Security Corner Blog

In 2022, nearly 70,000 people reported a romance scam, and reported losses hit a staggering $1.3 billion.¹ That's more than any other FTC fraud category! The median reported loss: $4,400.²

Social media, dating sites, and other apps are all avenues that scammers use to develop false relationships and build trust, sometimes talking or messaging several times a day. These scammers target individuals seeking companionship and often quickly express their infatuation or love. The bad actor frequently “lives abroad.” They may ask for money to pay for family issues, plane tickets, surgery or medical expenses, customs fees, or travel documents.

Red Flags for Romance Scams

These are common signs that you may be facing this type of scam:

• The person never video calls you or meets you in person.
• You share no mutual friends with them on social media, and their identity is tough to trace online.
• They claim to be in love with you before meeting in person.
• They plan to visit you, but always have an excuse for why they can’t that comes up last-minute.
• They request money be sent via wire transfer or gift card.

Steps to Prevent and Respond

The U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging provides these tips for avoiding romance scams:

• If the person always refuses to video call or meet in person, block them.
• Never send money or gifts to someone that you have not met in person.
• Talk to your family and friends, or someone you trust, to get their advice.
• Contact your bank or credit union immediately if you think you sent money to a scammer.

More Information

• The U.S. Secret Service provides tips on how to avoid romance scams in their article Stay Safe Online: Avoid Romance Scams.
• The Fedral Trade Commission provides information and reporting resources in their article What To Know About Romance Scams.
• The U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging is the focal point in the Senate for discussion and debate on matters relating to older Americans. The Aging Committee operates a toll-free Fraud Hotline (855-303-9470), which serves as a resource for older Americans and their family members to report suspicious activities and provides information on reporting frauds and scams to the proper officials, including law enforcement.

The information in this article comes from the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging's Fraud Book. Download the entire book below or visit www.aging.senate.gov.

Fighting Fraud: Top Scams in 2021

KATE KLEINERT:

ROMANCE SCAM SURVIVOR

Glenolden, Pennsylvania

“My husband, Bernie, passed away in 2009. Since then, I’ve never looked for any new romance in my life because I still feel married to my husband.”

“But last summer, in August 2020, I received a friend request on Facebook… His name is Tony – well, that’s what he told me.”

“We started talking on the phone through an App he had me download. He told me he was a surgeon working in Iraq through a contract with the United Nations and that he has two children, a little boy and a girl. Tony became romantic much more quickly than I did and I kept trying to put him off, saying we didn’t know each other. But Tony had the kids get in touch with me through email and they started calling me mom, which is my Achilles’ heel…”

“Tony wanted to get married. He even asked if I wanted to go out and start looking at houses. I was constantly sending him gift cards, even though now I was using up the last of my husband’s life insurance. My savings were gone… I kept doing this because he swore to me he would repay me the minute he got back to the States.”

“I got a phone call from a man who said he was Tony’s lawyer, who said that in Iraq, someone slipped drugs into Tony’s bag and he knew nothing about it, but now he needed money for bail. He asked me for $20,000. The lawyer told me to do whatever I could – put a mortgage on my house, borrow it from someone in my family. I couldn’t do it.”

“Even though this experience is painful to speak about, I want to be an ambassador to this experience because it’s so devastating... In my case, I got pulled in because I had forgotten how good it felt to be loved.”

Excerpts taken from Ms. Kleinert’s testimony provided to the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging in September 2021.

1 This figure is based on reports to the Federal Trade Commission's Consumer Sentinel Network (Sentinel) that were classified as romance scams. Reports filed with the Internet Crimes Complaint Center (IC3) prior to 2019 are not included in Sentinel. To ensure greater consistency in reporting trends over time, IC3 reports were excluded from earlier Spotlights about romance scams, but now are included in this Spotlight to focus on the scope and nature of the losses. Reported romance scam losses from all Sentinel sources by year are as follows: $493M (2019), $730M (2020), $1.3B (2021) $1.3B (2022). Because the vast majority of frauds are not reported to the government, these figures reflect just a small fraction of the public harm.

2 Reports provided by MoneyGram and Western Union are excluded for this median loss calculation as these data contributors report each loss transaction separately, which typically affects calculation of an individual’s median loss.