Military Romance Scams Facebook

If you feel you have been scammed by a person claiming to be a U.S. Soldier, contact the FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center and the Federal Trade Commission.

1. Facebook Military Romance Scams
2. Military Romance Scams Pictures
3. Military Romance Scammer
4. How To Report A Military Romance Scammer
5. Military Scammers Facebook

This Army Veteran Became The Face Of Military Romance Scams. Now He’s Fighting Back Brown County Browser: Don’t fall for veterans romance scams Fake US Soldiers Robbing Women Online How a billion-dollar Internet scam is breaking hearts and bank accounts Prince Charming' Behind Bars: Nigerian Romance Scammer Nets 27-Year Prison Sentence. Jan 08, 2008 There are no specific tips for military, but generally, if they have a facebook, or on any other social network or personal page, and know their details or pictures are used in scams, they should warn people, post warnings that their pictures are stolen and abused by scammers, place a link to Romancescam site. Military Romance Scams: Using stolen pictures from men in the military to excuse the absence of face-to-face contact and give a reliable backstory. They’ll also request funds for things like supplies or communication methods. The Military’s Big Problem With Facebook Love Scams. Daniel Anonsen retired from the Marines and abandoned Facebook and Instagram years ago, though plenty of his impostors are still there.

Army CID is warning anyone who is involved in online dating to proceed with caution when corresponding with persons claiming to be U.S. Soldiers currently serving in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria or elsewhere.

Army CID receives hundreds of allegations a month from victims who state they got involved in an online relationship with someone, on a legitimate dating website or other social media website, who claims to be a U.S. Soldier. The 'Soldier' then begins asking for money for various FALSE, service-related needs such as transportation costs, communication fees, marriage, processing and medical fees. Victims of these online scams have lost hundreds of thousands of dollars, with a very low possibility of recovery.

The U.S. has established numerous task force organizations to deal with this growing epidemic; unfortunately, many times the people committing these scams are from African countries using untraceable email addresses, routing accounts through numerous locations around the world and utilizing pay per hour Internet cyber cafes, which often times maintain no accountability of use.

Read the Joint Service Sextortion Brochure for more information and see examples of fake documents used by scammers.

You can also learn more about identity theft, romance scams, sextortion and online impostors at the U.S. Army's Social Media Resources site.

For more on these fraudulent acts, read the announcements released by Army CID:
U.S. Army CID Warn Citizens to Be Vigilant Against Internet, Digital Scammers
With National Spotlight on Internet Romance-Type Scams, Army CID Makes Additional Attempts to Warn Unsuspecting Victims
U.S. Army CID Pleads with Public, Warns Against Romance Scams
CID warns Army community about social media impersonation of Soldier accounts

• - DO NOT SEND MONEY! Be extremely suspicious if you are asked for money for transportation costs, communication fees or marriage processing and medical fees via Western Union.
• - If you do start an Internet-based relationship with someone, check them out, research what they are telling you with someone who would know, such as a current or former service member.
• - Be very suspicious if you never get to actually speak with the person on the phone or are told you cannot write or receive letters in the mail. Servicemen and women serving overseas will often have an APO or FPO mailing address. Internet or not, service members always appreciate a letter in the mail.
• - Many of the negative claims made about the military and the supposed lack of support and services provided to troops overseas are far from reality - check the facts.
• - Be very suspicious if you are asked to send money or ship property to a third party or company. Often times the company exists, but has no idea or is not a part of the scam.
• - Be very suspicious if the person you are corresponding with wants you to mail anything to an African country.
• - Be aware of common spelling, grammatical or language errors in the emails.
• - Be very suspicious of someone you have never met and who pledges their love at warp speed.

Saying they are on a peace keeping mission, looking for an honest woman, parents deceased, wife deceased, child being cared for by nanny or other guardian, profess their love almost immediately, refer to you as 'my love,' 'my darling' or any other affectionate term almost immediately, telling you they cannot wait to be with you, telling you they cannot talk on the phone or via webcam due to security reasons, or telling you they are sending you something (money, jewelry) through a diplomat. Finally, they claim to be a U.S. Army Soldier; however, their English and grammar do not match that of someone born and raised in the United States.

