The variations to African romance scams are nearly as many as there are scammers (thousands), however there is only one objective to all of them and that is to get your money. And there are still some basic similarities amongst all of them. There are many other ways scammers take your money, besides romance scamming, but on this site we mainly focus on exposing the romance scammers.
The steps a romance scammer generally follows:
1. They steal pictures, generally of white, affluent looking males and sexy young females.
2. They create fake profiles, usually stealing text and information from other legitimate dating profiles.
3. They make contact with you on a dating or social networking site.
4. They usually ask immediate questions about your experience with internet dating hoping to find you're unaware of romance scammers. They are also interested in your financial status but can be very subtle with their inquiries.
5. They begin the process of engaging you in a 'relationship' with the intent and promise of marriage. They fall for you quickly.
6. They steer you off the dating site to instant messenger chat services.
7. The male scammers pretend to be financially well off and usually widowed with children (to inspire a woman's compassion and empathy). Female scammers are usually young, sexy and needy.
8. The length of time they romance you is variable and determined by your receptiveness to their profuse flattery and terms of endearment.
9. You may notice that they tell you very little about themselves, especially their past, like childhood, education and employment history.
10. When they believe you are sufficiently hooked (in love with them) they then conjure a disaster of some sort that only financial aid can resolve. This can be the hardest part of the scam to accept as false because many scammers are very subtle with their money requests. Some never even ask their victims but wait for their victims to offer. And there are literally hundreds of different situations in which the scammers ask for money.
11. They provide you with options for sending money, usually to a contact of theirs, by Western Union, Money Gram or bank transfer. Sometimes they have fake cashiers checks sent to their victims and ask that the victim cash it and send them the money.
12. The money they receive NEVER resolves the crisis. They will always need more.
13. They keep the victim sending money until the victim stops. If the victim stops because they became aware they were scammed, the scammer will then come back pretending to be a new person, usually in law enforcement, offering to help the victim recover their money. This is called a Recovery Scam.
They also have access to pre-recorded stolen web-cam sessions to fool you and can easily obtain American and UK phone numbers that forward their calls to Africa. Many will have token gifts sent to you and many can also fake accents, but usually they claim to be mixed nationality to explain their own.
Please understand that you are just a job to them. They are professional liars so you can never believe anything they tell you, even if they confess to scamming you and say they love you still. In truth they don't care how they hurt you and they don't even care if you live or die.
Marisa, the founder of this site, once said:
Another axiom might be:“Remember mathematics at school? There is such a thing called an axiom (a premise so evident it has to be accepted as truth ). So, here is the axiom:
WHITE, HISPANIC OR ASIAN PEOPLE IN NIGERIA OR GHANA CONTACTING YOU ONLINE = A SCAMMER.
You don't have to question it, you don't have to ask why, you don't have to seek for exceptions from the rule, because there are NO EXCEPTIONS. That's just the way it is. And your handsome white dude or chick in Nigeria is also no exception. Sorry.
If they claim to be African-American, but presently “temporarily” in Nigeria or Ghana for any reason (job, taking care of a sick parent, etc.), this is also a scam. Especially if their picture looks like an African-American model or in the case of women, a PORN star.”
Any internet relationship that you have never met face to face, who asks for money = a scammer.
The above is only the basic criteria to beware of. Stealth, a moderator here, has created a list of signs that you might be dealing with a scammer. See her posts below.
Also, you may take our scam test here: http://www.romancescam.com/forum/viewto ... =75&t=5179" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Last, if you are still not sure, you may post all the information you have on your suspect here:
Am I being scammed?
In this section, anything you post will remain away from public view until they are proven a scammer. If they are not proven, the information will be removed.
More signs you might be talking to a scammer can be found here:
http://www.datingnmore.com/fraud/scam_s ... gerian.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;