MARCH 14, 2024 – Dating, whether man or woman or at any age, is difficult. Is there a true connection? Do you share similar values? Are you compatible religiously, temperamentally, and intimately? Is he or she a real person?
While it can be rewarding, online romance can also be dangerous. According to the Federal Trade Commission, “in 2022, nearly 70,000 people reported a romance scam, and reported losses hit a staggering $1.3 billion. The median reported loss: $4,400.”
Online dating creates unique challenges for any relationship, but before you start building a relationship with a stranger, find out if the person you are interacting with is real or a scammer. Photos and personal information of service members, and especially general officers – those service members with general in their rank – are the leading fake profiles scammers like to use.
General officers will never solicit your friendship, follows, messages, likes or shares on social media. Comments such as this should raise red flags:
“Thanks for your support On behalf of the U.S. military, I want to use this opportunity to say a huge thanks to you for your prayers and also for your love towards the U.S. military, it’s my prayer for you that God bless your good heart, please remain blessed and be safe okay? I want you to like and follow my page to find news coverage, videos, and photos, you can send me a direct message. God bless America.”
These comments follow the same pattern. Odd capitalization; poor grammar; declarations of prayers, blessings, and thanks for support; and the always used “like and follow my page” or “send me a friend request.”
Scammers ask you to send a friend request or to follow their page because Facebook limits the number of requests a person or page can send at one time. If anyone randomly asks you to send them a friend request, be highly suspicious.
Only a few of the highest seniority Army leaders have official social media accounts, and according to Army policy, these accounts must be registered with the Army and the Department of Defense.
While not a fail-safe that an account is official, look for the official blue checkmark showing a page is Facebook verified and search the Army directory for the legitimacy of an official social media account at: https://www.army.mil/socialmedia/directory/. Some scammers have started adding a blue circle with a checkmark to their profile photo – be sure you can recognize the difference.
Also, according to Army policy, personal accounts must be clearly identifiable as personal. They should not use DOD titles, insignia, uniforms or symbols in a way that could imply DOD sanction or endorsement of the content. This means that any profile showing a service member in uniform identified by a rank and military connection is likely not legitimate personal account.
Another red flag is a general officer listing a relationship status as “widowed” or “complicated.” A quick internet search of the service member should generate a biography or photos showing his or her spouse.
Always search the internet and social media for anyone you meet online and plan to get to know better. See if there are other profiles using the same or a similar name and photos of the person you are speaking with and keep scrolling to the bottom of the queue. A quick search recently of a four-star general officer who retired in January revealed 484 fake profiles, with several more dozen “new accounts” with only a name holder. There are many more general officers being impersonated with similar results.
If you are messaging with someone who asks for your help to pay medical expenses (for them or a family member), buy their ticket to visit you, pay for their visa, or help them pay fees to get them out of trouble, this is most likely a scam. These requests often come within two to four weeks after first establishing contact with the scammer, and these requests are always urgent and manipulate your emotions.
Frequent ruses for scammers pretending to be service members are: help replacing equipment, travel expenses to get out of a country back to the United States, a processing fee so that a service member can go on extended leave, and processing fees to receive a box the service member is mailing to the victim.
The U.S. Army does not leave Soldiers stranded in far-off countries having to pay for leave or for their transportation home. Nor does the Army or DOD sell leave to deployed service members by processing a payment from a beneficiary. “Leave Request Cost Fee” does not exist in the DOD, nor is there is an organization such as the “Office of the Discharge Leave Department.” If you have received documents with these names on them, you are being scammed.
According to the FTC, the request for money is in a format that is hard to recover such as wiring money through a company like Western Union or MoneyGram, gift cards, through a money transfer app, or a cryptocurrency transfer. Do not send money to someone you have never met in person.
You can start protecting yourself by protecting your personal information by ensuring that information is not visible to the public on your social media accounts.
For example, on Facebook, there are four categories your personal information can have: Public, Friends of Friends, Friends and Only Me. Scammers search your information for your likes and dislikes, movies, games, things you like to do, where you live and work, and what you post to target how they approach you and attempt to establish a connection with you. Do not give them this information. Your likes, personal information and friends list should all have the highest protection setting – Only Me, and your posts should only be visible to friends.
In Settings & privacy, under Profile details, Followers and public content, and Profile and Tagging – change each setting to be either Friends or Only Me to share only that information with friends that you want to share.
Periodically clean up your photos and change the visibility of profile photos and cover photos from Public to Friends. These are publicly visible when first posted, and if you do not change the audience for these photos and posts that published as public, then your content is visible to strangers. Here’s how to do that:
- Click on Settings & Privacy
- Under Audience and visibility, click on Posts
- Under Who can see your future posts ensure Friends is selected
- Next to Limit who can see past posts, click the View button
- Click the button to Limit Past Posts
- A screen warns you that you are about to limit all past posts on your timeline. Click Limit Past Posts again.
There are many other settings to check, but many platforms will walk you through a security review. If the platform does not, an internet search should turn up privacy settings you should be using.
Protect your information as though it is your bank account, because it is just as important to your security. And if you begin an online relationship with that person of your dreams, ensure you know the red flags to look for so that you can protect yourself.
Links
https://www.army.mil/socialmedia/directory/
https://www.cid.army.mil/Submit-a-Tip/
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/data-visualizations/data-spotlight/2023/02/romance-scammers-favorite-lies-exposed
Story by Carrie Campbell
U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command