Avast Blog Tips & Advices: Romance and confidence fraud: Cybercrime’s $363 million se

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FBI expert tells the Avast Blog about fraud related to social media and dating sites, the second-costliest type of cybercrime

Crying out from near the top of the FBI’s cybercrime report last week was a heartbreaking statistic. The second-costliest category of crime, behind only compromised business email, was confidence and romance fraud, with a 2018 cost of $363 million.

What does romance fraud look like? The FBI cases read like the ultimate cautionary tales about not falling for smooth-talkers.

A Houston woman sent $2 million to “Charlie,” her apparent online boyfriend, whom she came to trust over months of correspondence. An Oregon man accepted money from his supposed online girlfriend and sent it to an account at her direction, not realizing he was laundering the money from other fraud victims.

In the most unromantic terms, the FBI sums up the category of cybercrime this way: “A perpetrator deceives a victim” online into believing they have “a trust relationship, whether family, friendly, or romantic.” The victim is then persuaded to send money, personal and financial information, or to launder money on behalf of the perpetrator.

These scams happen 50 times a day

If this sounds rare, it isn’t. The scams happened 18,493 times last year, the FBI reports – an average of more than 50 times a day. Identity theft happened 13% less often.

Victims are predominantly older widowed or divorced women, the FBI says. Their supposed princes are often criminals who are computer literate and educated. Using social media and dating site profiles for background information, the con artists get close to their marks online through discussing hobbies and pursuits they supposedly have in common.

Special Agent Christine Beining (pictured), a veteran financial fraud investigator in the FBI’s Tampa, Fla., division, has seen a substantial increase in the number of romance scam cases. Most people “absolutely do not know how large this problem is,” she told us.

“Gone are the days where lonely people went to bars or church to meet someone. Now, they just hop on their computers and join dating websites. Online dating websites have opened up so many possibilities for those searching for love.” But with that convenience has come risk – and shame.

“Romance scams are highly underreported,” Beining said. “This is largely because victims feel extremely embarrassed and ashamed for having fallen prey to this type of scam.” One victim told Beining that she tried to report romance fraud, but a male law enforcement officer told her she had “no business being on a dating website at your age." That kind of judgement discourages victims from reporting this hidden crime, Beining said.

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