This archive report was first published on 6 September 2019.
According to the F.B.I., romance scams are on the rise, with reported losses exceeding $362 million in 2018, a 71 percent increase from 2017.
Patrick Peterson, chief executive of Agari, a cybersecurity firm that tracks internet fraud, attributes this increase to American authorities trying to combat such scams more effectively.
"What makes this very unique is that the scammers are based abroad, often in West Africa, but in these two recent cases, they are targeting people in the United States, with one of the scammers living in New Jersey," Peterson said.
One of the cases involved a woman who lost $50,000 to a man claiming to be a petty officer in the United States Navy, stationed in Canada. The scam started in January 2016, when the woman was asked to send $3,000.
Another victim was contacted in November 2016 and sent nearly $200,000 to a man who said he was in the military and needed help getting $10 million in gold bars and cash out of Syria.
