Online love interest, or scammer? Yukoners falling victim to 'romance fraud'

A Whitehorse lawyer is warning about the dangers of "romance fraud."

Fraudsters posing as online love interests have scammed a handful of Yukoners out of their life savings, says Carmen Gustafson, executive director of the Yukon Public Education Association.

"It's absolutely devastating to the people who have lost this money," she said.

The RCMP define romance fraud as scams by peoplewho create fake profiles on social media and online dating websites with the intention of luring potential victims into online relationships.

After creating a false sense of intimacy with their victims, the scammers make a financial request. They often say it's for an emergencymedical bill, or for travel to visit the victim. Themoney is never repaid.

Elaborate fake profiles

Gustafson warns people not to be fooled by social media accounts that seem to have a lot of photos and other information on them. Scammers are often professional criminals who build elaborate fake Facebook profiles with photos taken from the internet.

Gustafson says they communicate with their victims using messaging apps and even text messaging, but will not meet face-to-face.

"They create this feeling of trust, but whenever things like meeting in person come up they will always come up with an excuse," she says.

Gustafson says scammers often claim to be from a western country andsay they are working abroad. She says the problem with trying to press charges is that it's almost impossible to find out the person's real identity.

"You don't actually know where they are so what country they're in and what the laws would be in that country and who they are."

Gustafson says in the past year and a half, she's talked to several men and women in Yukon who have lost tens of thousands of dollars in romance scams. She says none of them have recovered a cent.

Gustafson says people should check with their banks before sending money to someone, to see if the money is in any way recoverable, so they aren't surprised when it isn't.

Whitehorse RCMP don't have stats on the number of Yukoners who may have fallen victim to such scams, but the Canadian Anti-fraud Centre says there were 700 reported victims of romance fraud in Canada in 2016, representing $17 million.

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