Saturday, February 2, 2013

On-Line Dating Scam Artists on the Rise


On-Line Dating Scam Artists On the Rise

I know you have all gotten those emails that say you have had an uncle or an aunt from Europe die and that you are in line to inherit a million dollars if you… Then you get all excited, and it turns out to be a scam. When these fraudulent emails first started popping up, they really turned heads. But now, if you get one, you just delete it and go on. But these scam artists are getting more like child molesters. They vet their prey now on dating sites and woo them until the right time, and then they begin their scam.

I want to share a story about a scam artist who I just followed for about a month. I suspected at the beginning that he was vetting me and setting me up, but I wanted to follow the process because I was willing to go through this process to share it.

The man was a drop-dead gorgeous guy with pictures that no one (man or woman) could resist. He had pictures of himself smiling, shirtless and in a military uniform. Who can not trust the military?

His bio read like a man who completely understood what an older, wealthy man or woman would want from a younger hot man. He said: “people say that I am cute and sexy, but I don’t see it. All I think of is finding the man of my dreams that I will spend the rest of my life with. I want a partner I can trust and love for the rest of my life.”

I mean really! Anyone who sees those words with those pictures would have to say, this is too good to be true, which is exactly what I figured.

I answered the ad with a great deal of innocence, pretending to be the person that could be wooed into the lair of someone like him. He started out asking me questions about where I lived, what is the value of my house compared to his in Atlanta. How much equity I had in it. What kind of car I drove. I told him I had my house paid off and that I drove a BMW, and I was completely in.

He asked me via the messenger program on the dating site to start talking to him personally on KIK messenger, because his military GPS device could pick me up better in Libya. He said he wouldn’t be home until March from the war there. This gave him plenty of time to talk to me without having to be contacted on the phone. He also picked a place that was rife with political disturbance.

A couple times I asked him what the time was in Libya. He answered the wrong time. All I did was check Google. He was off by 3 hours both times.

The interesting thing about our conversations is that they were very one-sided. He would answer questions and call me, Babe, and say that he was falling for me, but never really tell me anything about himself.

Three days ago I could tell he was getting ready to start his move. He told me that there was an uprising in his camp. That it was very scary there. There was an attack around him. I told him that I would pray for him.

I kept answering compassionately as if he were really in the middle of a war.

But yesterday I pressed a little too hard for information, because he spent the entire day not talking. Then this morning, he told me that his camp had been bombed. He was left with nothing but his GPS device, the clothes on his back and no food or money. He said the banks there would not recognize his checks and he needed cash.

At this point, I told him I knew a high-ranking military friend who could get him help if he gave me his coordinates. And also, this same man didn’t know of any air strikes that happened last night.

Immediately, all of the correspondence stopped!

This guy was getting ready to ask me for money, no doubt. He or she (who knows) had planted a seed of intimacy. He even sent pictures and words of love to produce more closeness. He spent a month doing this. Then used something like a bombing in Libya to produce the worst kind of disgusting guise.

I’m telling you all this, because I want you to be aware that though the Internet is one of the most effective ways to meet new people for dating these days, it is also another way for people to be deceived in the worst ways. Be AWARE!


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Bo Sebastian is a Hypnotherapist and Life & Health Coach, available for private sessions to QUIT SMOKING, Lose Weight, New Lap-Band Hypnosis for Weight Loss, CHANGE YOUR MIND, CHANGE YOUR LIFE! at 615-400-2334 or www.bosebastian.com.

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