Jul. 5, 2023 "Calgary woman swindled out of nearly $500K in online dating scam": Today I found this article by Colleen Underwood on CBC:
His online dating profile included a handsome looking photo and an uncomplicated life.
He was from Calgary. He was 62. He was divorced with no kids. Christian. He had an advanced degree.
And he was a romantic at heart.
"He basically said, 'I want to rush to where you are at the end of the day,'" said Shelley Smith, 60.
CBC News has agreed not to use the woman's real name because she is ashamed of having fallen prey to a romance scam that left her near financial ruin, at one point shunned by her family and feeling suicidal.
Calgary police are now investigating. Its blockchain investigative team is working with Europol and the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre to trace the source of the fraud.
Police are also encouraging other victims to come forward.
Smith says as hard as it is to come forward, that's the only way these scams will stop.
"It's easy to look at people and go, 'How stupid could she be?' But it's not that. It's that people are in a place in their life where they're so vulnerable that they fall victim to something like this," said Smith.
Building trust
Smith says looking back she realizes she was not in the best state of mind to initiate a relationship in September 2021.
Her sole sibling, a brother, had recently passed away.
Her father fell ill and died within weeks.
Her mother was recently diagnosed with dementia, and Smith says she had her own health issues.
"I was probably the most vulnerable that I've ever been in my entire life," said Smith.
But she says the man she met online through the dating app was there for her.
Carl Pettersson (not his real name) texted and talked with her constantly.
But attempts to meet in person were always thwarted before he said he had to leave the country. He'd told her he was an architect and was going to build a luxury hotel in Turkey starting in December 2021.
But when Pettersson landed there, he said his laptop had broken and he needed her to access his bank account to transfer money to different contractors.
And, by doing so, she could see his bank balance. It was more than $1 million — allowing her to believe he was rich.
"They groom you … it had his name and everything. It's quite elaborate what they can do."
Days later, he said the bank froze his account and he needed money to pay duty on all the heavy equipment being sent over. When she offered to help, he initially declined.
A week or so later, she says, he took her up on that offer.
"It was just going to be the short term, and that just progressed — from that to 'I just need another blah blah blah to get home and I'll make all of this right,' and then one problem after another."
An employee got injured and needed hospital care. Pettersson got sick. He had to go to court. Always a new issue.
The wire transfers were a few thousand at a time, usually through a bitcoin account, which he said was easier to access.
She also shipped him laptops and other computer equipment to sell overseas for money. All told, Smith estimates she sent Pettersson cash and equipment amounting to nearly $500,000.
All the while, she says, he told her not to tell anyone because he didn't want her friends and family to think poorly of him when they eventually met.
And whenever she questioned him, he turned the tables.
"'How dare you say that after all we've been through. I can't believe you would say that.' So then there's guilt placed on you that you're doubting [him]," said Smith.
Jarring reality
Smith says she was running out of money. She had used up a home equity line of credit, borrowed from family and friends, and cashed in RRSPs. She even took out a second mortgage.
But she says she couldn't stop because each time Pettersson said he just needed a little more to get home to repay her.
Then one day last August, as she was planning to sell her parents' home to access more cash, her cousins came over and broke the news to her.
They'd done a reverse image search with his photo and discovered Pettersson wasn't who he said he was.
The photo belonged to someone who lived in Denver and was used in several dating profiles.
"Finding out that you know this wasn't real and then that clearly I'd lost all of this money, I crashed," said Smith.
Smith says she not only lost her money and the supposed love of her life, but also several family members who couldn't believe she got scammed and hid so much from them.
"I was feeling suicidal. I was so devastated."
CBC News reached out to the man in the photo used by Pettersson. His name is Bradley Joseph. He works in marketing in Denver, and he says he hears from women from all over the world after they've figured out they've been scammed.
Joseph says this has been going on for about five years.
"It makes me uncomfortable and it makes me really sad and I get angry, there's so many people out there who are just lonely and vulnerable," said Joseph.
No background checks
Smith says she takes full responsibility for the mistakes she made, the lies she told her family and the red flags she ignored.
But she says she also thinks that the dating app, Zoosk, could have done more to protect its clients.
Zoosk's terms of agreement state it does not routinely screen users, inquire into backgrounds, attempt to verify information or conduct criminal background checks.
