Catfishing Scam – What is it and how to spot one

​What Is 'Catfishing'?
​“Catfishing’ refers to a scam where someone, the ‘catfish,’ creates a fictitious online identity and seeks out online relationships. These are frequently romantic relationships, and online dating websites and cell phone dating apps are fertile hunting ground for catfish. However, there are also catfish who seek out friendships and other forms of social contact.
Catfishing involves significant deception – it’s not just someone fudging his or her height and weight in a Match.com profile and using a three-year-old photo. A catfish will be far more deceptive. Often, he or she will use someone else’s photos; grab personal details such as work, educational history, and personal histories off of the Internet; and invent an entirely fictitious life for his or her fictitious identity.
The growing popularity of online dating has made catfishing more and more common. Estimates for catfishing victims are in the thousands, and that number is probably under representative. Catfishing victims can be deeply embarrassed and many don’t talk share or talk about it.

What Do ‘Catfish’ Want?
There’s not necessarily a catch to catfishing. A catfish is often just someone pretending to be someone they’re not using the anonymity of the Internet. He or she might may have low self-esteem and build a fictitious online persona to interact with people. Or a catfish might simply find their deception amusing.
More malicious motives can exist as well. Some catfish seek money, and build a fake relationship with their victims to get it. Others seek to prey on their victims’ sympathies and emotions, often relating tragic family events or personal circumstances. Catfish have also been known to seek revenge on a former significant other, prank a friend or acquaintance, or simply seek to amuse themselves at the expense of other people.

​‘Catfishing’ in Popular Culture
‘Catfishing’ has been prominently featured in popular culture. The term itself comes from Catfish, a 2010 movie that featured a man meeting a woman online before growing concerned about her true identity. The movie led to a spin-off, Catfish: The TV Show, on MTV.
Probably the most widely known catfishing case involved Manti Te’o, a University of Notre Dame football star. His girlfriend supposedly died of leukemia mid-season, leading to heart-warming tributes and media attention. Only later was it determined that his supposed, online girlfriend never existed. Her entire identity was faked.

​How Can I Recognize ‘Catfishing’ Online?
‘Catfishing’ boils down to someone maintaining a fake online profile. You can find tips for recognizing catfish on dating websites and advice columns across the Internet, but here are some common signs:

• They’re too good to be true - This may be the earliest warning sign. Catfish generally create fake online identities to seem more attractive than they really are. It’s not uncommon for them to pretend to be a model, actor, or part of another glamorous profession. Claiming to be a model or an actor can also give them access to photo libraries online, aiding in the deception.

• Their profile is new or incomplete - Catfish have to keep details of an assumed identity straight. Limiting the number of photos and personal information in a profile helps them maintain the façade.

• They move quickly - Catfish may quickly move a relationship along in order to manipulate their victims. Be cautious if someone becomes very close very quickly.

• They won’t meet you - This is the classic warning sign. The game is up when a fake online identity or profile is revealed. Because of this, a catfish will often avoid meeting you. Inventing stories about work emergencies, personal problems, or sick friends and relatives are common tactics for getting out of a face-to-face meeting.

What to Do
If you think someone you’re talking to online might not be who they say they are, there are a few things you can do:

• Often, the best first step is to Google the person’s name. If nothing comes up, or if you get a bunch of odd results that don’t seem to match up to what the person has told you, then there’s a good chance you’re talking to a catfish.
• Photos in a profile must come from somewhere, do a reverse Google image search for the person’s profile image, which can reveal where it might really come from.
• Ask lots of questions – where they grew up, schools they went to, where they like to go on the weekends. Search around on the web to confirm if what they’re telling you is true (Is that high school actually in that town?). If they don’t want to talk about themselves – but ask YOU a lot of questions instead – they may be trying to avoid revealing who they really are.
• Contacting a suspected catfish’s friends, connections, and acquaintances on a social networking site can quickly unravel a fake profile.
• Victims have a trump card: demand a meeting. This might chase a catfish off entirely, but it will resolve the issue.
• Take steps to protect yourself as you would in any online scenario. Avoid sending photos or videos that you would not want shared with anyone else, and keep your address, school and any other personal information private. If you agree to meet in person, consider meeting in a public place, and bring a friend with you if it makes you feel more comfortable.
• If money is involved or serious problems arise related to catfishing, we recommend contacting a consumer protection lawyer for advice and assistance.

If you find out you’ve been catfished, or even if you’re not sure, you might feel like you can’t trust the other person, even if you had developed a relationship online. It can be very confusing: should you move on, or try to make the relationship work now that you know the truth? When trust has been broken in any relationship, it takes time and effort from both people to heal. You might have to take a few steps back and get to know the person – the real person – all over again. Remember, trust is something that can be given and taken, but not necessarily “earned” back, and you’ll have to determine for yourself whether you can or should trust the other person.

CTV News: Canadians lost $17M to online dating scams last year

WHAT ARE THE DIFFERENT TYPES OF ONLINE CATFISH?

ONLINE DATING CATFISH
This is one of the newest and most recently publicized catfishing scams although, they’ve been going on a lot longer than people know about. Typically, the catfish reaches out to a person through a forum or social network (like Facebook or a dating site like pof.com, OKCupid, etc.) and engages conversation with them. The catfish will create fake profiles and oftentimes elaborate stories to keep the charade going. There are different things that motivate each of these people. It’s most commonly a need to be liked, hide who they really are because of confidence issue and sometimes it’s because of greed because they want your money but, in all cases, the catfish is lying about who they are.

NIGERIAN PRINCE SCAM
This is one of the oldest and most known catfishing profiles that originally started with mail then, fax and then email. The story has evolved over time from needing money to get the prince out of jail and then personal information in order to wire money but, the most recent story is the African prince needs money for bribes so that they can get access to the money and in return, they (the scam artist) claim that they will provide a large payoff. Another version of this story is that the prince needs to store the money temporarily in order to hide the money. They ask for personal bank information in order to transfer the money and then steal money. The latest version of this scam are people posing as your relatives on Facebook telling you that they know a wealthy person that needs money because to move because they don’t currently have access to their money. These are the worst types of the catfish scams and always involved a request for personal information or to send money.

RUSSIAN BRIDES SCAM (ROMANCE SCAM)
This is one of the easiest scams to catch but, so many people fall for it each year because it plays into their emotions. A typical Russian bride scam plays out where you are contacted by a women (it can be a man too) who is looking for an American mate to marry and settle down with. After a specified time, they start asking for money for things like internet (because it’s supposedly expensive in their country) plane tickets, travels expenses, etc. Another example is where the scammer will contact you, start developing feelings really quickly and then disappear. Once they reappear, they tell you that they’ve been in a horrible accident and that they need money for medical expenses, etc. These types of scams always involve asking for money to help them pay for things that can be narrowed down to medical expenses, travel costs or basic necessitates. Keep in mind that they don’t always come from Russia