Hawks bust online dating syndicate who allegedly targeted unsuspecting women

THE HAWKS have arrested four online dating scam syndicate members and confiscated five laptops and 12 cellphones.

Two of the laptops contained fraudulent profiles of people, which they used to lure unsuspecting victims.

One suspect was arrested shortly after receiving a dummy parcel from the Hawks at PostNet in Somerset Mall in the Western Cape.

The four suspects – two men and two women, aged between 27 and 38 – after appearing briefly in the Cape Town Magistrate’s Court today, are due to be transferred to join 11 others awaiting trial in Pretoria on similar charges.

Hawks spokesman Lieutenant- Colonel Robert Netshiunda said the suspects were charged with fraud for allegedly opening bank accounts with the major banks and using them to receive money from online dating victims. He said more charges would be added against the suspects as the investigation progressed.

Netshiunda said unsuspecting women were targeted by the syndicate, who befriended them on social media.

South African Banking Risk Information Centre chief executive Kalyani Pillay commended the Hawks for the arrests.

She said although it was unfortunate that the investigations took time, “the perseverance of the Hawks in this investigation has paid off”.

She said online dating could be a great way for singles to meet their perfect match, but was also a way for cyber criminals to find victims.

Pillay said organised criminals had entered the arena, and the scale and sophistication of the scams had increased significantly.

“They target victims, identified mostly through social media platforms, who appear to be affluent.”

She said a typical profile would be a middle-aged elderly widow or divorcée who appeared to have access to large amounts of cash.

The information was easily gleaned from a victim’s Facebook or Instagram profile, if the security settings weren’t strictly applied.

Sourcing information from online dating sites was also relatively easy because the victims usually shared freely in the hope of finding romance.

“It is important to note that while many victims have been female, men have also been duped,” she said.