Wang of UTA notes that she did not judge or use scammers generative AI to produce romantic scams, but she sees evidence that they use it to produce content for online dating profiles. “I think it’s unfortunately something that has happened,” she says. “Scammers are now only using Ai-generated profiles.”
Some criminals in Southeast Asia are already building AI instruments in their scam operations, with a United Nations report in October stating that organized crime efforts “have yielded personalized scripts to deceive victims while having real-time talks in hundreds of languages. “ Google says scam -E -mails to businesses are generated with AI. And separately, the FBI noted, allows criminals to message the victims faster.
Criminals will use a variety of manipulation tactics to capture their victims and build their perceived romantic relationships. This includes asking intimate questions from their potential victims who would ask only a reliable confidant – for example, questions about relationships or appointment history. Attackers also build up intimacy through a technique known as “love bombing”, in which they use terms of love to quickly promote a sense of connection and closeness. As romantic scams progress, it is very often that attackers begin to say that victims are their girlfriend or boyfriend, whether they even call “husband” or “woman” as a way to indicate their dedication.
Carter emphasizes that a core tactic used by romance swenders is to make their heartbeat staff look unfortunate and vulnerable. For example, criminals who peek at dating apps will even claim to be cheated before and are careful to trust someone new. It calls the elephant in the room immediately and makes it look less likely that the person talks to the victim can be a scammer.
When it comes to the output of money from their victims, this vulnerability is crucial. “They will do things like explaining that they have some kind of cash flow problem in their business, don’t ask for money, drop it, and maybe arrive again a few weeks later,” says Carter. At what point, she explains, the person who is manipulated wants to help and offer proactively to send money. At first, attackers can even go so far as to reason with victims and try to refrain from sending money, all to manipulate targets to believe that it is not only safe but also important to take a stand and someone to help what they care about.
“It’s never estimated as the perpetrator who wants money for themselves,” says Carter. “There is a real connection between the language of fraud criminals and the language of domestic abusers and coercive controllers.”
In many cases, criminals find the success of romance with people struggling with feelings of loneliness, says Brian Mason, a constable at Edmonton police service in Alberta, Canada, who works with the victims of scams. “Especially with romantic scams, it is very difficult to convince the person that the person he is talking to is not in love,” he says.