Dating Scam, from the Military Angle

I have talked about dating and romance scams in the past, but I recently came across an article dealing directly with Military Dating Scams that I wanted to share with you.

Since I am not a military person, and no one in my family has been an active military person since before I was born, I would not have known some of this information.

None of them use .mil email addresses that ALL military personnel have. These are just some of the tipoffs you should be aware of. 

This is good to know.  Just like when the scammer contacts a person pretending to be with a federal agency, but they are using a gmail account . . . this is a red flag.

Some of the other red flags are when the scammer asks you to help them to cash checks.  The author of this article points out that military personal do not need assistance from civilians to get their checks.  Another line the scammers will feed you . . . they are injured and need help getting home because they are stuck in Dubai.  The military will always pay for any flight home, and injured soldiers would not be transported to Dubai and just left there.

Internet Dating

Dating is hard . . . now add the internet to that and you can really complicate things. It is much easier for people to not be totally honest about who they are when they are just contacting you over the internet.

This is why you need to be very careful as to who you give your heart to, especially when it comes to the internet.

Here are a couple of sites that talk more about Internet Dating and Romance Scams.
http://alanprince.wordpress.com/
http://datescam.co.uk/frauduk/

LoveFraud ~ Should I warn the next victim?

The website LoveFraud is a site dedicated to helping those that have fallen in love with a con-man.  The owner of the site, Donna Andersen, knows this situation because she lived it.

When asked about warning the con-man's next victim, Donna gives some great advice.  Make sure to be safe, think about your emotional state, and how the victim's reaction may affect you.  She talks about all of these items in more depth on her site.

I’ve heard of cases where the victim was grateful for the warning and got out. I’ve heard of cases where the next victim has refused to listen and stayed with the sociopath. And I’ve heard of cases where the victim stayed for awhile, then started to see the bad behavior, remembered the warning, and got out.

I know that since I’ve posted the information about my ex-husband, James Montgomery, online, at least seven women have contacted me to thank me for the warning. They Googled his name, found Lovefraud, and dumped him. I don’t know how many may have dumped him without telling me. This makes me feel good.         ~ Donna Anderson

Date Scam

I would like to introduce you to another scam fighting site, DateScam.co.uk, and probably the best way to do so is to share the story from their About Us page.


As an "almost" victim of an online dating scam, TWICE, I came across so many difficulties trying to find the information and resources to deal with this. There is a lot of information out there that gives advice on how to prevent yourself from becoming a victim of a scam and how to spot a potential scam etc etc.

There is information about what to do in the event that you have been scammed. But dating scams are a VERY PERSONAL ISSUE, and one that many people may feel too embarrassed to talk about, even to their family and friends.
Many of the "scam/fraud information sites" are American and you only find out when you have spent ages reading through the "blurb" that they are of no use to you.

Many sites charge ASTRONOMICAL FEES to do background checks on people. You can do this yourself to a point, if you HAVE THE TIME and know where to look! But how can you check on someone using a false name, or address, or phone number?

The process is such a long winded one , and unless you are committed to spending the time researching, the chances are that you will give up!

I tried a variety of tactics using google and Bing etc. I typed in dating scam, Internet dating scam, online dating scams, how do I know if I've been scammed? and combinations of all of those. I got really confused and spent hours trawling online scam sites. With all of these difficulties there wasn't really on particular site that could give me the answers I needed.

So this website has been created to give support and help to those who have found themselves at the hands of a dating scammer, and to remove endless hours hitting your head against a brick wall.

There are currently 4 researchers who work at DateScam.co.uk, and they have ALL been victims of online dating scams at one time or another and they want to help to stamp out the online dating scam, or at least make a dent in it.

Scammers pretending to be US Soldiers

I just got done reading an article about the increase of scams in which the scammers are pretending to be a US Soldier. Why do these scams continue to work so well? These scams play on the victims emotions.

As far as we look back at history, we can find stories of letters being sent from soldiers going to fight for their country or a cause back to someone that they care for. With the age of the internet, these letters are sent via email instead of traditional methods. Through these letters people feel connected and share stories, and the start to build trust and sometimes even deeper feelings for the other person. Now, add to this that many people want to do the right thing to help out a soldier who is fighting for our country and you add even more emotion to this stories and THAT is why they work so well.

This article does state that

The Army has received complaints from the United States, Canada, Australia, Japan, Great Britain and elsewhere, with victims reporting losses from a few thousand dollars to $28,000 in one case, Grey said. The stolen identities have primarily come from soldiers and Marines, who have been deployed in the greatest numbers.

In response, the U.S. government has issued warnings, with its embassy in London going so far as to post online examples of fraudulent military papers used in scams.

The US Army released a warning about these internet scams which includes some red flags and warning signs to look for.  At Scam Victims United, we would recommend that you do not send money to anyone that you do not know personally.  If the first time that you came in contact with this person is via the internet, even if you have been speaking for months, remember that you do not really KNOW this person . . . you have no way of knowing who is really on the other end of the computer screen.

Victims - Tell your story!

I will OFTEN get requests from media people for victims to share their story (on radio, tv or in print).  If you are a victim who would be willing to share your story, please contact me via email with your name, state you live in, and the type of scam you were a victim of (counterfeit check, romance, roommate, credit card fraud, 419, ID theft, etc.)


