Via Facebook

Love scam: Styrian woman loses tens of thousands of euros

An online acquaintance ended in financial disaster for a 73-year-old woman from Styria: a fraudster cleverly courted the woman's affections on Facebook and tricked her out of tens of thousands of euros with lies. 

It probably started with an innocuous message on Facebook: A 73-year-old woman from the Graz area was contacted by a stranger and apparently cleverly ensnared. The fraudster - or fraudsters - manipulated the woman and thus won her affection. 

Typical scam: alleged emergencies
"The Frenchman supposedly living in Poland was a businessman and traded in cocoa. He was in a hospital and urgently needed money," was one of the scams, according to the Styrian Provincial Police Directorate. 

The woman believed the fraudster and transferred money several times to different accounts. According to the police, the loss amounts to several tens of thousands of euros. The contacts lasted from April 2023 to February 2024, and the woman has now filed a complaint.

When love makes you blind
This form of online fraud is called "love scam". The victim is involved in an affair and subsequently exploited financially. Contact is mainly made on social media platforms such as Facebook.

It usually follows the same pattern: the scammers first build up trust, often arranging meetings that never take place. Then the perpetrators usually feign an emergency (they have been robbed, their child has suddenly fallen seriously ill or something similar) and ask for financial help.