LANSING, MI — Romance scammers are ramping up their efforts as Valentine's Day approaches, targeting lonely hearts looking for love online. The FBI reported about 18,000 romance fraud cases in 2024, resulting in $672 million in total losses for victims across the country.
These con artists take advantage of people seeking romantic connections, particularly around holidays like Valentine's Day when emotions run high. The scammers convince victims they've fallen for them romantically or developed a close friendship, but these relationships quickly turn into financial transactions.
Victims are often asked to hand over banking information, send money, or pay for expenses like plane tickets for their supposed romantic interest.
Al Pascual, CEO of tech company Scamnetic, which focuses on protecting companies and consumers against fraud, explained that romance scams can affect anyone, but the impact varies by age group.
"Romance scams can really affect anyone. I think the big difference is what that scam looks like. When you're older you're more likely to lose a lot of money. The data if you look at the FTC, that data bears it out. Older people tend to lose more generally. They have more to lose and tend to be more susceptible but younger people get affected by romance scams too. It's just that especially for the youngest people that turns into things like sextortion," Pascual said.
According to Federal Trade Commission data, older victims typically lose larger amounts of money because they have more assets and may be more vulnerable to these schemes. However, younger people face different risks, including sextortion schemes where scammers threaten to release compromising images or information.
Reporting romance scams
If you suspect someone you're talking with online is running a romance scam, you can report it to the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center, even if you haven't lost any money.
If you've already lost money to one of these scams, the FBI recommends immediately reporting the loss to your bank and local police department.
This story was reported on-air by a journalist and has been converted to this platform with the assistance of AI. Our editorial team verifies all reporting on all platforms for fairness and accuracy.
