Published: Less than 50 min ago
The sun-and-springs have changed shape and moved online. Never before have so many romance frauds been reported in Sweden as last year.
– They know exactly which buttons to press, says Lotta Mauritzson at the National Fraud Centre.
In the world of the film, the romance con is a charming type, well-dressed and worldly with a pearly smile and tanned cheeks, who burrows his way into the hearts of his victims with umbrella drinks and flattery.
In reality, he has long since hung up his jacket and started working remotely.
Today, fraudsters often work in groups, and advanced schemes with stolen identities are common. Internationally, there are examples where the police have attacked call center-like businesses with tens of employees in ordinary office buildings.
For several years, Swedish criminal gangs have engaged in telephone fraud aimed at elderly people who are tricked into using codes and have their bank accounts emptied. When it comes to romance scams, however, foreign actors dominate.
Predictable but skilled
The fraudsters seek out their victims on dating sites and in social media. Like the gooey type in the movie, they can often be recognized from afar. A few approaches and character traits recur time and time again.
– You often claim to be an English-speaking person stationed far from home, for example as a doctor, soldier or employee on an oil rig. The conversations quickly become intense, and it is not unusual for daily contacts to happen quite quickly, says Lotta Mauritzson, co-ordinator of the police’s national fraud centre.
The person on the other end often happens to be in exactly the same life situation as you. According to Mauritzson, a simple trick to build community. After a relatively short time, questions about money come.
– The reasons can be the most amazing. The friend has been shot and the daughter is in hospital, all at once. You need to get rid of money quickly – and the only one who can help is you.
– In other cases, the fraudster shows that you have money, even allows the victim to log into the account, but says that for some reason you cannot access it when you are abroad.
Increased substantially
Romance fraud received its own criminal code in 2019, and since then the number of reported crimes has been around 1,000 per year. Last year, 1,300 notifications were recorded, a 15 percent increase from 2021.
The victims lose an average of more than SEK 300,000. In many cases whole life savings.
– People mortgage houses and get over their ears in debt because of these fantastic stories, says Lotta Mauritzson.
Judging by the reporting statistics, the most common victim is a woman in her 60s, but the number in the dark is large. Violet Petersson, chairperson of the support association Stoppa Romancebedrägerier, states that the victims often have one thing in common – loneliness.
– The fraudsters are experts at finding the weak points. You can have conversations for months where this person has given care and kind words, listened and been helpful – and then suddenly wants help himself, she says.
“A disaster”
She founded the support association in 2019, after she herself had been cheated out of hundreds of thousands of kroner. The association currently consists of around 30 members and is dedicated to disseminating information and offering conversational support to victims and relatives.
– It is a disaster when this happens, and it is associated with a lot of shame and guilt. We hear from people who are suicidal, and who express that they do not want to live.
For her own part, the fraud means, in addition to the psychological wounds, that she, as a 76-year-old, has to work full-time to pay off the debts. In addition to part-time jobs as a deacon and operations manager in an assistance company, the support association occupies much of the time.
The association lobbies for romance fraud and its victims to be taken more seriously by society and politicians.
Among other things, it is believed that the Bailiff must distinguish between those who have become indebted due to their own consumption and those who have been exposed to crime. They also want to see the banks take greater responsibility for customers who suddenly start transferring large sums of money.
– This is about economic violence. But not everyone is even considered a crime victim. The attitude is rather that you have to blame yourself for being stupid enough to happen to this.
Facts
See through the deception
The fraudsters are often very skilled. However, there are tricks to see through them.
According to the police, basic rule number one is to be critical of the source. If it seems too good to be true, it probably is.
The scammer often pretends to be an English-speaking man who is abroad on business.
The images displayed are often stolen from other people’s social media, and it is not unusual for them to be reused for several different identities. A good trick can therefore be to do a reverse image search via Google.
Save the image on the computer, go to Google image search and drop the saved image into the search field. You will then receive links to websites where the image has been used.
A sudden need for money is a warning sign. Never send money to people you have never met.
Consult with loved ones. They want you well. Ball the unusual explanations for the person wanting money.
After the relationship with a fraudster ends, it happens that the fraud continues in other forms. For example, by the victim being contacted by someone who wants to help get the money back for a fee.
If you have already sent money – contact your bank immediately and see if it is possible to stop the transaction. Then file a police report.
There is support available, both for victims and relatives. The Crime Victims’ Center offers free support. Another option is the support association Stoppa Romancebedrägerier, founded by people who themselves have been victims.
Source: The police
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