Catfishing Scam

I love that someone has dubbed a word for online dating scams. It helps it become more ingrained in the sub-conscious mind of more people. People like buzz words. People can remember them better.

Catfish. A little different than what you think this word would mean at first. But in the urban dictionary a "catfish" is someone who creates a full false identity online, typically in pursuit of deceptive online romances. The name came from a 2010 documentary movie made by Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman. In the movie, Ariel Schulman develops a relationship - falls in love, with a woman on Facebook and then goes to track her down in real life and finds her to be not at all what she represented herself to be, and married with children.

Now there are many more meanings for "catfishing" than just creating false identities for the purpose of deceptive online dating. People have created them to enact out whole "stories", about having cancer or some other crisis in their life. It is probably a convoluted way to feel the connection, sympathy and compassion of others. Sometimes, they want to "end" the story (it must become a burden after awhile keeping all the stories straight) but because others online think they are interacting with a real person, often the only way they can think to do this is to "kill" off their online identity. That is what happened in the case of Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te'o. He was, at first, torn to shreds in the media for making up a girlfriend (and still parts of the story do not make complete sense, like apparently his father referred to them being in Hawaii together), but Manti insists he was a victim of a "catfish" scam. That he thought someone was his girlfriend online and that she died of leukemia last year. Until some reporters looked into the story and realized there was no one by the name of his girlfriend. This particular story is still developing, but however it turns out, it is certainly a great example of the perils of online relationships. Most victims say it may seem crazy but that it happens in very small increments and does not seem so crazy at the time. Until you step back and look at the whole thing. But for me, how can these people think they are in a relationship and "in love" when they have never met the person face-to-face? It certainly targets people who may have idealized notions of love and relationships and those who may have more difficulty connecting face-to-face with people.

So what are the catfish scammers after? I think there are two main types. The ones after the deceptive sense of connection, sympathy, love, and compassion of another, and then those that are strictly in the game to eventually begin siphoning their victims dry of their money and savings. I mostly see the latter but I'm aware some create their false identities just to be able to "live" online as that character. It certainly blurs the lines of imagination, reality, identity exploration, and morality. The ones after the money are a little more clear cut. They are after the money. Very clear.

These type of scammers typically operate with more than one person, often in little cooperative "gangs", sharing the loot. And they go for big, big numbers. In fake buyer scams, they tend to target stealing about $1000-$3000 and stay under the radar of the authorities and just hope to get a lot of victims under the radar so it adds up. But in online dating scams, it may take longer to warm up their victim, but then they go for broke, often getting $200,000 or more out of the victims. I've seen cases commonly in the $800,000 range. You can see why scammers are attracted to this scam. Some victims, thinking they are helping someone they are in love with, will begin borrowing money once their own money is all gone, and in one case, the woman began writing checks from her employers checkbook and she was eventually arrested for embezzling. But she didn't keep a dime. It all went to her "fiancee", who she had never met face-to-face. So she was in jail with none of the money and the scammer got off scott-free, sitting in some foreign country with all the money. Amazing.

But I'm glad now there is a popularized term for this scam. Catfishing. It means more unsuspecting people will become educated and look out for the warning signs. Hopefully, it will begin to result in fewer victims. I review the warning signs for online dating in depth in my book "<a href="http://amzn.to/RZSfZc">Social Media Scams</a>". All efforts to bring this scam out of the dark corners of shame and embarrassment and bring more light to the subject is, well, a Good Thing. I think Manti Te'o is a reluctant educator on this subject, but still, that is a positive thing that will come out of his experience. And congrats to the "Catfish" documentary guys - you are doing great work to expose this scam.