So, you've decided to join an on-line dating site. You've seen the commercials. You've heard wonderful stories about love and marriage, after having met online.  You sign up for a popular online dating site. There is even an app for your phone.  Within minutes you receive your first "flirt" or "like" or email. You respond in-kind.  Now you're excited and hopeful. This guy/gal actually likes my profile; my pictures. You read their profile. They are perfect. NOT SO FAST!

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Remember hearing "If it seems too good to be true then it probably is" ? Take heed.  

 

We've worked far too many on-line dating scams for me to advocate meeting, and building a relationship, with someone in-the-blind.  From a Private Investigator's (and a mother's) perspective, always have this person investigated "before" you meet them in person. If your son or daughter is online dating convince them to do the same.

 

People can be whomever they want to be under the guise of an online profile.  Understand the brutality of people and be aware of your surroundings. NEVER give personal information to someone you know nothing about [beyond what you've seen online].

 

Does online dating have great outcomes? Sure. Sometimes. Best advice: Gather as much information you can and please call a private investigator. 

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Here are a couple examples of cases we've worked (without specific details to protect our clients):

 

We received a call from a woman who'd been dating a guy she'd met on an online dating site.  This woman was a busy professional with little time to meet someone outside of her workplace.  Everything was perfect for the first few months. Once the initial excitement was over, things started to seem a little odd to her.  He insisted that he always call her and never the other way around (RED FLAG).  They never went to his place (RED FLAG). They met right after work most of the time (RED FLAG). When she asked about his job, he mentioned that his job was "so secret" he couldn't disclose it to her (RED FLAG).  When she called Lanza Investigations, she said "I really like this guy" "but my gut is telling me something is wrong".   After our investigation, we found that this man was married with a child on-the-way and had been driving his wife's car on dates with my client.

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A highly successful woman [and mother] in her mid-forties, called me on a referral from her lawyer. This woman had been communicating with a man for nearly a year.  This handsome man looked legit, was her age, had a Facebook page (it was very slight... few friends...RED FLAG), a perfect profile on the dating site, called and emailed her regularly and had a local phone number that she could call and text anytime.  Over the months, without ever meeting in person, (RED FLAG) he professed his love to her (RED FLAG) with plans to meet as soon as he returned from his "job" overseas. (RED FLAG) He said all of the right things "You are the woman I'd always been searching for" (RED FLAG). His emails were filled with details about his life, job, family etc.. He even sent her beautiful gift baskets for Christmas and Valentine's day to her home an office. (RED FLAG- Never give out your address to someone you've never met). The couple began exchanging nude pictures.  (RED FLAG) This guy now, not only had her home and office address, but he had nude pictures of my client. Next, he attempted to convinced my client to send him tens of thousands of dollars because of an "accident" where his team member was tragically killed (RED FLAG) and he had expended his funds to the team member's family. He would promptly repay her (RED FLAG). This is about the time she called us.  We discovered that the Facebook profile was a fake [stolen from someone else's page and who likely had no idea their likeness was being used for fraudulent purposes].  The phone number was a fake and untraceable to his claimed address.  After doing some digging, nothing about this person was true and in fact, our investigation discovered that even the credit cards used to buy her "gift baskets" from an online delivery company, were stolen credit cards.

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