How to Indentify a Scammer

Thursday, November 30th, 2017

At Muddy Matches, we work really hard to ensure that scammers cannot join the website. We have sophisticated software in place and a team of trained people who look read through every single profile that is sent to us and look at every single photograph. We even look through profile changes to ensure that that there is no suspicious activity.

This belt and braces method is the most effective way to deter scammers, but if in addition to joining Muddy Matches, you have decided to join other dating websites it is important to be wary of scammers.

Here are some things that you might see on scammer’s profiles. Please be aware that some genuine people might have some of these characteristics and some scammers may not show them at all.

Strange wording

A lot of scammer’s profiles are created using translation software, so they may look like they have been translated  (often badly) from another language.

Sad stories

Scammers will often use sad stories to convince you that they need money. For example, they might say that their wife has died and left them to look after young children on their own, or that they have been discharged from the military due to injury.

There are real people who go through awful circumstances like these, but it is a common story for scammers to use.

You’ve seen it 100 times before

Sometimes the text will look really familiar. This is because scammers copy-paste dating profiles over and over again onto different websites, or even within the same dating site, but using different photographs.

If you’re unsure, take a snippet of the text and Google it to see if appears elsewhere online.

Moving things offline too quickly

Scammers don’t want to communicate via the dating website itself as they know that the conversations can be kept that way. If someone asks for your phone number, email address or Skype name in the first message, or is insistent about communicating outside of the dating website be wary of them.