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AIBU?

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Original poster

To think some romance scam victims are simply stupid?

531 replies

TheAverageJoanne · 19/12/2023 10:38

At home today and have the TV on with For Love or Money about romance fraud. One victim is an international business development manager but gave £113000 to scammers, persuading her mother and sister to part with their savings

How far the love of Christ would you trust someone with a responsible job when they do this sort of thing and judgement flies out of the window?

I get there are people who are lonely and vulnerable but this one took me by total surprise. How could she have been so stupid? She received an email while waiting for him at the airport, showed it to airport staff who confirmed it was fake but still sent another £30000 to prevent airport staff at the other side from killing him. Jesus Christ.

OP posts:
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14
CarterBeatsTheDevil · 19/12/2023 14:45

People are vulnerable in all sorts of ways, and not just to romance scams. In another life I did a lot of work with victims of fraud. Advance fee frauds, whisky frauds, champagne frauds. These are all frauds that play on the victim's blind spot. Most of the victims were intelligent people who'd built up a reasonable cache of savings. The problem wasn't that they weren't intelligent. The problem was that they wanted to believe what they were being told, whether that's "you're so beautiful that someone who normally wouldn't be likely to be interested in you cannot stop thinking about you" or "you could have £2m in your bank account tomorrow if you let me move £20m into it for a few days", or "you're a smart, savvy investor who's come across a brilliant chance to make some cash in a very impressive and exciting way".

It doesn't do to sneer at the people who fall for these frauds. They're just humans whose human strings got pulled by the wrong person at the wrong time. You could be the most competent CEO ever and completely blind to the fact that a romance scammer is stringing you along.

GnomeDePlume · 19/12/2023 14:53

I never think I couldn't be caught by a scam. Everyone has vulnerability of some sort.

  • the people who get caught up in MLM schemes
  • the people who fall for crisis scams where they are rushed into doing something
  • the people who fall for lottery scams
  • the people who fall for investment scams
  • the people who fall for 'make £££s in your spare time while working from home' scams

From what I have seen the romance scams can involve a bit of all of the above scams.

People don't admit to having been scammed because that means admitting they have been taken in. Also there can be a little bit of the conspiracy theory mindset - you're telling me it's a scam because you are jealous/want to take my money

NonPlayerCharacter · 19/12/2023 14:55

I've never been scammed but I have absolutely done some stupid things when my vulnerabilities were subjected to it. I really can't be certain that I'd never ever fall for a scam because I'm so clever and morally righteous. Possibly because I'm too stingy...

saltinesandcoffeecups · 19/12/2023 14:55

Panama2 · 19/12/2023 11:32

I have had a friend request from Johnny Depp, yes really Johnny Depp......

I don't think so

I did get a friend request from a minor celebrity, was the star of a tv series awhile ago.

Haha… some key differences to your Johnny Depp, though.

  • I went to school with this person
  • I doubt he’d be the first celebrity that comes to mind when a scammer picked someone to impersonate (his series wasn’t exactly ‘Friends’ successful
  • His FB posts are full of pics of his family, including his very beautiful wife and cute puppy.
  • He’s never asked me for a loan, been kidnapped, hasn’t been waiting for his royal title, or offered to come visit me if only he had the money
😁 If I had the time I might have accepted the Johnny Depp request, just to waste their time.
Showmethesunny · 19/12/2023 15:00

I think it’s disingenuous when the hosts always stress ‘you weren’t being stupid, it could happen to any of us.’ I think this normalises some people’s unhinged behaviour. Most people wouldn’t send thousands to a romance scam.

I also wonder how these vulnerable, crazy people have so much money to give!!

shearwater2 · 19/12/2023 15:02

Yes of there are lots of people out there who are vulnerable and do not have high intelligence or their wits about them, and/or are lonely and vulnerable which might reduce their defences.

It doesn't mean they don't deserve the protection of the law or for a con artists to scam them out of their money.

There are some more sophisticated scams as well that can catch anyone out at the right place and right time.

I nearly opened a phishing email one time from "eBay" as I'd just sold something on there.

I did open a phishing email at work because Microsoft was always asking me to put my password in - sometimes several times in a few minutes - and there was nothing unusual about the email or attachment I received that triggered any suspicions.

Gwenhwyfar · 19/12/2023 15:03

Wellhellooooodear · 19/12/2023 10:42

Yes. Same goes for elderly women who come back from their holiday with some 20 something lad, claiming he's the love of her life!

Yep.

Then you get a lot of people who don't believe in the concept of 'leagues' in dating and this is what it leads to. The thought that a 20 something man is interested in your 70 something body.