Smith believes Zoosk should ask for two pieces of ID to raise the entry bar,
require new clients to watch a video depicting stories of victims who've been scammed,
and do reverse image searches of profile photos.
"My biggest thing right now is I can't walk away from this without trying to make a difference somehow," said Smith.
Last year, a U.S. court ruled that another online dating service, Match Group Inc., was not guilty of defrauding its customers for failing to keep fake profiles off of Match.com.
Don't blame victim
Legal expert Irina Manta says people could try more exclusive and expensive online dating services to receive a better vetting process.
But in the meantime, she says, people need to stop blaming the victim.
Manta is a law professor at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y., and the founding director of its Center for Intellectual Property Law.
She says it's tough to put yourself in someone else's shoes. She says sometimes people are down on their luck through no fault of their own. And sometimes, she says, there can be rational reasons why people brush away red flags.
In these cases, she says, it might be a limited dating pool.
"If there are not a lot of awesome people that might want to be in a partnership with you, there's a chance this is not a good person.
But maybe there is a chance this is a good person. You're going to sort of keep going for as long as possible," said Manta.
Smith says that when she finally confronted Pettersson, he told her he was sorry and that he was also a victim. Pettersson said he had been trying to pay back a gambling debt, and had to call her for money, often at gunpoint.
And then he blamed her, saying she forced him to take the money.
Smith says that rather than asking "how can the victim be so stupid," people need to ask "how can the criminal be so cruel?"
"I really want to change that attitude. It's like you guys are forgetting here a crime was committed."
Smith, a registered nurse, says she will now have to work past her original retirement date to rebuild her savings.
But she says she's been able to pay back the money she borrowed and keep her home. She still has an outstanding line of credit.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/calgary-woman-swindled-online-dating-scam-1.6897545
My opinion:
1. Do reverse image searches of profile photos.
2. Don't give money to someone you haven't met in- person before. Or at the very least have a video call with them.
This part stood out to me:
"But when Pettersson landed there, he said his laptop had broken and he needed her to access his bank account to transfer money to different contractors.
And, by doing so, she could see his bank balance. It was more than $1 million — allowing her to believe he was rich."
Here's a couple of good questions:
Why would this man whom you've never met before, would trust you so much that he would give you access to his bank accounts?
How does he know that this woman isn't going to get the money out of him?
If this was real life, he would either buy a new laptop, use a public computer at the library, or call the bank, or go to a bank.
This is from my Jul. 2017 blog post:
Mar. 30, 2024: I would like to add this:
The boss and company gave me a $4000 check to deposit into my account so I can withdraw the cash and put it into this account at another bank. Scotiabank CSR and manager told me this was a scam.
Here's a couple of good questions:
Why would the boss and company give Tracy a $4000 check, a woman they have never met before?
How do they know that Tracy isn't going to spend the money?
At the time, I thought: "If I or any of their employees do spend the money, they're going to call the police."
Scream 4/ Southgate Construction scam
https://badcb.blogspot.com/2017/07/scream-4-southgate-construction-scam.html
Feb. 5, 2024 "Romance scammer reveals how he tricks women after failing to fool Go Public reporter": Today I found this article by Erica Johnson on CBC:
When "Bobby Brown" sent me a direct message on Instagram, I knew right away he wasn't the real deal. A tall, handsome, 40-something man who said he'd found my social media profile and become enamoured.
"Nice smile," he wrote. "I'm Bobby Brown from Sacramento, California, USA. Currently living in Scotland working here as an oil drilling engineer."
Usually, I delete messages from strangers who reach out on social media claiming to be soldiers, surgeons or, like "Bobby," oil rig engineers. An uncannily high number claim they are widowed.
I suspected this online Romeo was running one of the most popular cons going — the romance scam.
With Valentine's Day approaching, Go Public asked the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre (CAFC) for statistics on romance scams and received some staggering figures.
Romance scams were responsible for some of the highest financial fraud losses in 2023, according to the CAFC,
costing 945 victims more than $50 million.
That means each person lost an average of almost $53,000.
And that only reflects the fraud that victims reported to authorities.
Rather than scoff at people who fall prey to romance scams, social psychologist Andre Wang says people should understand what drives that need for connection.
"It's actually tapping into something that's quite fundamental about who we are as human beings," says Wang, assistant professor of psychology at the University of Toronto. "This fundamental need to belong."
