Love Scams...
Be Aware of the Dangers Involved!

Love scams are quite common on the internet nowadays; thus compelling everyone to exercise the utmost caution while dating and flirting online.

Certainly, love and dating are subjects which are very close to many persons' heart. As a result of this, even fraudsters endeavour to exploit the human need for love and companionship to perpetrate their devilish acts.

How do they accomplish this? In many instances scammers who are males pretend to be girls or women when in actual fact they are males.

And in 75% of all scam cases of this nature, according to some online estimates, the scammers succeed in defrauding their unsuspecting victims who are desperately in need of affection from the opposite sex.

That is why the trend is very worrisome indeed.

But, how do they operate? Well, they lurk around social network sites where they hook up with their potential victims. Thereafter, they arrange to exchange e-mails, phone numbers and photographs.

An important factor in all love scams is that the scammers are quite eager to develop the trust and confidence of their possible preys. So, they seek to connect on phone with them using a pre-arranged female accomplice.

Another important ingredient to watch out for in love scams is that the scammers always narrate an ordeal of misfortune, claiming to have lost all their family members in one tragedy or the other.

Additionally, they also claim that they are the only survivor in the tragedy and they desire to settle down to family life.

The story looks so convincing that the most careful of all persons can fall a victim.

Analysis of Some Scam e-mails

Okay. Now, time to get practical. Take a look at some sample e-mails from certain scammers exchanged with me after coming in contact with them on a dating site. Also take note of the areas l have highlighted and the various advice l have given on some very vital points deserving the utmost attention.

1. e-mail from "Felista"

(i) Look at the very first line:

"My name is felista Godwill I am from Ivory Coast in West Africa,I am 5.3ft tall, (never married before)". l believe lvory Coast should be Cote'd-lvoire, isn't it?

Advice: Be careful of e-mails where the sender says s/he is "from West Africa". This is because the person is aware of the profoundly negative image of widespread squalor and poverty that have been painted on television by foreign media.

The person seeks to exploit that image to defraud the unsuspecting prey. Just take a look at the second line for you to understand what l mean.

"And presently i am residing in the refugee camp here in Dakar as a result of the civil war that was fought in my country."

So what next? You obviosly start pitying her. Such a beautiful young girl - that is another thing about scammers, they never use an ugly girl's photo - to have passed through so much pain, suffering and deprivation. And, without knowing it, you are gradually getting hooked.

(ii) Now, let's look at the next line:

"My late father (Dr William Godwill) was the managing director of Fredcocoa and Associates (Ltd) and he was the personal adviser to the former head of state (Late Dr Robert Guei) before the rebels attacked our house one early morning and killed my mother and my father in cold blood.

Advice: The scammer is obviously taking a chance here that you do not know anything about the history of Ivory Coast and their troubled political story. So, he tries to educate you. Now, you are not interested in the history of a West African country, are you? Of course not. Okay. So, the scammer answers your question: "what's in it for me?" by hinting that s/he has money that s/he is willing and eager to share with you.

(iii) Take a look at the next line:

"It was only me that is alive now and I managed to make my way to a near by country Senegal where i am leaving now.
I would like to know more about you. Your likes and dislikes,your hobbies and what you are doing presently.
I will tell you more about myself in my next mail.Attached here is my picture.I will also like to see your's picture.Hoping to hear from you soonest
felista"

Advice:The scammer would always say they are the only surviving person remaining in their family, wanting you to know that whatever wealth they have would not have to be shared with any family member since they are all deceased. This e-mail looks and sounds genuine, isn't it? But, believe me, it is a cleverly-worded love scam!

2. e-mail from "Blessing"

Let us analyse the second mail.

"Compliments,today is one of my happiest moment to express my feelings to you and you honored me,i thank you for given that love a chance,I'm miss Blessing Theophile From Rwanda but living currently in Senegal as a refugee,because of untimely death of my late parents,I still have a lot to talk on that but time will not permit me to say everything to you now,please you can call me always with our Reverend father Number(+221-768-702-174) his name is Reverend father timothy,email (reverendtimothy@yahoo.com) he will sent for me to answer your call,here are my likes, i love honest and sincerity,more above a decent person who always have the fear of god in him and always stand for the truth,you can ask question if you wish,but please i will be more happy if you can kindly call me on phone for that,Remember nearness is love and it takes proper care to build a lasting love,but i will boldly say i welcome you into my life with all my heart,remember to call me on phone is very much important to hear each other,thanks
Miss Blessing."

Advice:This scammer has also painted a picture of misfortune of being a refugee in a West African country. S/he also says she is presently living with a reverend father. Take note that it is very easy for people to lie with the church because not only is the lie unveriable, many people easily get "sold" that way.

