It was an error of judgment that cost Suzanne Hardman dearly. Not only did the wealthy divorcee lose a huge amount of money but, by the time the fraudsters who scammed her were finally caught, it had stripped her of her confidence and self-respect.It doesn't matter how old they are. It's always someone else's fault. This is what John Adams meant when he referred to the tyranny of the petticoat.
For Suzanne, 58, a mother of grown-up daughters, had turned to online dating for a last chance at romance, ending up as the unsuspecting victim of professional conmen hiding behind fake but convincingly elaborate internet profiles.
An office manager who had recently lost her mother, Suzanne was lured by the attentions of an attractive, middle-aged widower. Or so she thought.
Lonely and vulnerable, she believed his hard luck stories and within weeks she had – foolishly, she now acknowledges – handed over £174,000 of her hard-earned savings.
Sadly, Suzanne is far from being alone. Last week, the fiance of children’s author Helen Bailey, whose body was found dumped in a cesspit, was jailed for more than 30 years after killing the 51-year-old for her multi-million pound inheritance. The two had met on a Facebook dating group.
Then another victim, teaching assistant Anna Rowe, 44, who was duped on Tinder, called on the Government to pass laws against ‘catfishing’ as it is known – the practice of using a fake profile to start an online romance.
Women can't even stop themselves from handing over money to sob stories. How well do you think they'll do when spending everyone else's money?
18 comments:
Think of a 17 year old girl. That is about as mature as most women will ever get. I'm not surprised when women of whatever age make poor choices. I think it's an act of cruelty to give women all the rights of adulthood with none of the responsibilities then expect good decisions from them.
I don't understand - what is the law that they want exactly? Fraud is already illegal. Scams are illegal in as much as they involve actual, well, fraud or breach of some kind of contract (they tend to work because, um, not much paperwork or legal protection is being used by the mark. It's your own damn foolishness.
"He told Suzanne that his late father had £895,567.32 in a frozen account that he couldn’t access. Once that was sorted, they could meet – if Suzanne could transfer the £700 he needed to gain access to the account.
Thinking it was a one off, Suzanne sent the money but, won over by his affection, she soon sent additional sums totalling £174,000."
Was he Nigerian royalty by any chance as well? I mean, really now have you not... heard of....
"Susan Tollefsen would certainly describe herself as the latter. She lost nearly £160,000 after African fraudsters posed as ‘Glenn Vanslyke’, an Italian diamond dealer whose wife had died of cancer."
... I mean... really?
So what is the proposal then? Do they want to return to the Victorian era, of being given a stipend from their husband for small purchases, with no legal ability to directly transfer funds out of the account themselves?
"In her 2008 book Truth, Lies And Trust On The Internet, Prof Whitty explains that online romances can be ‘hyper-personal – more strong and intimate than physical relationships’. Older people are hardest hit because, she says, there’s evidence that the ability to detect deception declines with age. Certain personality types, more common among women, are particularly vulnerable – those who are romantics and risk-takers, believers in fate and destiny."
Sounds like the next prescription they'll be asking for is that all suitors are met at debutante balls, under supervision from older, wizened women and protective, concerned fathers, to weed out the oiks, cads and charlatans.
"She is determined to make it illegal to pose as someone else online. As she points out: ‘The problem is that legislation is not keeping up with technology."
Ah - there we have it. Pseudonymity is the real target here. Reminds of the final Last Psych article - a warning about how advertiser-driven social media requires women to feel "safe" online. All of which means making sure they don't have to hide behind an identity, and making sure that men can't victimise them from behind a false identity. It's the same thing as the above article. It's not about protecting women from con-men - these women were defrauded by extensive, theatrical shows of defrauding IRL, long after the initial encounter online. Cat-.
Pardon me getting a bit tin-foil Alex Jonesy, but the reason I think an article like this is is pushed is that pseudonymity/anonymity is a threat to the consumer-driven Statist system. If women can't feel safe on these platforms, that "everything that can be done is being done", then they won't use them, and so there's less data to harvest from these dating sites to sell on to advertisers (where these sites make most their money). These women are fearful and want to feel protected; the system obliges them, pushing out articles like this, and laws to complement them, because we gotta keep them gals spending, gotta prevent people from saving and investing, oh, sorry, "under-utilising" their money, or else the system collapses. Same reason I think the media likes to push these "Anonymous Gamer/Trump/Nazi Trolls Ate My Hamster!" headlines - it's not about vilifying men primarily, or really about pushing a political agenda (or maybe that's a symbiotic element). It's about the merchant making sure the shopper isn't scared off from visiting his stall.
