Avoid Fake Cupid Valentine’s Day Scams

It’s only a few days from Valentine’s Day, and we’re betting there are more lonely hearts out there this year than most. We get it. 2020 pretty much sucked all the way around, and the pandemic has made it pretty tough to meet people. A lot of people looking for companionship or partners are turning to dating websites, apps, chat rooms, and social networking sites to help fill that void in their lives. There’s not a thing wrong with that.

However, we want to encourage you to be leery of online romance scams. The scammers’ ultimate goal is to get access to the victim’s financial or personal identifying information.

The victims of these scams are often seniors – usually older men who find this person that they’re talking to be very genuine but is actually scamming them.

These types of scams happen a lot but seem to be particularly prevalent this time of the year. There were 23,768 complaints about romance scams reported to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center – with those victims losing more than $605 million of their hard-earned money. The truth is that those numbers are actually much higher as many victims are too embarrassed to report what happened to them.

Remember the old saying, “If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.” As a general rule, you should always assume that scammers are trolling even the most reputable dating and social media sites. Don’t send any money to people that you meet online or offer up any personal information.

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