HOW ROMANCE SCAMS WORK

Australians lost more than $17 million to romance scammers in 2017 alone. How can so many people believe a dream that all others see as obviously false?

“Offenders are very good at identifying a weakness or vulnerability in a person. They use a variety of grooming techniques and tactics of power, control and persuasion that manipulate victims into doing things they wouldn’t normally do,” explains Dr Cassandra Cross, Senior Lecturer in the School of Justice at the Queensland University of Technology.

Most romance scams start through dating sites, although social media, particularly Facebook, is growing in popularity, says Delia Rickard, Deputy Chair of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC). “Scammers usually have a good understanding of who

this person is through looking at what they like and don’t like. They are highly skilled at manipulating their victims’ emotions.”

The scammers ‘love bomb’ their victims with loving words, poems and gifts to gain their trust, following much-tested scripts that have been proven to work. They’ll isolate victims from their friends and family, and message them through the night so they are sleep-deprived.

“These people make a lot of effort to groom their victims,” says Rickard. “They’ll be incredibly thoughtful and create a dream universe just for the two of you. Then they will eventually ask for money. They all lead to money.”

Scammers might ask directly for gifts, or for your bank account details. They may need money to visit you or to escape from some sort of emergency, or they may ask you to transfer money for them in a moneylaundering scam. They may even try to lure you overseas to meet them, putting you at great personal risk. Others may record intimate videos of you, which they will then use for blackmail.

Whatever their methods, scammers are part of international criminal networks that are causing significant emotional and financial harm to the community.