Elteto.net

There are many people out there trying to find their dream partner online, but it takes a lot of hard work and a healthy dose of suspicion to sort through all the smoke and mirrors of scammers.

Here are some things to look out for in your onlie quest for true love. Not every sign by itself is an indicator of a scammer, rather, watch out for a combination of signs.

-Prefers to communicate through e-mail. This way he/she can just plug your name in the appropriate places, and does not have to stay attentive to ongoing chat. Watch for he/she accidentally putting someone else's name in correspondence.

-He she dazzles you with long e-mails, but there is no (or very limited) specifics about your online relationship, talks, exchanges of ideas.

-He/she tells you that based on your profile how perfect you are for him/her, that you are funny, and share the same interests. Great, except your profile barely has your height, weight, and age on it. These sorts of solicitations are easy to catch when you just signed up and have not even completed your profile. Especially if you have not even uploaded a picture yet.

-Shows intense interest in you initially, then wavers off, gradually introducing his/her troubles, first hoping you would offer assistance, then if that does not work, making more direct solicitations. Variation: may try to guilt trip you into sending money.

-Ceases contact rapidly after seeing you will not budge about money.-Suddenly regains interest, after not having corresponded for a while, if you contact him/her with money offer.

-Sends you a lengthy introductory message, that only (or not even) mentions your username, and there is no specific reference to your profile in it. To be honest, some people do have form introductions, and are just lazy to customize it. It is not automatically a scam.

-He/she wants to meet you in person after only a day or two of meeting online for the first time. Too desperate. May be followed up soon with solicitation for money for a ticket. If he/she wants you to go to him/her, it is more likely a desperate member really just wanting to hook up with anyone willing to cater to his/her needs. May be indicative of a lot of baggage (social, romantic, emotional, psychological). Or, there is the sinister possibility. A person should NEVER travel to a foreign country alone on a short notice like that. This situation reeks of human trafficking attempts.

-Answers in chat session with short sentences, sporadically. This may mean he/she is preoccupied with other things, such as chatting with multiple targets (like you) at the same time. Note, however, that legitimate members may simply have a life other than looking for "the one", so they may simply be living their (not so) social life online concurrently.

-To ease your suspicion, he/she has multiple photos readily available. Usually good looking ones. Many will be posed, professional portraits. After an initial load, you may not receive many more, or you may receive one or two occasionally, to keep you interested. Knowing his/her own tactic, he/she may ask you to provide pictures of yourself because he/she would feel more confident about your true identity.

-Refuses voice or video chat. May make excuses about camera not working, claiming not having one on laptop (there ARE still some models out there without one), or may even use the "my friend borrowed it" excuse. Claims the built-in microphone is not working. If you suggest to use a $3 plug-in mic, he/she claims he/she could not get it working (it must be really hard to plug a 3.5 mm plug in the mic port). Counter tactic: offer to send them a mic. Not much financial loss for you, and you can note how they react to the offer. Some members are ligitimatelly proud and do not want a "handout" or "charity". Some, also legitimately, do not want to give you their address. You can offer to buy it from a wish-list off a site that does not list their address. Scammers may come up with excuses or try to change the subject. If he/she has asked you for money, ask why you cannot also send a microphone. (But then again, he/she may accept it and just claim it does not work later.)

-Refuses video chat claiming privacy concerns. He/she has already put very clear pictures of himself/herself online, and it is not like he/she would be naked in the chat session. (If he/she is, then you are on a different sort of site...) He/she may claim he/she does not want the video to end up on video sharing sites. Fair enough as there are shy and privacy-minded people, but the above picture reasoning applies. If he/she agrees to voice chat, that may be recorded as well, anyway.

-Refuses voice chat saying his/her voice is weak due to illness. For days or weeks. On the same note, in today's Internet-based instant communications age, refusing to give out phone numbers is completely acceptable. Same thing with e-mail.

-Keeps using the "maybe later", or "tomorrow" delaying tactics, usually in conjunction with "not feeling well", "feeling tired", "worried about something", "a lot on my mind", etc.

-Sends you correspondence after only a day or two claiming you are "the one". But you have really only talked about the weather so far. And you do not even have a picture uploaded on your profile yet. He/she, however, wants to share his heart, spirit, mind, soul and body with you forever.

-He/she says he/she needs to go (as in, sign off), but you see them still logged in for a while. This does not automatically mean he/she is a scammer. A legitimate chat partner may have other things to take care of and hit up friends or family.

-Sends you a link where you can continue chatting. Adult site spam, most likely, especially if it is in the first few sentences.-Variation to the above one: sends you a link where you can see more photos of him/her. True, sometimes people do have their own sites, but always be careful.

-Sends you a link to download some software. Do not EVER do it. Under any circumstances. No, just do not do it. If you want to share a good piece of software, tell each other its name, and you can find out about it and get download links form a search engine.