After six weeks of messaging back and forth with Bobby, I finally called him out and asked him to come clean about his life as a romance scammer, how he does it and why he says he can't stop.
How he wooed me
After Bobby introduced himself as an oil drilling engineer, he explained he was working in Scotland on a short-term contract and had a nine-year-old son in a military boarding school in the U.S.
"Can I have your mobile number?" he asked right away, claiming that his laptop battery was almost dead so he'd need to switch to texting on his phone.
Over the next couple of weeks, Bobby asked for my number repeatedly. I learned later that he was worried that if one of the many other women he was corresponding with reported the phoney account, Instagram would shut it down.
Within two weeks, he was calling me "dear" and "sweetheart."
He came on pretty heavy — and his English didn't always make sense. "Well you are really an interesting woman, I would love to be a part of you," he wrote.
"I want you to be MINE and I want to love you til the end of the world," he messaged.
In the meantime, Bobby sent a photo of what he claimed was a street in Edinburgh where he was working — only the cars were parked on the wrong side of the road, as people in Scotland drive on the left.
We made small talk and I asked him about his favourite meal, which he claimed was "macaroni and spaghetti with garlic" and sent a photo of a pasta dish. (Later, he told me he googled "popular American foods" to find an answer — he must have misunderstood the results.)
To prove he was legit, he sent a photo of a staff ID card, bearing the name Bobby Brown and said he was an oil spillage controller for an oil and gas company based in Aberdeen, Scotland. Oddly, the signature below the photo looked nothing like "Bobby Brown."
At the six week mark, the dashing oil engineer proposed.
"Will you be mine?" he asked, adding an emoji of a diamond ring. "I want you to own my heart. I think this love will last forever sweetheart." Yes, he included a red heart emoji.
Finally, I've reached my limit. Though I've been waiting to see how he planned to convince me to send him money, now, I'm ready to hear the truth.
"I would just like to have an honest conversation," I write. "Will you do that?"
Silence. Then, blue dots appear on my phone as he types. They disappear. Reappear. Finally, he responds.
"You are going to hate me."
To my surprise, he agrees to talk, as long as CBC keeps his identity concealed, because he says speaking out about the shady world of romance scams will put his safety at risk.
'Yahoo boys'
The phone line is crackly, his voice barely audible. I've dialed a number with the area code for Rochester, New York, but the scammer says he's rigged the phone so he can talk to women from where he actually lives — Oghara, in southern Nigeria, with a population of about 290,000.
It's evening there, and he says he's walked to a deserted field, where no one can hear his conversation.
He says he's 27, the oldest of several siblings. He tells me that six years ago, his father lost a good job and has struggled to find work. His mother was pregnant and out of work at the time, he says.
"We had to sell our house to survive," he tells me. His voice cracks. If he's lying, he's doing a convincing job.
Poverty is widespread, he says, and getting worse. According to a report by the Nigerian government, inflation hasn't climbed so high since the mid-90s.
He tried to get odd jobs for a little cash, he says, but most days came home empty handed.
Reluctantly, he says, he decided to become a "Yahoo boy" — a nickname that comes from the email service Yahoo, which became a popular tool for online fraudsters in Nigeria.
He estimates 80 per cent of the people he knows are Yahoo boys, most of them committing romance scams.
Though he says it's not something people in Nigeria look upon favourably, "they can't force it to go away" because "families need it to survive."
'The boss'
After his dad lost his job, he says he moved into an apartment where an older man — "the boss" — provided a bed and one meal a day.
In exchange, he says he and two other Yahoo boys who lived there were required to catfish — pretend to be other people online, seduce foreign women, win their trust and eventually convince them to send money.
The boss would take half their earnings, he says.
Late in the evening — when women in North America were just waking up — he says his boss would call his three recruits to the living room.
"Get your social media accounts ready," he says the boss would tell them. "Start hustling."
The boss provided photos of attractive Caucasian men to use as their catfishing profile pictures — stolen from social media accounts, he says.
He also gave them scripts for various scenarios, explaining what to say as an oil engineer, a doctor or someone in the military, as well as how to use flattery, and excuses for when the targeted women would ask to meet in person or talk on the phone.
The scammer says he was told to claim he had a son, because women generally like young children. "It helps build trust," he says. A child also figures prominently in his scams.