There's a famous clip from This Morning that I've shared before, but I won't be so mean this time.

saltinesandcoffeecups · 19/12/2023 15:03

WhatsTheUseOfWorrying · 19/12/2023 14:08

There are scams and scams. We could all be the victims of some fraud or other. It depends how it’s done, what information the fraudster has, who they are, and so on.

Internet romance and wealth scams - the out of the blue sort - do, though, rely on vanity and greed. I do not feel sorry for men who lose money to ‘Ukrainian lovelies’ or women who do the same for ‘Jason Statham’ (Barry Gibb? WTF?) or those who send money to release $15m from the US Lottery Settlement Account.

Agreed…

I don’t think it’s victim blaming to point out someone’s responsibility in the situation (I go back to people must take reasonable precautions to avoid being a victim). With scams it usually falls down to greed, loneliness, or vulnerability of some sort. In some cases I feel bad in others I don’t.

I think it would be a rare case where someone made it through life without being scammed (myself included) Think about all of those charities that only spend a fraction of their take on the intended cause, dodgy products that are essentially worthless, some random begger that you flip a few coins to that live better than you, or the suspicious link that gets clicked even though we know better.

Most of us limit the exposure though and recognize the con fairly quickly.

shearwater2 · 19/12/2023 15:05

Systems can be a little OTT as well sometimes. I was trying to pay my John Lewis credit card the other day and the bank asked me several times (much more than usual) whether I was sure it wasn't a fraudulent transaction. It definitely wasn't and my account was credited as normal.

Gwenhwyfar · 19/12/2023 15:05

"There are some more sophisticated scams as well that can catch anyone out at the right place and right time."

Oh yes, but the OP is about romance scams.

I've also had genuines emails that have just looked a bit like scams and confused me.

TheGander · 19/12/2023 15:06

MackEndSea · 19/12/2023 10:52

Totally agree. I remember one where it was a woman in her 50s - morbidly obese, practically housebound and she “found love” with a young good looking man in his 20s who just happened to be “in danger” and needing thousands of pounds sent to him on a regular basis which she was willingly doing. She’d never even met this bloke, just had a photo and a shit ton of messages saying how much he loved her and couldn’t wait to marry her etc. I actually felt sorry for her kids who were desperately trying to make her see sense whilst watching their inheritance being thrown away to some random scammer.

I’ll never understand the absolute stupidity of some people.

A woman who becomes morbidly obese clearly does not have well developed coping strategies and defences in the first place. Add to that years of loneliness and isolation, a lack of friends and adult conversation and it’s not too much of a stretch to imagine that they could be vulnerable to manipulation. There are also plenty of non neurotypical persons especially men who do not perceive human interactions in a nuanced way. It’s easy to scoff but there are many out there who struggle with life and lack social support and are vulnerable to someone who feigns interest in them.

Vroomfondleswaistcoat · 19/12/2023 15:08

I am glued to Social Catfish, which shows a number of these scams, how they work and what the effects can be. I started watching because I live alone, can sometimes be lonely and worried that I could get sucked into some kind of romance scam (although I never 'Friend' single men and like to think that I would never send money to a man I'd never met, even if we were 'engaged'. Better the devil you know, and all that.)

I started out thinking it was stupidity on the part of the victim. How COULD a toothless 70 year old man think a gorgeous Ukrainian model was deeply in love with him and would fly over and marry him as soon as she could get enough money to get out of the country? I mean - ridiculous! But then I saw how some of these scammers play a really really long game. They carefully draw in their victim, no mention of money at ALL until they are certain that the victim is emotionally tied to them.

The scammers train to do this. They practice. They work hard at knowing their victim, their weaknesses and vulnerabilities. They don't just befriend them and then hit them with demands for money, they talk to the victim. Draw out their secrets, pretend to understand them. Bond with them. It's clever. I am still a bit 😳about how anyone gets sucked in in the first place, but they do and then... well. It's easy.

TheGander · 19/12/2023 15:09

shearwater2 · 19/12/2023 15:05

Systems can be a little OTT as well sometimes. I was trying to pay my John Lewis credit card the other day and the bank asked me several times (much more than usual) whether I was sure it wasn't a fraudulent transaction. It definitely wasn't and my account was credited as normal.

I got one too when I was paying a deposit for the guy who changed my garage door, it freaked me out as he wasn’t a recommendation and I’d never used him before. I rang the bank at that point and got the script read to me, if they’d told me it was standard message I would have felt better. I paid him and he was genuine and it was all ok.

shearwater2 · 19/12/2023 15:10

I also still remember being on the phone for an hour to Barclays in a shop about ten years ago in the January sales trying to buy a slow cooker.

They had randomly put a stop on my card over Christmas as I had spent more than usual in December. I wonder what I could have been spending it on?