This can be a wonderful way for you to share your story and help to warn and educate other people about scams!

You can also find me at http://www.retaggr.com/page/ShawnMosch

Romance Scams

Romance Scams, also referred to at Sweetheart Scams, Dating Scams or Love Scams, usually begin on a legitimate dating website or throughonline classified ads looking to meet people. In theses scams, the scammer plays on the target's emotions. They know that they are looking for love or a strong relationship, so they use all of the right words to convince the target that they truly care for them. Many of the scammers will use pictures found on others profiles or even modeling sites as their profile. They will also use a variety of fake names, and some scammers could be operating several "profiles" and names at once. This is why the name of the person or what they look like is not a good way to determine if they are a scammer or not. It is the situation, not the name that matters.

Once they believe that the target is emotionally connected to them, they will tell them that they need money for some reason . . . they were in an accident and have medical and legal fees to pay or simply to pay for a plane ticket so that they finally meet in person. The scammer will ask the target to wire them money, and sometimes will even promise to pay it back as soon as possible. Since the target is emotionallyinvested in this relationship they want to do whatever they can to helpout this person that they love.

The websites Cyber Love Illusions and CyberPaths tell the stories of these scams.

You can also read more at http://scamvictimsunited.com/Romance.htm

Why do scammers love Craigslist?

Many websites have become infested with scammers, but Craigslist seems to be one of the places that the scammers really love to hang out. Why is that?

Variety of categories - In the past, when a scammer wanted to find a victim for their overpayment scams they had to go to a website were people were selling items, usually of large value. If they wanted to find a victim for an employment scam, they had to go to a site where people were posting their resumes. If they wanted to find a victim for a romance or dating scam, they would have to go to a dating website. If you wanted to find a victim for renter or roommate scam, you had to go to a site where people were posting housing information. With Craigslist, you can find all of those people in the different categories on the same site.

Includes the entire country - There are other classified ad sites that would have the same variety of categories that Craigslist has, but they are usually for a certain geographic location. If the scammer wants to try and find more victims, they would have to go to another classified ad site that is targeted towards another geographic location. With Craigslist all the scammer has to do is click on a new city and state for their search location and they have a entirely different group of victims to try and bring into their scam.

It's free - Not only is Craigslist free for people to post or creating listings, but it is also free to people looking at those listings. This
works to the scammer's advantage. If the scammer is the one placing the listing, for a Secret Shopper job for example, they do not have to pay anything to place that advertisement. Many of the sites that require you to pay to post have a lower number of scams posted simply due to the fact that the scammer is there to make money, and not to spend it. It works the other way too . . . if the scammer is the one searching the posted ads for their next victim, they do not have to pay anything to have access to those listings.

Craigslist does have warning information on their site, and I think that some of their warnings should hold true if you are using their site or another classified ad site.

Deal with local buyers and sellers. If you sell your item and you need to have it shipped someplace you are taking a greater risk. If you deal locally, you can arrange to meet the person face to face to exchange money and the item for sale.

Never wire funds to someone you only know via email conversations. Scammers use services like Western Union and MoneyGram in their scams because they know that once the money is wired off and picked up on the other end there is no way to recover the money. Also, since they are overseas, our law enforcement in the United States cannot just go and pick them up for taking your money. It becomes an issue for the government and law enforcement in the country that they live in. This all goes back to jurisdiction, which we talked about in the past, and you can review here.

One thing that I think that Craigslist could add to their posted warning is that a cashier's check could take 10 business days or more to go through the clearing process. Just because you take the check to the bank and they tell you that it has cleared, or that it will be verified as good in 24 hours does not mean that the bank knows for sure that this check was written on a good account and has the funds in that account to cover the check. This is the information that is missing from so many of the current internet scam warnings, but is also the piece of information that could save so many scam victims. So why don't the places that post the warnings understand this and include this information? Personally, I feel it is because they are thinking as a "business" and not as a scam victims, and that is one thing that I can do since I have been there myself.

Had we known back in October of 2002 that the check could take up to 10 business days to go through the entire clearing process and that until that happened we would be liable for the entire amount of the check, then there is no way we would have wired any money off any sooner than 10 business days . . . actually, my husband and I had promised each other that what ever amount of time the bank said to wait to be safe we were going to double to be extra safe, so like I said, if they would have been honest with us there is no way we would have become scam victims.

Mother Finds Her Baby Son Up for Adoption on Craigslist - Local News | News Articles | National News | US News - FOXNews.com

Can you imagine finding your own child listed in an advertisement as being up for adoption? Well that is what happened to one mother recently.

Mother Finds Her Baby Son Up for Adoption on Craigslist - Local News News Articles National News US News - FOXNews.com

It turns out that some scammers used a photo of her child, that she posted on a family blog, and they created an advertisement with it. The scammers would then try to get the people answering the ad to send them money for the legal fees for the adoption of the child.

This is VERY similar to what scammers have been doing with Romance and Dating Scams for years. They will take the picture of an attractive person off of a website, sometimes a modeling site, and use that as the "decoy" to get people to try and connect with them.


Shawn Mosch
Co-Founder of ScamVictimsUnited.com
There is strength in numbers!

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http://www.retaggr.com/page/ShawnMosch