Online dating scams and measures to prevent those

Needless to say that scam systems await the inexperienced users practically everywhere on the internet. The problem of online dating scams has probably been discussed hundreds of times by now and still, one can't name a totally scam free service to look for your significant other. The fact is site moderators can't guess whether a person signing up with the site is a potential fraudster or not. Those peculiar facts usually start occurring later on, when complaints on online dating scam strike out of a sudden and one can no longer find any trace of a scammer.

Look for the signs of online dating scams or any other sort of fraud in a profile

Whenever you suspect anyone of being not entirely faithful or planning to play some kind of trick on you inspect this person's profile very attentively. You may happen to find proves of him/her being not the one he/she pretends to be. The first thing you need to check is, of course, the user's photo. Luckily, one can easily do it via Google image. Online dating scammer photos are sometimes being uploaded on the themed forums or other dating sites where those sly individuals once showed up. Should you get some evidence of him/her being a scammer, report to the site technical support immediately.

Other things you need to study carefully are the employment, residence and marital status information. Those who are involved in online dating scam activity often tend to avoid giving these details or simply provide some commonly met info to not stand out from the crowd. Ask some questions about those aspects and see whether the answers are clear or not. Speaking in advance, there's a tendency among fraudsters to put 'divorced' or 'widowed' into marital status to gain some kind of sympathy. Don't get caught on that psychological trick. Just view it as another sign of online dating scams and stop all your communications with that person.

Be on your guard with those who speak of trust all the time

The primary goal of every scammer is to make you trust anything he says, so he could finally ask to send him money for a flight/gift/surgery - anything. The key point of all the online dating scams is usually the trust as the main concept of interpersonal relations. Thus, if you don't send a required sum (which he, of course, claims to give back) you then don't value those principles and there's no background for further relationships. Nice try, but with a prepared user that little trick won't work!

Those desperately calling for trust are the candidates to restock your online dating scammer list - set it as a rule and stick to it to stay on a safer side. Whatever they say, you should always be guided by your own principles - "I know nothing about you, how can I trust you?"

All online dating scams usually start with 'dear' and 'honey'

Most scammers' messages tend to contain one of those two words to awake some pleasant thoughts in a person they are addressed to. Usually, it's something like "Hi Dear, can you add me?" Using this form of appeal creates another convenience - one can send one type of a message to a whole group of people. It's quite natural for online dating scams to strive for ease and shortcutting in communication and you should keep that in mind. Also, there could be a number of spelling or grammar mistakes, stating that the one who wrote it was in a hurry. Simply ignore the emails like that. There are lots of other people worth your attention.

Beware of rapid escalations

If somebody out of a sudden starts saying he's in love with you and can't do without you that appears to be a mere sign of a fraud. Some narrow-minded individuals tend to believe this causes an addressee to respond the same and get ready for the next step. The practice shows that a lot of online dating scams act exactly this way and if something goes wrong, they just switch to another potential victim.

Always mind, one can't fall in love with anyone without seeing him/her at least once. And, surely, it can't happen after just a couple of messages sent. The one who writes those things doesn't have noble intentions and that's for sure! You may just say in response "I highly doubt you are" or say nothing at all. Scammers like that come and go. But you should always stay true to yourself and never give a chance to fool you.