The cons of online dating...

Going through my many magazines, I stumbled upon an article in the October 2012 edition of Glamour by Liz Brody that sheds some light on the cons of online dating.

Thankfully, I haven't had any of these issues, but I wanted to spread the word so you don't fall into one of the traps. 

1) Giant red flag if he/she asks for money...even if it sounds like a legit reason.  There is no reason a person you have been talking to should ask for money.  You aren't married, your money is not their money.  An even bigger red flag is if they try to lay on the guilt.  "Don't you love me?" or "I would loan the money to you." babble is just that...babble.

2) Be cautious if "I love you" is said early on in the relationship.  In some cases it was said within a few weeks!  Hmmm.

3) If you are having a live chat (IM or Skype) with the person, be aware if they are "getting interrupted a lot" or "sidetracked" when you ask easy questions...that they need to look up some answers to.

4) Pet names are cute, but if he/she constantly uses them instead of your name, it could be because they are chatting it up with more than one person and hey, it's hard to keep them all straight.

The article described many more scenarios, and I would recommend reading it if you get the chance.  (I tried to find it on Glamour's website, but no luck.)  

So what can you do to protect yourself?

Thankfully they gave several suggestions:

• Do a Google Image search of the pictures they have posted. Click on the little camera icon next to the search bar and you can upload a picture.  The search will show you were it appears online.  So nifty!
• There are sites that help with this sort of thing: romancescams.org, romancescam.com, scamsurvivors.com or militarygear.com/asp.  Please report a con if you are unfortunate to find one.  Save someone else from being conned.  Romancescams.org has some quizzes you can take to see if you are being conned, twists on the scams, and a photo album of pictures men and women have used.  Makes me sick.
• You can check for a foreign IP address.  Got to love technology!  The romancescams.org can help you find that information.

Now don't get the impression that I'm telling you they are all bad people out there or that I'm against online dating.  Most online dating companies have people on the lookout for these con artists and are pretty good about fielding applicants.  There are a lot of legit people out there looking to meet people and have a relationship, but it doesn't pay to be naive or uninformed.

Don't be too ashamed to tell others or to report the incident.  The article says that "women are being scammed out of million of dollars a year!"  So you aren't the only one!  You can report these con artists to ic3.gov. 

Who knows, your help and evidence could help bring justice to these criminals!