.
In some cases, even your decent photos can be manipulated by using AI and turned into pornographic material.
This was recently showcased by Laura McClur, a New Zealand MP, by holding up a fake nude photo of herself in parliament to draw attention to AI-generated deepfake pornography. You can read about it here.
Verify Identities
People you meet on social media or dating sites may not be who they claim to be. Before things get more serious, you need to verify their identity. Here are some ways to achieve that:
1- Do a Reverse Image Search
Romance scammers use stolen photos of innocent people. However, there is a quick way to find out if they are who they say they are. You could do that by doing an online reverse image search.
Here are the online resources that you can use in different ways to do a reverse image search:
FaceCheckID
Google Images
PimEyes
TinEye
Yandex
Bing
2- Video Chat to Verify Their Identity
Romance scammers use stolen pictures of innocent individuals, making it almost impossible to video chat with them. This has always been a dead giveaway that they are not who they say they are. Well-equipped scammers will use deepfakes to prove themselves, but as for the others, there will always be an excuse. Their camera may be broken, or the signal may be weak.
Here are the online resources that you can use in different ways to check deep-fake videos or detect AI voice recordings:
To check deep-fake videos, use:
ScannerDeepware
To detect AI voice recordings use:
VoiceClassifier
3- Meeting In-Person
If you have met a potential partner on a dating website and feel comfortable meeting in person, this would be a good way to verify their identity. However, there are circumstances in which the person you have been in a relationship with may use a fake name or be married. Anna Rowe’s situation exemplifies this type of in-person romance scam.
4- Do an Online Search
You could search for their name or details online to see if they match the person they claim to be. I personally searched for an emergency doctor in San Jose with the name he gave me and could not find any trace of him. Because he was not an emergency doctor in San Jose, he was, in fact, a scammer from Nigeria.
5- Ask Them for a Picture or Video Doing Something Specific
They may have plenty of photo-shopped pictures or pre-prepared videos to make you believe they are real, but if you ask them to do something specific, they get caught off guard and fail to deliver. That’s when you know you are talking to a romance scammer.
I remember asking a so-called military person stationed in Yemen to record his voice with his beautiful American accent — he claimed to be from the US — and send it to me. He told me he couldn’t do it because he was with his team members. How would he talk to me on Instagram if he were with his team members? Scammers do not like being challenged, and this one in particular did not like it.
Other Key Safety Measures to Consider
Before we get to the most common part of romance scams — asking for money, that is — there are other safety measures you need to consider to safeguard yourself against romance scammers.
Follow Your Instincts
Romance scammers are expert manipulators. Once they pinpoint your vulnerabilities, likes, and dislikes, as well as who in the past treated you badly, they create a persona to fill these gaps and present themselves as a perfect personality.
They present themselves as perfect lovers who are overly attentive, considerate, trustworthy and kind.
You know the saying…
If it feels too good to be true, it probably is.
Listen to your gut feelings, follow your instincts. Listen to that nagging feeling behind everything.
Never Fall for the Fastest “I’m Falling in Love with You”
Normal people do not fall in love with someone they have never met in person so soon.
In some cases, your online romance scammer professes their love for you in a matter of days. How is that possible?
Based on the information they gathered about you, they now know all about your weak spots, and they are playing to get to the finish line: your wallet.
The lies they tell you:
- They say they have found their soulmate or missing rib.
- They say they have never felt like this before.
They say all the right things, but it is all part of their game. Do not fall for it.
Never Send Money
The ultimate goal of romance scams is to obtain money from their victims. If someone you have never met in person asks for money, this is a big red flag and should be avoided at all costs.
It’s important to note that romance scammers initially ask for small amounts of money, such as a gift card, Steam card, or iTunes card. However, at the same time, they continue to groom you into sending more.
The other scenario is that they ask for money because of a crisis. Perhaps a loved one is in the hospital or dying. If you love children, the loved one will be more likely to be a child. Romance scammers will usually find a way of pulling on your heartstrings because it’s an easier way to get your money.
Another common theme behind romance scams is that they are from a Western country and have to live overseas for now.
The reasons for them living in another country may vary. They may be working on an oil rig or deployed in a war zone under the UN, or have signed a contract to build roads in another country.
In my case, my scammer claimed to be working as an emergency doctor at a gas rig in my home country.
Whatever the reason, never send money to someone you have never met in person.
As a final note, let me tell you this: Educate yourself because that’s the only protection you have against scams.
