What's Behind Online Dating Fraud? iovation Quantifies the How Often, What, When and Where - Seite 2

Where Fraudsters Live
The highest percentage of fraudulent transactions on online dating sites in 2014 originated from these countries:

1. Nigeria -- 29 percent
2. Ghana -- 26 percent
3. Ivory Coast -- 15 percent
4. Vietnam -- 10 percent
5. Argentina -- 8 percent

When Fraud Occurs
According to iovation, the highest percentage of fraud attempts on online dating sites in 2014 occurred between 9am to 12pm UTC. This is 1am to 4am PST and 4am to 7am EST.

What Consumers Should Look For
There are many telltale signs that someone's looking to defraud you on an online dating site. Some of the more common clues are:

• Being asked to move the conversation off of the dating site too soon
• An unusual use of words, bad grammar and/or excessive punctuation
• Someone geographically far from you attempts to strike up a conversation
• After minimal contact, someone professes strong feelings
• Claims of working out of the country for an extended time
• Online personality varies to extremes
• Profile picture or photograph looks different from their description
• Personal information or phone number is requested too soon
  
  

"An increasingly common dating scam that occurs on dating sites experience is when fraudsters target older females in rural areas and shower them with kindness. The scammers claim to be engineers working outside of the country on a big project. They court their victims extensively, even sending presents on special days," said Jon Karl, Vice President of Corporate Development at iovation. "When the fraudsters feel the time is right, they say they have an emergency, can't access their bank account back home, and need money wired to them immediately. In many cases, the victims fall for the scam."

What Businesses Should Look For
Knowing the true location of scammers, and when they are hiding behind proxies or using Tor -- a privacy protocol that is intended to help people to browse the Internet anonymously -- is extremely helpful to dating sites for protecting their members. iovation has a unique view into the activity of Internet-enabled devices across the globe. By protecting online businesses in a variety of industries, including dating, gaming, financial services, retail and others, iovation's shared device intelligence helps businesses sort good customers from the bad.