'The Method'
During his time with the boss, the scammer says he learned how to pull off what was called "The Method" — a scam that involves asking women for photos of Apple or iTunes gift cards.
He then trades the codes on those cards on the black market for cash.
He says he'd sometimes tell his marks that he needed gift cards to buy data for his phone.
He'd claim he was having trouble accessing his bank account from another country but desperately wanted to stay in touch.
The young son he mentions when he first connects with them comes in handy, too.
"I'm just going to tell [her] that my son needs the gift card for his subscription on his mobile phone. And games," he says. "Keep sending them every three days."
He says he tells her that he's going to pay her back and that when he's done his overseas contract, she'll benefit from a loving relationship with a handsome and financially secure man.
"The woman won't want to miss out," he says.
While people might question why women might provide emotional or financial support, Wang, the psychologist, says it's normal human behaviour for someone who believes they're in a relationship.
"We're supposed to support people with whom we have romantic bonds," says Wang.
"Romance scammers can definitely tap into that sense of obligation that people feel when they are intimately connected with another person," he says.
"Even a simple request that might seem outlandish from an observer's point of view might feel different when you are the one being asked."
The scammer says they were coached to never ask women to wire money, because "they might be told the whole truth at the bank" and months of effort could be lost.
When "The Method" didn't work on a woman, he says the boss beat him. He claims that when he didn't earn enough, the boss would sometimes purposely serve him food that would make him sick.
After two years, he says he fled and moved back home, where he now mostly runs online romance scams on his own.
He's tight-lipped about how many women he's tricked and how much money he's bilked out of them over the past six years, saying only that most victims have been in Canada or the United States.
Some of the bigger windfalls — $2,000 or $3,000 US — are the result of a fraud that pulls on the heartstrings of the women who fall for it: "Billing."
Billing
In this scam, he sends a frantic text to the woman he's courting, telling her his young son living in the U.S. has been rushed to an emergency room. He urgently needs to send the hospital a $3,000 deposit, he says, but can't access his bank account from Scotland.
He tells me that because it's such a big ask, he texts the woman a photo of his son in a hospital bed, with doctors at his bedside.
In reality, he says it's all been Photoshopped.
"You get the proof to make the client trust," he says. "Whatever I ask of her, she gives to me."
He says he knows that preying on the generosity of women he's misled for months is wrong, but poverty and desperation to feed his family trump feeling bad about the manipulation.
Though a request for such a large amount of money may seem like an obvious scam,
Wang says some women follow through because of a psychological process called "motivated reasoning."
"We tend to put more weight into evidence that supports our sense of reality,
and we're more likely to disregard evidence pointing to the contrary," he says.
"We are confirming what we want to believe."
The scammer says he studied my Instagram account, and would definitely have asked me for gift cards for his non-existent son. He says he might have tried "The Billing" scam, too.
Our phone call has stretched past midnight in Nigeria, where it's started to rain. He's shivering and says he has to end the interview.
He's hoping I'll mention how sorry he is for ripping women off, for breaking their trust and their hearts. He says he understands why they might be angry with him.
"I know the kind of life I'm living," he says. "I don't have money."
"I feel badly, but I've got no option."
If you think you or somebody you know may be a victim of a romance scam, report it to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre.
Later this week, CBC News: Marketplace goes overseas to uncover a long-term con that combines investment schemes, romance scams and cryptocurrency fraud. They also speak to perpetrators who reveal how they're forced to scam Canadians. "Bad Romance: Who's conning Canadians" airs Friday, Feb. 9 on CBC News: Marketplace.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/go-public-romance-scams-1.7088334
My opinion: I feel sorry for this Nigerian man and all the others who are desperate for money. I can't help them.
There is a difference between force and financial pressure. There is so much financial pressure that he is has to run these online scams.
This reminds me of my Jan. 2024 blog post:
TV and movie comparisons- Justin Berry/ strippers/ sugar babies
Dec. 26, 2023 Financial pressure: These women are working as strippers and sugar babies to make money to pay bills.
This reminds me of this book I read back in 2006 by Robert T. Kiyosaki:
Poor dad: Money is the root of all evil.
Rich dad: The lack of money is the root of all evil.
College tuition and living costs should be more affordable.
https://www.amazon.ca/Rich-Dad-Poor-Teach-Middle/dp/1612680194
https://badcb.blogspot.com/2024/01/tv-and-movie-comparisons-justin-berry.html
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