A 71-year-old from the Sömmerda district fell for a fraudster with the so-called “Romance Scam” scam.
The woman met the man on the Internet and he made her believe he was in a romantic relationship. Supposedly he comes from America and needed money to start over. With several transfers, the senior citizen lost over EUR 20,000 . She files a complaint, the money is gone and so is the supposed dream man.
Love Scamming” or “Romance Scamming” is like a kind of love scam in the digital world. The victim is led to believe that a romantic relationship has developed or existed through frequent messaging (contact exchanges, messenger services, email). The victim becomes emotionally dependent on the fraudster, even though there was never direct contact.
The word “scam” means “to deceive” in German. Literally, this is about romance scams (English: Romance Scam): Facebook or Instagram profiles that pretend to be a young man, usually an American, who is in military service, has “stumbled upon” a profile and is interested in interested in the user's profile. However, after a short time the interest shifts more towards financial matters.
Promises are often not kept.
Because of the emotional dependence, the victim falls for the perpetrator and does everything to avoid losing his favor. The deceived person transfers several amounts of money to the perpetrator over a longer period of time.
Don't be afraid to call the police if you have any doubts or have already fallen for a scam. The police will provide you with advice and support.
How do I behave if I have been cheated on?
- Break off contact and use the options available to block a scammer.
- If you have already responded to the fraudsters' demands, they will be very persistent: therefore, consistently ignore any further attempts to contact them.
- Save all correspondence with the fraudsters and have all transfer receipts etc. on file.
- Contact your police in confidence and file a criminal complaint.
[mk_ad]
Related to the topic: How to recognize love scammers on Facebook
Source: Erfurt State Police Inspectorate
Article image: Shutterstock / Artur Szczybylo
Notes:
1) This content reflects the current state of affairs at the time of publication. The reproduction of individual images, screenshots, embeds or video sequences serves to discuss the topic. 2) Individual contributions were created through the use of machine assistance and were carefully checked by the Mimikama editorial team before publication. ( Reason )