Okay, what's in it for you? S/he is eager, albeit anxious to get married. So, what will you do? Are you just going to pass up the opportunity of getting married to the prettiest girl in town? Maybe you should take a second look at the picture in this write-up to get the mental picture of what l am talking about. So, you respond favourably to the request for love.

And if you already think that this is the height of all scams on the internet, you just wait till you read the second e-mail from this scammer just further down!

Take a look again at the reply l sent to this scammer.

Hello Miss Blessing. How do you do? Thanks for your message. I'm sorry to hear about your misfortune. l'm also interested in having a relationship with you, but let's not rush it. Tell me more about yourself. What do you do for a living right now? Is it the good reverend that is taking care of your guardianship right now? I also noticed a ring on the fourth finger of your left hand - what does it signify? What are your immediate plans regarding marriage and family life? I hope you already know that l live and work in Nigeria. Are you ready to make the move to live in Nigeria when the time comes and if the need arises?
I await your prompt response as l'm impatient to get this thing off the ground.
Kome

S/he sent a reply on the 14th of October, 2009

As a result of the favourable response in my e-mail above, the scammer subsequently sent a more detailed mail a few days later. Please read on...

"Hello Darling,
Thanks again for your little time to tell me a brief about your self, I think we have known each other a little, please like i told you before,i will still urge you with permission to call me always on phone, because life here in the camp are full of miserable,your calls can help me bright up my mood and smiles, the ring is a gift from my daddy on my birthday, i use it to remember them.

Please i think i should let you know this in time, My late father was into politics before finally joined business in our country,i can say he is a successful business man with a lots of investments,I'm the only child in the family, my mum and dad was involve in a Road accident that claims a lot of life's, they died without saying good bye to there only child, I'm only 24 yrs old now, is very painful to be out from your family,i shield tears in writing this mail now, i just run away from our country to a near by country Senegal where I'm seeking asylum because i knew that my late father has a lot of enemies because of his successful life including his community members,if you are an Africa you will understand this better,

I just want to let you know this in time, that was one of the reason i called you to be a friend a lover and also my only best true friend, please i ran away with some of my late father valuable documents and his account information's together with his death certificate after the burial, please my father deposited the sum of ( 7.800) million us dollars to one of ,the leading banks London,i have all the documents that proof all this vital information's that I'm given you now,

I have been in touch with the bank,they advice me to seek for a foreign partner whom i trust most on the claims of my late father, my age and the laws of the bank will never permit them to have anything together with me until I'm matured enough,but life in this refugee camp are full of sorrows every day, therefore i seek your help on that, i will be happy if you accept my proposal and forward to me all this necessary in-formations of yours to help me inform the bank about you today

Names ..........................................
Age ..........................................
Address .........................................
Telephone ...........................................
Bank Info ..........................................

So i can inform the bank about your coming to claim this money on my behalf and also to send the bank in-formations to you, please everything is pure and 100% correctct, you dont have to risk any thing in helping me, but please you will help me to decid the best investment that will profit me and of curse you as well, so please i let you know this because i thought by now we have known each other, please identify with me together with your full informations because i want you to transfer this account to your personal account so you can come over here in person to take me along to your country, please just call me for further directions on this issue,
Miss Blessing."

Advice: Is there any need for me to analyse this e-mail and spell it out for you any longer. This particular mail is similar in many respects to the one sent to me by "Felista". l will not be surprised indeed if the author of the two mails is actually one and the same person.

Quite frankly, by this time l was already totally fed up with this obvious scam, so l just ignored the e-mail altogether and refused to reply.

As a result of my silence, the scammer now sent another reply on the 17th of October, 2009.

"Hello Kome, How are you to day? I did not hear from you are you ok. please i will love to read from your mails. i miss you kiss bye.
Blessing.

This time, the scammer felt that all that there was to be said had already been said in the last mail, so decided to make this one a brief one.

Well, l did not reply again to this last e-mail because l knew it was a complete waste of my precious time as it had scam written all over it. And that was the end of the exchange of e-mails between the scammer and me.

3. e-mail from "Princess Nwani"

Ok. Let's take a look at the third e-mail.

