Romance Scams : The Needle In The Hay Stack

“A knockoff is not as easy to spot when it comes to love.” - Actress Sarah Jessica Parker as Carrie Bradshaw in Sex In The City, 2008

"You can close your eyes to the things you don't want to see, but you can't close your heart to the things you don't want to feel."  - Johnny Depp, actor

NOTE: This post is for any single Broad, male or female, living Abroad or otherwise untethered to their homeland, who are considering online dating. 

Meeting someone to date is a daunting task, regardless of where you live.  Living abroad however, poses challenges that can lead to some level of despair for those of us searching for a date, or life partner.  Within the local population of our host countries, there will be cultural differences that may seem off-putting, or deliciously exotic.  I've had one reader suggest that taking a local lover is the best way to learn the language!  Voila, an instant benefit!

Many of us would prefer to date someone from our own countries.  We share cultural context with this cohort group, such as life events, music, and values.  For English-speaking women living abroad, who are not working, the ratio of single women to single men is 20:1.  Not very good odds for finding a partner.  However, if you are working with an international company, those odds are reversed!  Congratulations!

Almost all of the global expatriate communities have developed clubs that bring foreigners together.  They offer opportunities for mingling at fundraising events, community cocktail hours, and a bevy of other volunteer events.  Generally, these clubs are sought out once you have settled back into your own skin.  Yet, after a few trial months, and a few connections, the organized aspect is put aside, as you begin to live your life.  If you live in a quickly growing expatriate community, continue to check-in with these organizations, as you will have opportunities to meet the newest members of your community.  

Dating sites are still available as a viable option.  In my own community, the highest number of arriving foreigners conveniently are coming from my home state.  Joining an online dating site with a search criteria for your home state or country, can bring you in contact with people who may very well have the same desire you had to move to your adopted country.  There are however, huge disadvantages to online dating, if you are opening up the search criteria for anyone outside of your immediate area.   

The number one drawback discussed on expatriate forums for online dating is NOT unavailability for immediately meeting!  As much as you may love your life in your new country, emotional vulnerability is actually the larger issue.  You have changed every aspect of your life, and you may very well love that you have, but for singles, this also means developing a level of self-reliance that stretches all of ones' resources, especially during the first year.  

If you do decide to go the route of online dating, here are a few tips from Romance Scam and Pig Busters.

• Search Google!  Cut and paste the first two sentences of the profile details, and Google.  If the search reveals identical words with a different profile picture, you are likely dealing with a professional scammer.
• Search Google!  Save the profile picture to your desktop.  In Google image search, there is a small camera icon in the lower bottom right corner of the search box.  Click this, add the image of your paramour, and search.  Follow the link if the image comes up.
• Google Search!  Cut and paste a few lines from any email sent to you.  In Google, search for the text.  Scammers are lazy.  They are writing to many people at once, and to save time, are using scripted letters.

How to spot a scammer:

• Wants to move the conversation away from the dating site.  Don't!
• Loves you immediately.  That would be nice.
• Never really answers your emails.  Instead, you receive messages that God has destined this meeting of hearts.  Yes, they are on Christian dating sites.
• Sends emails that are filled with odd grammatical errors, uses "i" instead of "I", may make reference to gender that aren't correct to your gender or their own (for example, a man may write, "you make me feel beautiful" or "you look handsome in that hat".
• Waiting for a job to finish, or a family disaster to be resolved so they can free up money to come see you.
• They make excuses for why they will not use video technologies to communicate with you.
• You can call them but they cannot call you.  Their phone number often has an odd prefix for the country it is suppose to reside.  419 numbers are associated with Nigerian scams. All the following are used by romance scammers to hide their country of residence: +44070, +44087, or 70, 070, 87, or 087.   
• You have chats, on the phone or in Messenger with their orphaned children, who seem to live somewhere else, like at a boarding school.
• They are professionals, that in any other country, would require a high functioning computer and internet connection, yet their computers require frequent rebooting (say every 30 minutes), and are prone to virus attacks, thus, they can send you no more pictures of themselves.
• IP address!  Visit the Pig Busters site.  Jeff will help you find the IP address and run a check.  If the address turns up as Nigeria, you are involved with a romance scammer.
• Eventually, they ask you for money to help cover the cost of the airfare or a family emergency.  This could take months.  DO NOT SEND ANYONE YOU HAVE NOT MET ANY OF YOUR MONEY!  

I'm shouting because you need to remember that what these people do is make you believe that they love and need you.  You got onto a dating site because you wanted to meet someone.  Right?  Now you have.  It seems almost too perfect to be real.  Right?  Well, it isn't real.  It's virtual.  Virtual games work because we are programmed by reality.

I Love You

Be Careful

-The Broad 

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