-Asks you for money. The consensus on this one is pretty much DO NOT DO IT. Almost no exceptions. If he/she asks you for money for a plane ticket to come and see you, and you have been communicating for a LONG while, having voice and video chatted, talked about serious issues and expectations in a relationship, just offer to buy the ticket for his/her name specifically. A legitimate member may not have thought of that one and will probably accept immediately.

-Uses Yahoo! E-mail address. Yahoo!, for some reason, is the prevalent choice of dating site scammers. Not a scam by itself.-He/she asks for money to take care of a loved one. In that case he/she should be on an aid/loan/charity/financial help site (or a bank), not a dating site in the first place.

-He/she asks you to show your commitment by canceling your dating site account. This is usually so you cannot see that he/she is till active and is listed as available on the site. This is very iffy, and is probably against the site regulations, but you can create a new account, with no real name listed, and no photo, and check on his/her profile. If you cancel your first account, then creating a new account is probably not a violation of the terms of service. You can also ask him/her to change or cancel his/her account as a sign of commitment. Tell him/her you will do it first. He/she will think he/she is safe and away from your suspecting eyes.-If he/she realizes you have computer skills, he/she may test them, both to make sure you cannot catch him/her, and maybe even to learn some hacking/scamming tips from you.

-If you are able to capture his/her IP address, it does not map to the location he/she lists on his/her profile. This by itself is not necessarily a sign of scamming. Many people use TOR, and others, understandably, list only the nearest major city to their smaller town. That is an understandable privacy measure. In this last case, you should not even worry about it.

-He/she is very intent on relocating. This is a tricky one. Many Russian women specifically enroll on dating sites because they want to move to the U.S. Very often they have this utopian picture in their mind about America, and their drive to achieve their dream may overpower their selective judgment about their prospective partners. They are not necessarily trying to scam you, but their pursuit of the wrong reasons will most likely leave all involved very disappointed.

-He/she asks you about income too fast. Gold digger. If you live in your mom's basement, your primary food groups are pizza and soda, you play online multiplayer roleplaying games, and you are in your thirties, you may be desperate enough to think you can charm someone with your Americanness, but you will find out that he/she is only after your money. Like you have any. Now take a shower! I t has been five days!

-A side note on the above point: if he/she lists a specific income range for his/her potential partner, he/she may simply be looking for financial stability, which nowadays is completely understandable. If he/she says "any" for income range, it may simply be someone who is self-supporting enough that his/her future partner's income is irrelevant.

-Why would someone very rich who can probably find a mate in his/her social circle sign up for an international dating site, especially one that offers free memberships? ANY site that offers free membership to one or both genders will attract a healthy dose of scammers. If you are serious about finding true love online, sign up for a professional all-members-must-pay site.

-He/she says in profile if you are not rich do not bother him/her, and has some sizzling hot scantily clad pictures. Skip him/her, no matter how good he/she looks. In my mind, that is borderline prostitution, illegal or not.-His/her username has earnest qualities in it, and there is a string of numbers at the end, such as 01, 002, usually indicative of a series of fraudulently created accounts. (Example: honestlucy003)

-Tying in with the last one, his/her profile emphasizes all those earnest qualities, such as honest, loving, caring, authentic, genuine, real.

-His/her profile has traumatic life experiences. That is kind of a private information, something that a member looking for a fresh start in a new partner would not just air out up front. The only reason to mention such experiences is to solicit sympathy. Stating "widowed" for marital status, however, can be simply honesty, not sympathy solicitation. Look for combination of widowed marital status with other indicators of scamming, though.

-His/her profile emphasizes association with good humanitarian agencies, charities, aid organizations. Look for a combination of this indicator with other sympathy-soliciting profile points, but consider that he/she may really simply work at a real non-profit agency.

-Looking for any partner of any age, with any traits. Meaning: looking for any sucker to scam. On this one, though, sometimes legitimate members are lazy to fill their desired partner description out, and some subscribe to the philosophy of "What the heck, who knows what will pop up, why limit the chances?"

-Calls you by endearing names, such as babe, sweetie, honey, too often and too soon after first contact. Note: there ARE nice, flirtatious people out there, who are just naturally sweettalkers. Not necessarily a scammer indicator by itself.

Most important: use common sense. Be suspicious of delaying tactics, avoidance of straight answers, changing subjects, refusal to personalize oneself through voice or video, ANYTHING developing too fast for your comfort level, and any solicitation for material things. Legitimate profiles should have candid photos, some personality represented in the description, and specific expectations about a potential match.

For advanced web users: if you have no life, are bored and are solid in your scammer detection skills, feed scammers their own poison. Lure them in, play with them, make them work hard, feed them false info, false indentity, false life stories, then slam them in the face (online), confront them (online), and expose them. Post their username, photos, chat transcripts and e-mails on a scam awareness site. Make sure you do not violate dating site terms of use, and do not turn legitimate members into scammers through entrapment. Act only if the scammer made the first attempt.