Watch out for the ‘Catfish’
Other than the online dating scams for money, online daters now have to watch out for a new kind of scammer called the “catfish”. A catfish is a person who pretends to be someone that they’re not. Usually to mess with someone’s head or just lie because they are insecure about who they are.
This type of scam has become very common in recent days and we consider it equally as dangerous as the scam for money because, though you don’t really end up with an empty bank account, you’ll have wasted your time and, much worse, you’ll have ended up with a broken heart.
Safety Tips
We’ve compiled a few safety tips for you to follow so you can stay safe and keep your heart unbroken:
Tip #1:
Check to see if the person’s description of him/herself is reliable. Check if they’ve lied about their physical attributes. The fact is that if they lie about something as small as appearances they may be hiding much bigger parts of themselves.
Tip #2:
Use Google Search as much as possible. The catfishes usually use someone else’s information and photos. Google the name or the email address or any piece of information you have of the person and see if it matches. You can also do a search for images based on a picture when using Google so make sure that you use this feature when checking if he/she really is the person on the picture.
Tip #3:
Do not listen to anyone that wants to start talking off the portal right away. What could be the reason behind that? You can’t trust a random person that moves you off the site and then usually starts asking for personal information right away.
Tip #4:
Ask questions and lots of it. This offers you a way to check for consistency. It isn’t easy to keep a lie going for a long time so this tip is very helpful with figuring out if you’re dealing with a catfish or not.
Tip #5:
These days, almost everybody has Facebook. Especially the younger generation and if your partner says she doesn’t have one then it’s just outright suspicious.
Some catfish may actually go as far as creating a fake profile but that is a bit difficult and a bit rare.
Yes, we know that following these tips sound like they require some effort but better safe than sorry! Trust us. You want to keep yourself safe and listen to every catfish warning you hear.