Here are answers to some of the most common types of scams:

• 1. Soldiers and their loved ones are not charged money so that the Soldier can go on leave.
• 2. No one is required to request leave on behalf of a Soldier.
• 3. A general officer will not correspond with you on behalf of a Soldier planning to take leave.
• 4. A general officer will not be a member of an internet dating site.
• 5. Soldiers are not charged money or taxes to secure communications or leave.
• 6. Soldiers do not need permission to get married.
• 7. Soldiers do not have to pay for early retirement.
• 8. Soldiers have medical insurance for themselves and their immediate family members (spouse and/or children), which pays for their medical costs when treated at health care facilities worldwide - family and friends do not need to pay their medical expenses.
• 9. Military aircraft are not used to transport Privately Owned Vehicles.
• 10. Army financial offices are not used to help Soldiers buy or sell items of any kind.
• 11. Soldiers deployed to combat zones do not need to solicit money from the public to feed or house their troops.
• 12. Deployed Soldiers do not find large sums of money and do not need your help to get that money out of the country.

Report the theft to the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) (FBI-NW3C Partnership). Online: http://www.ic3.gov/default.aspx

Report the theft to the Federal Trade Commission. Your report helps law enforcement officials across the United States in their investigations. Online: http://www.ftc.gov/idtheft

By phone: 1-877-ID-THEFT (438-4338) or TTY, 1-866-653-4261

By mail: Identity Theft Clearinghouse, Federal Trade Commission, Washington, DC 20580

Report the fraud to the Federal Trade Commission on Nigerian Scams. Email: spam@uce.gov.

Men in California oversaw a romance scam that targeted women worldwide, feds say
Better Call Harry: Stolen Heart, Stolen Identity
This Army Veteran Became The Face Of Military Romance Scams. Now He’s Fighting Back
Brown County Browser: Don’t fall for veterans romance scams
Fake US Soldiers Robbing Women Online
How a billion-dollar Internet scam is breaking hearts and bank accounts
Prince Charming' Behind Bars: Nigerian Romance Scammer Nets 27-Year Prison Sentence
Love a man in uniform? Online dating scammers hope so
Love me don't: the West African online scam using U.S. Soldiers
Australian grandmother on drug ice charges in Malaysia: Maria Elvira Pinto Exposto may be victim of a military romance scam
U.S. Embassy Accra-Ghana

I’ve worked with many taken advantage of by scammers impersonating soldiers. Each scam has its unique attributes, but there are some common themes.

If you run across any of these elements with the person you met online claiming to be a soldier, there is no question you are dealing with a scammer. None.

You’re welcome to message me to chat about your situation. But if the signs below are present, my answer will be the same as what I’m telling you in this article – it’s a scam.

Let’s dive in and look at each of the most common signs of a romance scam.

He’s on a Peacekeeping Mission

I’m not sure why this is such a popular excuse to use why they are deployed in another country, but this comes up often.

Granted, my husband served in the military as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were going strong. Still, I have never heard a real soldier refer to his deployment as a peacekeeping mission.

It’s just not common terminology in the military. Though if I based it solely on the people who have found themselves involved with a scammer, you would think peacekeeping missions are the only reason any of our military ever leaves the country.

They may also say they’re on a peacekeeping mission with the U.N. in what is usually a war-torn country, but he’s in the U.S. military. Negative.

It’s definitely a red flag.

He’s in a Country You Haven’t Heard of Us Officially Being In

We have soldiers deployed to various regions and countries around the globe. With most, you can easily learn we have a presence in that country with a simple Google search.

You will hear references to many countries in various news stories about our actions or, sadly, when a soldier is killed.

If you do not hear that we’re in that country from very public sources, the person is full of it.

Do we currently have soldiers in countries that the general public isn’t aware of? Absolutely.

But here’s the deal. The soldiers deployed somewhere like that aren’t allowed to tell their spouse where they are, much less a random person they met online.

Those missions and deployments are generally classified. And any real soldier would quickly find himself on the first plane back to the U.S. in some serious trouble for divulging their location. If he’s truly in Syria, he can’t tell you he’s in Syria.

My husband was in special operations. At the time he was in, we weren’t even able to tell anyone he deployed. I wasn’t allowed to know exactly where he was or when he was coming home. Our conversations were monitored to make sure there weren’t any slips.

So the chance that a soldier would volunteer he’s currently chatting with you from Syria is none to none.

The other country often used is Nigeria. As many of these scammers are actually located in Nigeria, he may be telling the truth. But he’s not in Nigeria with the U.S. military.

