Valentine’s Day is just about here, but unfortunately, there are bad things coming with it. While a lot of people are looking forward to this special day to spend time with their significant other, bad actors out there are going to take advantage of others loneliness and need to be with someone so that they can steal their hard earned money.
Sadly, romance scams are on the rise and more and more people are losing money to them. A lot of times these romance scams combine with another scam which is Pig Butchering and I’ve talked a lot about Pig Butchering already. It’s a serious issue and I’ve talked about how a bank collapsed because of it, thanks to the actions of its former CEO.
I’m going to talk about detecting romance scams online and more importantly, how to avoid them. We all seek companionship, but we can’t let our need for that as well as our emotions get away from us because that’s what the scammers are counting on. They will use all kinds of tricks to make you think they are genuine and after a time, they will start pressing you for money in the guise of an opportunity.
Chicago Man Loses Thousands to Romance Scam
Imagine one day that you find someone online that makes you feel like you’re special, understands you, and always seems to put a smile on your face. You finally found someone who you feel like you have a true connection with and you even have seen each other over video calls and know what the other person sounds like.
You end up talking for months and feel like you know the best parts about each other. Surely this is an innocent relationship and they are truly in love and so there is no cost to this right? Wrong, as this happened to a person living in the Chicago region and he ended up losing over $70,000. It definitely ended up costing him dearly.
So how in the world did this man ended up meeting this woman online? It was through Facebook dating and it happened back in 2024. Now I don’t want to scare anyone away from online dating as I also use Facebook Dating and actually met someone through it back in 2024 myself, but the key here is that we actually met up in person and did not just talk online and so I know she is genuine and the big thing here is that she didn’t ask me for money or tell me about a great investment opportunity.
This man apparently face timed this woman nearly every single day, but I still have to say that face timing doesn’t mean the person is genuine and this case, the woman was not only being genuine, she wasn’t real either. This may sound strange as you might be wondering if you face time someone, how can they not be real? I will get to that shortly, but I will remind you that we now live in a world where AI (Artificial Intelligence) is ramping up.
After a few months of talking and building what he thought was a true and deep connection, the scam was finally starting to reveal itself, but of course he didn’t believe it was a scam at the time. The woman who he was supposedly talking to said she was making profits by trading cryptocurrency and said that he could as well and is willing to show him how it’s done. In order to get him to try it out, she suggested starting out with an investment of at least $100.
Once he agreed to it, she told him to get a specific crypto trading app and how to set it all up and that he would be making profits in no time. Sure enough, he checked the app and it showed that he was making a lot of profit from crypto trading. If this sounds like Pig Butchering, which I’ve talked about quite a bit already, you would be right. Here is where Pig Butchering in this instance is starting to take a little bit of an interesting (and scary) turn. He wanted to see if he truly did earn some profits and so he tried withdrawing some of what the application said he earned. Do you think he was successful or not? The answer may surprise you.
He actually was able to withdraw some of the funds, but this is where Pig Butchering now is taking a dangerous turn. Pig Butchering scammers will allow you to take a certain amount of money out early on to “prove” to you that this is not a scam. So once you take some of the “profits” out, this will convince you that this is a legitimate trading platform and because you withdrew some of the profits, you are now FAR more willing to “invest” more money to make even more profits.
That’s exactly what this man did as he was able to get a pretty good sized loan and some other money that totaled to over $70,000. This time though whe he tried to withdraw the profts the app said he made, things went south very quickly. The application completely locked him out and in anger, he sent multiple messages to the woman he had been in communication with one of which was asking about why do you scam people. There was a response and it while it may seem shocking, the scammer laid it out bare to him “Because you are stupid”.
Now I’m not going to call this man stupid because we all want a connection with someone, a lot of times a romantic connection and so I understand the need to try and make that happen, but this is where you need to be careful and not let emotions guide you in this instance. The shocking part here is that the person who he had been talking to for months wasn’t even real. It was all AI generated and this is where AI is getting more and more dangerous because scammers now see how it can be used greatly to deceive people. It is easier than ever now to create AI generated profiles, photos, and even fake videos and post it all on social media. So what can be done about this? I’ll talk about that next. If you want to read more about this news story of the Chicago area man who got scammed, you can do so by clicking here.
Steps To Avoid Romance Scams
Romance scams and Pig Butchering are heavily tied together so it is important to take steps to protect yourself as well as loved ones and others you care about. One thing I have noticed very recently as a Bank Teller is that a number of my local customers are asking about cryptocurrency and the best ways to start investing in it. I tell them that it is very important to do a lot of research and to be very careful when investing in it. It is still a newer asset class and is not regulated at this time like the more traditional assets are.
Because of that, there are lots of cryptocurrency scams out there and it is very easy to lose money. Be wary of people who you might come across online that say they are making profits every single day and want to show you how you can do that also. This means they are trying to swindle you and take as much money away from you as possible. Do not let emotion guide you especially in this instance where the platform they want you to use will show you that you are making lots of money quickly when you truly aren’t. I also tell them to open a separate account to be used just for the purpose of cryptocurrency, but only put little amounts in it so you can try it for yourself and keep it away from you main accounts.
I also tell them that romance scams are running rampant right now and a lot of them try to get people into a fake cryptocurrency platform to steal their money. That’s why I tell them to do a lot of research and that cryptocurrency does operate in a similar fashion to traditional assets, but they are more volatile then stocks and bonds right now because of very little regulation. Yes, there are those who have made lots of money from cryptocurrency, but they didn’t do it just instantly and they had been in it for some time.
I reiterate to them to not let emotion guide them, because that is when you’re prone to make mistakes without thinking logically and you can end up losing lots of money very quickly. Be very careful who you talk to online and run for the hills if they say they’ve made lots of money very fast and can show you how to do the same. Scammers are out in force just before Valentine’s Day as they know people are going to be looking for some kind of love connection online and they can try to take advantage of that. Stay safe out there!