You still all for direct democracy with universal suffrage? I say reduce the vote to a stock holder position, 1 vote to the patriarch of a family with zero divorces and 2+ kids and is not receiving any welfare nor a paycheck from the public sector. That would deal with all the issues with Universal suffrage.
You aren't very attractive. He is. You don't have a special story. He does. You can't find love. He has.
The only thing stopping you from being together is a simple wire transfer of $5,000 USD to a foreign account. But, if you just cannot wait and must have love NOW, you can become a Premium Plus Victim(TM) by donating an additional $15,000 to pay off Jake's debt from his children's funeral and buy him a firs-class ticket to your city where he will arrive TONIGHT.
Act now, before a luckier woman swipes right.
Think of a 17 year old girl. That is about as mature as most women will ever get.
You're being at least four years too generous.
"He told Suzanne that his late father had £895,567.32 in a frozen account that he couldn’t access. Once that was sorted, they could meet – if Suzanne could transfer the £700 he needed to gain access to the account.
Thinking it was a one off, Suzanne sent the money but, won over by his affection, she soon sent additional sums totalling £174,000."
Twenty-plus years into the Age of the Internet and people are STILL falling for the world's oldest cyberscam?!
This mentally incompetent woman needs to be put under some man's guardianship before she gets herself killed. Clearly she's not capable of living by herself as a responsible adult.
Not only did the wealthy divorcee lose a huge amount of money
It probably wasn't even her money.
How do legislate stupid out of the populace? There's been 419 scams since Netscape, and well-off older women getting schemed out of everything has been happening since the first barter economy, it just used to be done in person.
Of course, the statists love this screeching, as it provides an opportunity to further attack Internet anonymity because "it's women who are suffering!": "It is not just a financial cost which devastated victims must pay; the majority are women"
"Was he Nigerian royalty by any chance as well? I mean, really now have you not... heard of...."
This is not the worst scam out there. In fact, something that I got from the Ariel Castro Cleveland kidnapping case was that there are people that still fall for the whole "I have puppies at my home. Would you like to see them?" scam. Now, I'm not absolving Castro himself for the man was truly a monster, but you must be all sorts of dumb for falling into a scam that most of us have been taught since children to avoid.
I don't understand - what is the law that they want exactly?
The Fried Ice Act. They want to be able to have wild, taboo, exciting "relationships" with men their daddies would disapprove of whenever the whim strikes; and also have those relationships be safe, healthy, and profitable in all ways. That's all.
"Something must be done because as bad as seems, it's WORSE because it's happening to WOMEN!"
When a man falls for a scam, he spends the rest of his life berating himself for being SO STUPID!
His friends will even help him maintain his self-hate by reminding him at parties and celebrations, after they've all had a few, about that time he was SO STUPID!
Women, on the other hand, immediately start looking for someone bigger and stronger to somehow protect them and make everything all better!
I wonder if conmen realize how much more GULLIBLE a once-scammed woman is? Send around a compatriot t approach her, commiserate with her, earn her trust (so easy! Just say what she wants to hear), and then tell you how you can get her money BACK!
All she has to do is give your the remainder of her inheritance so that you can...
Its obvious none of these women were honest with themselves when looking in the mirror.
All but Anna are butt ugly and fat. Even Anna is looking a bit weathered for her age .
A fat middle aged cow being picked up by an "alpha" driving a Range Rover.. Wow the solipsism is alive and well with this bunch.
@mountain man I don't think any of us women ever see ourselves objectively.We had *so* much attention before 30 that its hard to imagine it'll ever be gone. The wall is a bitch even when you know it's coming.
fake but convincingly elaborate internet profiles
Ergo a crudely photoshopped profile pic of a shirtless dude next to a black Mercedes.
I personally find it disgusting that woman of that age tart themselves up so shamelessly. Whatever happened to growing old with dignity? Do they really think that not having a man in their life is the worst thing that can happen to them?
I wonder how many years her ex spent in a cubicle to save that much money.
Delusions and vanity, thy names be woman...In the Middle Ages, there was no such thing as a free woman of substance without a male protector, and for good reason.
Those guys, those lies
They're part of the Tinder trap
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