He’s on a Top Secret Mission

Ok, let’s think about this. Does he volunteer that he’s on a top-secret mission? There is no conversation between the soldier and his closest confidantes if he’s on a “top secret mission” and certainly not with someone he met online.

The very idea of a top-secret anything is that it remains a secret. They aren’t allowed to speak of it. There are serious legal consequences to leaking information that is classified, which a top-secret mission would be.

If someone tells you this, end the conversation. He’s lying.

He Needs You To Talk To His Commander

This has always been one of my favorites because it’s so ridiculous. Sad but true, when you are involved with a soldier but not yet married, you are basically invisible to the military.

You’re not a consideration if you’re not married, and some would argue being married to him doesn’t even help.

Commanders or higher-ranking officers do not have time to chat with and vet the person a soldier met online while he’s deployed. There’s no interest in it and no benefit to it. Quite frankly, they have better things to do with their time.

There is no reason for you to talk to his commander. He doesn’t need permission from his commander to speak with you, email you, or call you.

No matter how official sounding the title may be, you are not communicating with a high-ranking officer in the United States military.

He Needs You To Fill Out Fiancee Paperwork

This is generally used in conjunction with the scam above about needing to speak to his commander.

In this instance, he will inform you to speak to each other on the phone, continue communicating online, or even get engaged; you need to complete paperwork.

There is no such thing as this paperwork in the real world of the military. Again, the military doesn’t care if you exist until you’re married. And then the only official paperwork on you is what you have to do to get your military ID made AFTER you get married.

He will tell you that you can’t get engaged until you have completed this paperwork. He may even tell you that you need to complete the fiancee paperwork to be eligible for his benefits or him to send money to you.

Typically, this form appears to come from a higher-ranking officer and has specific instructions to follow. This includes a processing fee for the form. In some cases, they may tell you the fee is to enable him to return home.

The paperwork will usually appear on watermarked paper with the logo of that particular branch of service (Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, etc.). The grammatical errors within the form are generally laughable.

All fake.

He Refuses to Provide His Military Email Address

Every soldier is assigned a military email address. This email address ends in mail.mil. His official military email address will not be Gmail, Yahoo, or anything similar. It also won’t end in usa.com. If it doesn’t end in mail.mil, it’s not an official military email address.

There is NO reason why he can’t share this with you. After all, it’s just an email.

It’s not top-secret, he doesn’t have to get permission from his commander, and there is no security risk to him providing it to you.

If he can’t provide it to you, he’s a scammer. Period.

It is always funny to me when someone says he can’t share his email address but then sends me a picture of what is supposedly his military ID. His email address is a lot less sensitive than his military ID.

If he refuses to provide his email address, cut communication.

Even if he provides it, you must try to send an email to it by starting a new email. Do not reply to the email he sent to you, even if it looks like it came from a mail.mil email address.

Does it bounce back when you try to send it? Is he able to reply to you from the mail.mil email address with your original email intact?

Every single person who suspected they were involved in a scam and has ever tried this found the email address the person gave was fake.

He Asks For Money

This is the biggest clue of all. A real soldier is not going to meet someone online and then ask for money. And certainly won’t do it with some made-up story as to why he needs it.

Asking for money can occur in multiple ways.

He could ask for an iTunes gift card.

He could ask you to pay for his flight home from his deployment.

He could ask you to cash the check he’s sending to you and send the money to him.

He could ask you to send him money via Western Union.

He could tell you that you have to pay a fee to continue communicating with each other.

Facebook Military Romance Scams

He could give you a sob story about how his child needs medical care, and he doesn’t have access to his bank account.

Regardless of how it happens, if he asks you to spend money on anything, it’s a scam.

Scammers are working on multiple victims at once, and it may be anywhere from a few days to a few months before the topic of money comes up. Regardless of when it may, it’s always a scam.

Military Romance Scams Pictures

Some have insisted he’s real because they have been talking for six months, and this is the first time he’s asking for money. It doesn’t matter when he asks.

Military Romance Scammer

If you honor any of these requests, the next ask for money will only get larger. They will play on your sympathy and good heart to try to get you to part with your money.

How To Report A Military Romance Scammer

Trust your gut. If there’s even a small part of you that thinks it may be a scam, it probably is.

These are the biggest signs that you are dealing with a scammer. If the soldier you met online sounds similar, cut communication. Then, check out this article about what to do if you are involved in a scam.

Military Scammers Facebook

If you have questions about a situation you’re in with a soldier you met online, reach out to me.