Karen is a California woman who ran into one of the most sophisticated scam networks we’ve seen to date, and they took over $300,000 from her in just a few months. And as usual, the lure that tricked Karen into losing this massive amount of money was a smooth-talking scammer intent on taking everything she had. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
It all started when Karen got a friend request on Facebook. As soon as she accepted the friend request, she received a message from him. His name was David, and he said he was a military doctor on a secret mission in Korea. Because of this, he claimed that he couldn’t reveal much about himself. All he could say was he was on a boat somewhere in Korea. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
After a few weeks of talking, David began confessing his love for Karen. His sweet words had a massive effect on her. He would send her messages like “I love you with everything in me”. And before long, Karen found herself deeply falling for him. But she still couldn’t find out much about him. The situation he was in sounded very intense. He would send her messages about how he and his teammates could die at any moment, and everything they were doing was top secret. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Karen was surprised by the whole situation at first. There was a noticeable age difference between the two, but once they got closer, these doubts started to fade into the background. David would call her, and he never asked for money, until one day he said two of his teammates fell overboard, and he jumped into the ocean to save them. He claimed to have his wallet and his phone in his pocket at the time, and he was calling her from his friend’s phone because everything he had was destroyed. But, he said he wanted to marry her, but she would have to pay for her own engagement ring. So Karen sent him $40,000, and he sent her a cubic zirconium ring worth around $9.99 in return.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As Karen and David kept talking, David claimed that there was a problem with his Google Hangout accounts. He claimed that he needed to buy more accounts because they kept getting deleted. All in all, Karen sent over $30,000 for Google Hangouts accounts. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Karen still felt that the relationship was real. Karen showed the images to her family, and she was met with skepticism. Her daughter didn’t believe that he was real, so she did some investigation on her own, and her searching led her to “David’s” real Instagram account. When she brought the news to her mother, she confronted David. He claimed that he stole someone elses’ photos because it would have been illegal for him to reveal his true identity. Karen didn’t believe this, so she broke things off with him and moved on.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Karen wanted to find someone to replace David, so she went to Plenty of Fish. She met a new man named Robert. Once they started having a deeper conversation, they got to the subject of their past relationships. She told Robert about David, and when they started talking about it, she sent him a picture of David. As soon as she sent it, she instantly got a text from David, and he was angry. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
He said that she had committed a crime by exposing his identity, and he could get in trouble with the government because of his secret mission. Karen was confused. How did he know that she sent his picture to Robert…?<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Karen kept talking to Robert, and he said that he was a hacker, and he could get all of her money back from David, she agreed. After a few days, Robert told her that he got her money back, all she had to do was go to a website link he sent her, and she could reclaim it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Once Karen got to the website, it said that she could reclaim her money, she would just have to pay thousands of dollars in taxes, but once she did, the money would be hers again. She paid the taxes, but never got her money back. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
It turns out that Robert and David were both scammers, and they stole over $300,000 from her. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Once a romance scammer has lured you into constant conversation, it may be too late. Run a reverse image search to find out whether or not the person you met online is who they say they are. Run your first reverse image search today to stay safe online!<\/p>\n\n\n\n