Police have alerted to a new scam called “romance scam” in which an organized group established virtual romantic relationships through the Tinder app and convinced victims to send them money so they could meet in person; it is believed that they obtained transfers of more than 200,000 euros.
The Tinder app has become one of the main tools for finding love today, it works like a social network that connects you with people with whom you may have something in common or who live relatively close to you, although you can also contact people from other parts of the world.
How did the scam start?
The victims, who have been found to be from various European countries, were often elderly, living alone and with no occupation. The scammers contacted them through Tinder, and began to talk to them in an affectionate and attentive way to start a long-distance relationship with them.
Cybercriminals used stolen photos of unknown models and actors to trick their victims, relying on excuses like they were traveling, working, or their camera was broken every time victims asked for a new photo or wanted to make a video call.
Shortly after establishing this supposed long-distance relationship, the scammers asked their victims to send them money, claiming that they needed it to buy a trip to meet them and in some cases even saying that it was for a medical operation.
Account tracking
In September 2021, an Irish woman reported that she had been the victim of the so-called “romance scam”. Thus began the tracking of the bank account to which the woman had sent money, and following the trail it was discovered that the account was of Spanish origin.
After investigating the account and following the IP address of the transfers, the National Police discovered that they belonged to a person who lived in Barcelona and that in the same account there were numerous transfers with high amounts from other Spanish accounts, something that seemed very suspicious.
By continuing with the investigation, the police found that there were several bank accounts that were related to each other, in addition to discovering money transfers to other accounts abroad. By tracking these movements, the authorities came to identify two men, one residing in Pamplona and the other in Alicante, who appeared as the headlines and who belonged to an organized group specializing in these scams.
The men have been arrested and the police themselves assure that this scam has collected more than 200,000 euros in total thanks to the transfers of the victims, the main problem was that the victims had not reported it before, or because they were not aware of the scam or out of shame for having been deceived.
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