Love might be in the air on Feb. 14, but Saint Valentine’s Day is also peak time for scamming lonely hearts for money, an Australian government body warned yesterday.
Romance scams cost victims more money than any other form of cheating, with those aged 45 and older more likely to be stung, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission said.
Social media, and particularly Facebook, are very popular with scammers seeking to contact targets.
Photo: AFP
Last year, 4,100 Australians contacted the commission’s Scamwatch service to report dating and romance swindles and losses of more than A$25 million (US$19 million) — the largest sum for any type of scam in Australia.
Reports of dating and romance scams increased by more than a third last year, the commission said, and the amount of money reported lost rose by about A$3 million compared with 2015.
“Romance scammers are getting increasingly manipulative, so if you are going online this Valentine’s Day to look for love, it’s absolutely vital that you’re able to recognize the warning signs,” commission deputy chair Delia Rickard said in a statement.
“Scammers create very believable profiles, including stealing the identities of real, trusted people. If you meet someone who seems too good to be true, do some research to see if they’re the real deal,” Rickard said.
She also warned against people who quickly express strong feelings.
Never provide your financial details or send funds to someone you have met online and run an image search to check the authenticity of any photographs, Scamwatch said.
People should be very wary if they are moved from a dating Web site, as scammers prefer to use private e-mails or the telephone to avoid detection, and should not share intimate photos or use webcams in an intimate setting, which can leave you open to blackmail, it added.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
A top Vietnamese property tycoon was on Thursday sentenced to death in one of the biggest corruption cases in history, with an estimated US$27 billion in damages. A panel of three hand-picked jurors and two judges rejected all defense arguments by Truong My Lan, chair of major developer Van Thinh Phat, who was found guilty of swindling cash from Saigon Commercial Bank (SCB) over a decade. “The defendant’s actions ... eroded people’s trust in the leadership of the [Communist] Party and state,” read the verdict at the trial in Ho Chi Minh City. After the five-week trial, 85 others were also sentenced on
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
RAMPAGE: A Palestinian man was left dead after dozens of Israeli settlers searching for a missing 14-year-old boy stormed a village in the Israeli-occupied West Bank US President Joe Biden on Friday said he expected Iran to attack Israel “sooner, rather than later” and warned Tehran not to proceed. Asked by reporters about his message to Iran, Biden simply said: “Don’t,” underscoring Washington’s commitment to defend Israel. “We are devoted to the defense of Israel. We will support Israel. We will help defend Israel and Iran will not succeed,” he said. Biden said he would not divulge secure information, but said his expectation was that an attack could come “sooner, rather than later.” Israel braced on Friday for an attack by Iran or its proxies as warnings grew of