Have you received a scam mail recently? Have you received a scam mail recently? What should you do about it? e-mail service providers in recent times have developed and are continuously refining their applications to reduce the high occurence of spam in their service. Thus, e-mail messages that are perceived as spam in the best judgment of their system are junked together in a special folder marked as spam. So, users of their service are prevented from seeing such e-mails when they find their way into their e-mail add. Some service providers even go the extent of deleting such messages after the passage of some time without the messages haven been opened by their recipients. But, despite their best efforts to reduce the incidence of spam, spam still remains a worrying global problem. So, what should you do if you have received a spam e-mail? 1. Do a point by point analysis of the e-mail to be sure it is intended to defraud as l have done in this write-up. 2. Do a reply asking for a detailed information of the recipient based on your findings and suspicion of scam in the first mail. Analyse this second mail. They will usually give themselves away in this second e-mail because it is no longer a cut and dry one-sided mail any more. 3. Ask for a very recent photograph. With camera phones this shouldn't be difficult to get nowadays. Analyse the photograph carefully. Look at the face, then at the hands, then at the posture in the photograph. Does it tell you anything? 4. Go a step further. Ask for a video recording. Analyse the video from all angles. 5. Reach a conclusion. Is it a love scam? Reach a decision. Then do a reply, if you have the time. But, if you do not have the time to waste on scam mails and you are 100% convinced it is a love scam, ignore the e-mail altogether and pretend you never received it while marking the e-mail as spam in your junk folder. Based on the high points provided above, you can analyse all e-mails that you receive in your e-mail address inbox as to the likelihood of them being scam mails. Usually, when a proposition, love or business, looks too good to be true, then it is. Go with your gut feeling. In 99% of all cases where there is an initial doubt by those involved in internet scams, it is often found out later on that their initial fears and scepticism was right on the mark. But, that is not to say that there are no genuine love propositions, equally leading to a business proposition on the net. lt only takes discernment, good judgement and strict discipline to make the right decision. So, be wise. Avoid love scams on the internet like the plague that they truly are! (For other kinds of e-mail scams, see this blog post of mine at SCAM ALERT!!!! DO NOT SEND YOUR PERSONAL CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION TO ANYBODY FOR ANY REASON WHATSOEVER!!!!)

"Dear Love,
Thanks for your mail,I will really like to have a good relationship with you, and i have a special reason why i decided to contact you. I decided to contact you because of the urgency of my situation here and after reading your profile ,I am Princess, 24 years old girl from Sudan,the only daughter of Late Dr.Fung Wani, my father was a diamond merchant who was killed by the rebel attack in my country Sudan. (Here is another picture of misfortune, very much like the previous e-mails before it)

I am constrained to contact you because of the maltreatment I am receiving from my step mother. She planned to take away all my late father's treasury and properties from me since the unexpected death of my beloved Father. Meanwhile I wanted to escape to Europe but she hide away my international passport and other valuable traveling documents.(The situation is very urgent, so there is no need to delay a day longer) Luckily she did not discover where I kept my fathers File which contains important documents.

So I decided to run to the refugee camp where I am presently seeking asylum under the United Nations High Commission for the Refugee herein Dakar, Republic of Senegal. I wish to contact you personally for a long term business relationship and investment assistance in your Country. My father of blessed memory deposited the sum of US$7.500, 000.00 (sweet Jeeezuuz! What a huge con artist!) in a Bank with my name as the next of kin.(S/he is the next of kin, so if you marry her quickly you immediately inherit her wealth too!)

However, I shall forward you with the necessary documents on confirmation of your acceptance to assist me for the transfer and investment of the fund. As you will help me in an investment, i will like to complete my studies, as i was in my 1st year in th university, when the crisis started.

(What's in it for you?) It is my intention to compensate you with 15% of the total money for your services and the balance shall be my investment capital. This is the reason why I decided to contact you. Please all communications should be through this email address only for confidential purposes. As soon as I receive your positive response showing your interest I will put things into action immediately. In the light of the above, I shall appreciate an urgent message indicating your ability and willingness to handle this transaction sincerely.

Awaiting your urgent and positive response. Please do keep this only to your self i beg you not to disclose it till i come over, once the fund has been transferred.I send you my pictures, looking forward to see yours as well.

Yours Sincerely,
Princess

Advice:So, what do you think? Another love scam! A whooping US$7.500, 000.00 and you get 15% of the total sum for managing the fund. Sweet Jeeezuuz! What a cleverly-worded love scam! Hahahahahaha!

Have you received a scam e-mail recently? What should you do if you do receive a scam mail? See the box opposite for the answer.

Avoid Love Scams

After reading those few samples of e-mails from scammers on the internet, l will leave you to be the judge. What do you think? Do they not sound like love scams to you?

Certainly, it is a fact that love scams are quite common on the internet nowadays. And it is costing a lot of persons huge expenditure to finance this love fraud.

It is certainly no fun and there is no joy in being ripped off a large sum of money by scammers posing to be interested in having a love relationship or getting married.

It can result in a good laugh when it happens to others. But certainly not when it happens to us. So take precautionary measures to protect and safeguard both your heart and your bank account. Love scams on the internet are growing by the second.

Please, do not add to the statistic!

Are You on Facebook? If You Are, Then This Is A MUST READ!!!

Are you on Facebook? If you are, then the February 2011 edition of the Perfect Relationship Advisor's free True love and dating tips newsletter is a must read. lt addresses the subject: Love Scam on Facebook? Better Believe It! It is Real!!!