Many card holders and
businesses around the world continue to lose billions of dollars each year to
credit card fraud. Criminal syndicates continue to combine a wide variety of
extortion scams and other fraudulent schemes to keep at pace with improvements
on payment security protocols. A lot of these scams are now targeted at the
online dating industry, especially due to the widespread worldwide adoption of
online payment systems and card not present platforms.
These criminal syndicates
are now targeting married men and women who hang out in popular dating sites and
apps for extortion schemes. These are often called romance scams, which also
usually result to more serious credit card fraud. So, how exactly are these
romance scams done by these scammers?
Romance Scams & Credit Card Fraud
A romance scam is designed to
extort money from unsuspecting online dating users. These schemes are mostly
targeted at married men and women in the USA, Canada, Australia, the UK, some
EU territories and a few Asian countries. On the other hand, some scammers try
to trick users into unknowingly participating in credit card fraud and money laundering operations.
To extort money from
unsuspecting users, these criminals convince their targets to engage in
friendly conversations at these online dating platforms. When these
conversations become intimate, these scammers trick victims into continuing
their conversations at widely used social networks like Facebook and also
through popular instant messaging apps like Skype. What these users don't know
is that their intimate conversations are logged and recorded without their
consent.
These scammers then move in
for the kill. They threaten these users to expose their infidelity by
publishing their conversation logs and recordings all over the Internet. They
also force these users to pay a significant amount of money by telling them
that they'll directly send these logs and recordings to their spouses,
children, employers, friends and colleagues. Once these users pay, these
scammers also try to steal their financial information. They do this to use
these stolen details for more serious credit card fraud.
To deceive users into
unknowingly participating in credit card fraud and money laundering operations,
these criminals try to convince users to go on a business venture with them.
They ask unsuspecting users to set up a business in their country and apply for
a merchant account. What their targets don't know is that this merchant account
will only be used for charging and cashing out stolen credit cards.
They also convince users to
receive money for them. What these users don't know is that this money is sent
as cash advance remittances from stolen credit cards. Before victims know it,
they're participating in money laundering and credit card fraud.
Some scammers trick users
into agreeing to receive products on their behalf. In reality, these products
are also purchased with stolen credit cards.
Now that you know how credit
card fraud is done by these scammers through these online dating scams, you'll
be able to arm yourself with the knowledge to spot and avoid these schemes. You
should also share this with your family and friends, so they can also steer
clear from these online dating scams and fraudulent credit card schemes.