PeppermintMandy · 19/12/2023 15:15

NonPlayerCharacter · 19/12/2023 14:41

It’s nearly 2024. We should have evolved past this thinking and financially, academically and socially successful women should have enough self esteem to not fall for a very over the top, completely unrealistic romantic fantasy.

We won't and we never will. However successful and full a life, romantic and sexual longing can never be erased. They are too intrinsically human. It should be a sign of just how powerful they are that such a successful and active woman could still be so vulnerable in this regard.

Show quote history

What an utterly depressing take. & just completely untrue. Plenty of women do not fall for this stuff. Plenty. Most in fact wouldn’t.

I never said anything about “sexual and romantic longing being erased”. But that longing shouldn’t make you “vulnerable”. We all have that longing but we aren’t all “vulnerable”.

NonPlayerCharacter · 19/12/2023 15:19

PeppermintMandy · 19/12/2023 15:15

What an utterly depressing take. & just completely untrue. Plenty of women do not fall for this stuff. Plenty. Most in fact wouldn’t.

I never said anything about “sexual and romantic longing being erased”. But that longing shouldn’t make you “vulnerable”. We all have that longing but we aren’t all “vulnerable”.

Edited
Show quote history

Of course plenty of women don't fall for it.

But as a species we are never going to "evolve" out of being vulnerable over sex and love. It's not a woman thing, it's a human thing.

Tacotortoise · 19/12/2023 15:20

Yep. Similarly, a lot of people that fall prey to finance based frauds are gullible, greedy and have an inflated sense if their own cleverness (they have managed to find this amazing investment opportunity that all others have missed ).

BungleandGeorge · 19/12/2023 15:24

Some peoples’ brain functioning makes them more susceptible and vulnerable. We all have different brains it’s not a character flaw to have less good functioning in some areas eg some people are rubbish at maths, some can’t organise themselves, some don’t have much empathy and some don’t understand manipulation and are too trusting. I’m sure nobody actually willingly throws their money away!

Rickenbackergoodgrief · 19/12/2023 15:25

I watched a documentary on Netflix a while ago, where a man had scammed several women out of everything they owned, one had even sold her house and borrowed god knows how much from family and friends to give him.
These were apparently sane and rational women!
I can't remember the name of it now, but he was living the high life while romance scamming several women.
At what point do you wake up and think, hang on a minute?
I have zero sympathy.

GnomeDePlume · 19/12/2023 15:47

@Rickenbackergoodgrief Tinder Swindler?

I know someone who fell for a low rent version of that. He rinsed her for her savings. Always talked big but suffered from deep pockets/short arms syndrome. She paid for everything and gave him cash.

She wasn't lonely exactly but she was desperate for a relationship.

jessycake · 19/12/2023 16:36

I think it must somehow rewire their brain ,and once they have invested a certain amount ,the obsession with the fantasy man
shuts out anything else .

Abitofalark · 19/12/2023 17:36

I remember the one featured on Radio 4 Money Box about the 77 year old retired widower who lost £800,000 including his house to an investment scam.
Low interest rates led him to look for better returns and he found a company online, investing £50 initially. He was told that the more he invested; the greater the returns. The next day he invested £10,000. Within a few weeks, he had invested over £100,000. Reeled in, he was soon up to his neck in debt, borrowing against his house and finally, having it sold to a cash buying firm. Later, he and his daughter decided to go public, despite his humiliation, as a warning and a lesson to others. As in so many cases, he was bereaved and vulnerable. His family hadn't known.
The story is told here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-60801606

DdraigGoch · 19/12/2023 17:57

MammaTo · 19/12/2023 11:29

I worked in a branch of a high street bank for many years and the stories people would come in with were jaw dropping.
We’d have to tell them it’s a romance scam and it’s not real etc, we’d tell them we have to leave notes on their accounts to say we’ve told them the dangers and they’re willingly sending them the money - but nope people still insisted on sending it to strangers from the internet.

This is why the replacement of branch staff by machines is such a bad thing.

maybejustonemoretime · 19/12/2023 18:50

@TheAverageJoanne do you know which episode it was or the woman's first name I'm just looking on iplayer but don't fancy watching them all 🤦🏻‍♀️.

CatsWillRuleTheWorld · 19/12/2023 19:05

Romance scams are just another kind of abusive relationship. Anyone can fall into an abusive relationship, not because they are stupid, but because even with the abuse/exploitation, in the same package they're sometimes getting something they need, something they can't get at all otherwise: compliments, attention, company, someone who listens, someone who asks how your day has been, someone who pretends to understand you. Many people's lives are lonely and empty. It's easy to judge if your emotional needs are already being met.