To think some romance scam victims are simply stupid?

[TheAverageJoanne]

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.

I don't think scams like this are targeted as such...I'm sure they'd try anyone, it's just the vulnerable who take the bait. For every one who does there'll be a thousand who don't!

I'd forgotten all about it, but nice to know that two days later, you found it that irrelevant.

She thought people who fall victim to scams are morally reprehensible, I don't, you barged in two days later to give me what you presumably think is a really cutting telling off and is in fact a load of self serving waffle that doesn't even make sense. The MN world continues turning...

From what i gather they use bad english and deliberate spelling mistakes because the know that if potentisl victims cant see past that then they are very gullable and easily defrauded

Some of the scammed have walked out on partners and children for their romances.

Are we supposed to feel sorry for them just because large amounts of money have been exchanged?

What about the man who walks out on his wife and children and who later finds out the younger OW just wanted a bit of fun and access to his money.

Is he a "victim"?

All scams play on human weakness. Loneliness, greed, vanity, shame, misguided loyalty, laziness, gullibility, arrogance.

If you know your own weaknesses then you are less likely to be scammed. But you have to stay alert. Even then there might be a scam just waiting to catch you.

My DB convinced himself and DM that staying with the same insurer meant they were getting the best price for home insurance. In fact they were both paying double what they could have been paying if they shopped around.

Not an illegal scam but one born out of arrogance. DB assumed he knew best but cost him and DM some thousands across 10 years. God knows what they thought the meerkats were advertising!

I agree.

I often get messages via fb messenger who claim to be from good looking, 50 something, US based surgeons (usually).

My partner and I laugh at them, joke about how I should just skip the bs and send them my life savings, then block and ignore.

So they don't target vulnerable people but vulnerable people ae the only ones who give a second thought to them and would consider that they were telling the truth.

My friend's daughter is mid 20s and autistic. She'd be very vulnerable to something like this. She trusts people and she's generous with money. I had a friend with borderline LD and autism who fell out with me because I wouldn't take £10,000 from him. His words, "All my other friends take money from me. Why won't you? I thought we were friends."

Indeed. I think this too but my young adult dc was taken in by someone (not romance or online ), and it nearly ruined his life. He is very clever, but was vulnerable at the time. However, it was probably his insight that did ‘save’ him ultimately.
It is all about vulnerability - these scammers probably send hundreds of messages out and the one person who responds is the one they’re gonna pounce on. The famous people ones make me 🤦‍♀️ though - why would a rich, famous guy need your life savings? I suppose by then the person just doesn’t want to admit what’s happened?

I think they’re incredibly stupid. I met my late husband online (not a dating site), and we were happy and married for over 20 years when he died.

But our conversations online, when we started, never involved money - no reason to mention it!

Until we actually got together, in real life, as a proper couple, neither of us knew what the other one had in the bank.

Until you actually meet someone, in life, and get to know them/their families etc. you cannot possibly be “in love”.🙄

I understand loneliness, but I do think some of these people should look in the mirror and look at who is saying they are in love with them - good looking 20/30 year olds do not generally fall in love with pensioners.

A bit of common sense goes a long way 😉

Compare the Meerkat.

They often target women who are divorced or widowed after a long marriage - in other words, women who are out of touch with the modern dating scene and don't know what to expect.

The last time they were dating might have been 30 + years ago, pre-online days and when they were young and had lots of ardent admirers - so it doesn't strike them as strange, in the way that it would strike someone who was used to the scene, when an apparently wealthy, successful, attractive man falls head over heels 'in love' with an average 60 year old woman after little more than seeing a photo.

These scumbags know exactly what they are doing.

That would indicate they know the woman, they don’t. They throw the net wide, see who bites.

I would agree, they are not sitting down to research the best "mark". They are looking at dating sites and messaging everyone. I have been married forever and am not using dating sites but would imagine that as with those sorts of sites you can sort by recently signed up or something similar and just send out the same generic message to everyone who has signed up in the last week. See what responses you get, start to work on the ones who "like" the message or send a reply. The pictures used on the fake profiles are rarely unique, they are ripped off other real profiles and used on multiple fakes with different names and are easily found with a reverse image search. It's entirely reasonable to assume though that a woman aged 45-70 who is new to a dating site is newly out of a marriage or long-term relationship. The ones who don't respond to your messages are the savvy ones and you don't spend any more time on them.

I also agree with the points you made @MayThe4th about the threads I remember on here about overseas taxi drivers or tour guides who approach a former customer years later with a tale of woe about their kids or not being able to pay the rent. Posters ignore the oodles of links to charities or food banks in the area where this person lives, and then the virtue signallers leap in with "how can you live with yourself" and "it's only £50/£200 and will make such a difference" with a good smattering of generalisation about poor people and developing countries. It's EXACTLY why scammers scam, because they know that some people will overlook the dozens of red flags to give themselves the warm fuzzy feeling of being a good person and being able to tell everyone else on MN that they are a good person too.

*NonPlayerCharacter · Yesterday 13:10

Zoreos · Yesterday 12:57

Who are the 7% of people who think YABU? 🤷🏻‍♀️
Those of us with a more nuanced, sympathetic and, I'd say, intelligent view of how people can get manipulated.*

I suggest it isn’t the nuanced view of others which makes people vulnerable to this type of scam but the view people have of themselves.

