Finding love online comes with risks.
But you probably already know this. I damn well hope so anyway. If not, consider yourself warned.
If you haven’t tried online dating yet or are rather new to it, then you won’t be thinking that you have to watch out for the fakes and cons and scam artists. But you very much do have to.
Not everyone is who they appear to be online. I feel silly for even typing that out because I think it would be common knowledge. But it isn’t. They made a show based on people’s naivety and Dr. Phil *still* has women going on his show thinking they’ve found love and a loved one wrote in to Phil begging him to help their family member see the truth about the “love of their life.” It’s sad. And these women lose tens of thousands of dollars because they didn’t stop to think for a minute.
I have swiped on quite a few catfishers in my almost two years online. Nobody got the better of me though because I literally read every website and article I could on this once I got wind of what was going on. I armed myself with knowledge and you should too.
I talk a lot about this in my upcoming book, so I’ll keep this short here.
If a guy seems too good to be real, he is 99.9% of the time.
If he asks for money and starts calling you baby and love almost right away, he’s likely a scammer from Nigeria (where a large portion of these scams take place).
If he says he’s in the military and can’t get away yet unless you help him with funds for a variety of reasons, he’s likely a scammer. Military romance scams are the fastest growing and largest online dating romance scam going on. Read this website for how to protect yourself: http://www.cid.army.mil/romancescam.html
No guy will start professing his love for you and tell you he wants a soulmate and wants to marry you within a few weeks of getting to know you. Think about it: Men don’t talk or act like that!! We can barely get them to agree to go on a friggin’ date lol or be monogamous. That’s a typical guy, not the guy saying he wants the heart of his heart and love of his love … within a week.
These scammers play on your heart strings. They KNOW you are lonely and want love and will likely pay to keep it. So he gives a sob story about needing money in hopes your love for him is strong enough to have you send it to him. DO NOT.
Run his image through a Google image search or https://tineye.com to see if his image pops up elsewhere online. If no matches come up, MAYBE this guy is for real. Maybe. Dig around. Check Facebook, verify facts he gives you. If he’s vague, beware.
No matter what, don’t send these guys a fucking dime.
Check out www.scambusters.org and www.datingbusters.com and http://www.yourittoday.com/scammers.php to read stories and see if the guy you’re dealing with sounds familiar in these other women’s stories. You will fast learn what their MO is and how they operate and then use your head, not your heart, to determine if you’re being catfished or not.
Flirting With Perception 