How to avoid being swindled by an online romance scammer hoping to woo you to ruin #nigeria | #nigeriascams | #lovescams


The story of Cindy Tsai — the Newton lawyer who told the Herald how she was taken for $2.5 million by an online scammer who gained her trust as she was dying of cancer — is not an isolated one, but a tragic example in the burgeoning romance scam racket, where the silver-tongued, sophisticated con artists of old have moved online.

Courtesy Cindy Tsai

Cindy Tsai undergoing treatment for cancer. (Courtesy Cindy Tsai)

Internet users have come a long way from the nascent days of the ’90s internet, when a sudden email from a “Nigerian prince” or similar character would crop up, duping the recipient into emptying their bank account to help the would-be royal out of some complicated financial jam for a promised exchange of tremendous monetary reward.

Netflix’s doc, “The Tinder Swindler,” which came out in February, detailed the story of the Israeli conman Simon Leviev who’s alleged to have used dating app Tinder to hook up with women looking for love only to emotionally manipulate them into taking out massive loans to support him. They thought he was in danger and needed the money, but their debt just bankrolled the elite lifestyle he lived and used to woo his next mark. Its popularity has helped bring the sophistication of the modern con to light.

The job of a scammer has always been to stay one step ahead of their possible marks, and in the modern age that means taking the personal touch of the old-fashioned street con and translating it into the modern world of global social media.

Victims of romance scams broken down into age brackets. While the “over 60” age group has the largest share, that is the fastest-growing segment of the population as the nation ages, according to U.S. Census data. The FBI said the typical victim of these crimes is in their 40s. (Federal Bureau of Investigation)

“Individuals who are looking for love and companionship are the target victims of romance scams, and anyone at any time can become a victim,” FBI Boston spokeswoman Kristen Setera told the Herald. “Typically, the perpetrators are men targeting women over 40 who are divorced, widowed, elderly or disabled. But scammers do not discriminate. The scam usually starts with an ‘innocent’ contact online and builds from there.”

Victims of online romance scams are second only to victims of email account compromise scams, a scam that primarily affects business email addresses. In those scams, the criminal often spoofs an email address the target does business with often — for example, switching just one letter in an email address of a representative of a supply company and sending a phony invoice to a target that outlays instructions for depositing the payment into a new bank account the scammer controls.

In Massachusetts last year, 553 people reported being victimized by a compromised email scam to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center, or IC3, collectively losing more than $61.7 million.

While that’s the largest internet scam, romance and confidence scams represent one of the fastest growing fraud categories. There were 415 reported victims of online romance or confidence scams in Massachusetts, according to IC3 data, who collectively lost nearly $21.8 million — that’s an average loss of just over $52,500.

Year over year, the number of victims of romance scams jumped 15% in 2020, to 361, but their losses shot up by a whopping 63% to over $8 million.

Those personal losses are one thing, but Setera warns that your money could inadvertently wind up financing other criminal activities.

Wooed to ruin: How to avoid being swindled by a romance scammer

There are common-sense steps you can take to avoid becoming a victim and adding your story to these growing statistics.

  • If you’re a high-earning professional, especially one with an advanced degree — which was roughly 14% of the U.S. population in 2021, according to the U.S. Census Bureau — be on high alert. Romance and confidence scammers are particularly attracted to this class, according to the volunteer-run Global Anti-Scam Organization.
  • Be wary of sharing personal information even before you interact with someone online, as “scammers can use the information that’s shared on social media and dating sites to better understand and target you,” Setera said.
  • The same holds doubly true for financial information: “You should also never disclose your current financial status to people you don’t know or trust. Don’t provide your banking information, Social Security number, or any other sensitive information to anyone you haven’t met, or to a website that you don’t know is legitimate,” Setera said.
  • Trust in the old adage, “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.” If your recent online fling suddenly begins hounding you about money opportunities with promises of great returns, get out. If the person persists despite your discomfort, learn from Tsai’s mistake and trust that the red flags are, in fact cause for concern. Here are some examples:
  • Inconsistency in the possible scammer’s behavior. The UK arm of Equifax, the credit bureau, gave an example of a scammer claiming to have a college education but consistently using poor spelling and grammar in their communications.
  • Watch out for a possible love interest moving too quickly in the love category. Are you in a place in life where you’re more susceptible to flattery or attention? Take a skeptical look toward any sudden adoration. Also be wary of attempts to quickly move the conversation off the initial app or website.
  • Finally, many advisers recommend the more technical step of performing a reverse image search of photos your possible scammer has sent you. You can upload an image to a search engine like Google or Bing or the website Tineye.com to see if it has cropped up elsewhere online. If you find out it’s a stock photo or a photo of someone else, then immediately leave the situation.

If you feel you are being scammed or have already lost money to an online romance scammer, Setera said you should alert your financial institution immediately and file a complaint at IC3.gov.

A chart prepared by the FBI detailing the rise in cybercrimes over the last several years. This chart depicts all categories of internet scams, not just romance scams. (Federal Bureau of Investigation)



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