Somehow they don’t see what is looking at them in the mirror and don’t question why a young guy barely out of his teens is declaring undying love to a woman twice or three times their age
Even in the cases where they send pics of some handsome older white guy they don’t take a look in the mirror and aren’t realistic that anyone who looks like these guys aren’t likely to be single. Even if they were (they nearly always live in the US) they could have their pick of women without leaving their home city but instead they are starting random chats on FB and hooking up with some random woman from a place far enough away that they can’t visit on a whim .

This!!!! Amazes me that any of the scam money goes through as when I an trying to make a payment to a respectable organisation the bank repeatedly asks me of I have been told to answer questions from the bank confirming it is authentic …
And the banks should NOT be returning scam money!! The rest of us c pay for those who choose to lie to their banks.

I think the targeting is in the sense of 'how much can I rinse someone for with this type of scam' so where/how do I lay out my bait?

Years ago we watched a programme where a middle-aged man boasted to the interviewer about how clever he was and how stupid other people were. All the while he was opening letter after letter where people were sending him cheques to join a 'earn ££s in your spare time working from home' scheme. The letters went in the bin, the cheques went in his bank account.

MLM is a scam, all those people who put up photos on SM of themselves posing next to a high end car or show home saying something along the lines of 'just choosing my next big purchase thanks to conalife'. They are strongly encouraged to do this to attract in new sales agents. The Tinder Swindler used this 'live the high life' as part of his scamming.

The man with his cheques coming in was targeting people who would spend a few pounds to start a side hustle. His scam was aimed at producing a large number of small sums.

The MLM scam is similar but for a bit more money , the 'hit rate' is lower. You lay out your bait in SM as what you are selling is aspirational lifestyle.

The Tinder Swindler style romance scam is playing for much bigger returns. You lay out your bait where people with access to cash go: expensive hotel lobbies (buy a coffee and look like you are staying there), car showrooms (it doesn't cost to look like you are making your next purchase).

@NonPlayerCharacter Yes, I think it completely washed over DB and since he tells DM what to do she was oblivious as well.

@Jf20 they throw their net wide but the successful ones look at the waters where they are throwing their net.

This also brings to mind the awful gaslighting and subsequent murder of Peter Farquhar by Ben Field. This was a very intelligent, but lonely older gay man believing that a 20-year old handsome guy was in love with him. All in ‘real life’, so you can imagine how much easier it is to scam online. He didn’t believe his family when they weren’t happy with the situation (if you’ve seen the dramatisation).

This.

I did watch the Tinder Swindler, his victims seemed to be greedy initially being drawn un by his apparent lifestyle and throwing gifts and money around. He them starts to get money from them. I didn't feel that sorry for those.

Others seem lonely and a bit stupid and send money in a delusional way, I feel more sorry for them.

MLM seem to pull in some easier than others.

@Goatymum yes. I do think a lot of scam artists are psychopaths especially if scamming in person. Very convinced of their own brilliance and dangerous if cornered or thwarted in some way.

As a 50 something out of a long marriage who last dated in the early 90’s it’s a minefield out there.
Im pretty savvy as I work in the financial industry and we’ve had scamming and fraud drummed into us so I’m good at spotting the signs.

The pics usually look not quite right and the absolutely gorgeous immaculately dressed silver fox who lives in Basildon or Romford - hmmm.

I used to play games with them to think they’d reeled me in. I always then asked what’s the best bar where they live for our age to meet for a drink - that pretty much guarantees a delete as they don’t have a clue.

I work in a scamming field, and while yes it's frustrating when people fall for it, and I REALLY struggle to have sympathy when it's 70 year old Roger chatting with gorgeous 20 year old Brittany, or 55 year old Sandra with 23 year old Oliver, because I think as a separate issue those people are not good people, to think it's appropriate to be engaging in a relationship with someone so young.

So while that does annoy me, I do think...
Our entire society is and has been for many years built around multiple what I would consider 'scams'
The idea that men can still be considered 'good dads' because they say they love their kids and play with them occasionally, even when it transpires they don't hold any of the physical, emotional, financial or mental responsibility for that child's life other than maybe paying the rent.
The idea that men who let you do all the house and child labour 'love you'
The idea that if you as a daughter don't care for your elderly parents, or even your in-laws then you are a horrible, awful person.

Do you see what all these scams have in common? People profiting off women's unpaid labour, as they have done for thousands of years.

I'd consider that a bigger scam, tbh, but that's just 'normal'

The common denominator in the vast majority is loneliness in my opinion. It's very sad.

I suggest it isn’t the nuanced view of others which makes people vulnerable to this type of scam but the view people have of themselves.

I don't think anyone has suggested that a more nuanced view of scam victims is what causes them to be scam victims.

@Goatymum Yes I saw that, with Timothy Spall. I couldn't watch the rest of it as I found it upsetting. There is a bloke called Paul Bint who made out he was Keir Starmer and got one woman believing it, another supposedly smart cookie, but she fell for it.