$50 Million Lost To Online Romance Scammers Annually
Forget your broken heart and wounded pride. The true cost of Internet romance scams is $50,399,536.16, the amount of losses reported by Americans in 2011 to the The Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3), a low-key quasi-project of the FBI and the National White Collar Crime Center.
Women constituted more than $39 million of the losses, with the most vulnerable segments of the population being specifically women in their fifties and over the age of 60; however, even within that group, women in their fifties are more likely to hand over large sums of money to scammers than their older counterparts. As the IC3 soberly puts it, the scammers “use poetry, flowers and other gifts to reel in victims, while declaring ‘undying love.’” Then, of course, the PayPal payments and checks start arriving.
» via Fast Company
Impressive. The internet can be such a tricky place.
3 Notes
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electrictragedy reblogged this from infoneer-pulse and added:
It’s sad that this happens to so many people.
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thecollegesocialpath reblogged this from infoneer-pulse and added:
Impressive. The internet can be such a tricky place.
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kevinnuut likes this
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infoneer-pulse posted this
