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Articles · Online dating · 3 min read
Online dating scams: how to spot them
Dating apps are mostly full of genuine people — and a handful of scams that keep repeating the same few moves. Learn the moves and you'll spot them long before they cost you anything. Here are the five you'll actually run into.
1. The “verify yourself” link
A match asks you to confirm you're a real person first — through a link they send, to get a “safety ID” or “verification badge”. The link leads to a site that has nothing to do with the app: it collects your card details, or quietly signs you up to a paid subscription. No dating app makes another user vet you, and none hands out verification through a stranger's link. The request itself is the scam.
2. “Let's move to WhatsApp”
Within a message or two, the conversation is steered off the app and onto WhatsApp, Telegram, or text. It's framed as warmth — “I'm barely on here anyway” — but the real purpose is to leave behind the app's reporting tools, moderation, and record of what was said. Once you're off the platform, there's no one left to report to. Being rushed to move the chat that fast is the scam starting.
3. The too-good profile
The photos look like a modelling shoot, the bio is a line or two, and the person is always travelling for work or serving overseas. When you suggest a quick video call, there's always a reason it can't happen right now. Real people will jump on a live video; a borrowed photo can't. If they'll trade endless messages but never a live call, treat the profile as fake.
4. The money moment
Once there's some trust, the ask arrives: a medical emergency, a shipment stuck in customs, a “guaranteed” investment they want to let you in on, a request for gift cards or crypto. It always comes before you've met in person, and there's always a reason meeting keeps slipping. Anyone you've only ever spoken to online asking for money — however sympathetic the story — is the whole scam in one message.
5. The “watch me here” link
The chat gets nudged somewhere else “to keep talking” or “to see more of me” — another site, an app to download, a private stream. It's a paid trap, a page built to harvest your details, or a way to slip malware onto your phone. A genuine match wants to talk where you already are. Any link that's needed just to continue the conversation is bait.
One thread runs through all of them: every scam here tries to move you off the app, rush you, or get money out of you. Spot any of those three, and slow right down — keep the chat on the app until you've had a live video call, and report and block anyone who pushes past it.
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