Through online dating, I have been approached by 33 Nigerian scammers. They work in giant warehouses with phones and computers. Scammers are easy to spot:

1. Poor command of the English language. Rarely capitalize "i."
2. Strikingly handsome/beautiful pictures stolen from modeling websites.
3. Same sob story: his wife died in a fiery car crash or ran off with his best friend.
4. Claims to be born in Europe and is (magically) an American citizen.
5. Says he fell in love with you instantly from your photos. "You are an angel from heaven."
6. Pressures you to instantly switch to Yahoo instant messaging.
7. Claims to be an engineer or missionary temporarily working in West Africa oil fields.
8. Says he lives in a large city in your state. In my case it's Seattle.
9. Keeps up the romantic pressure until SURPRISE! .... he was robbed at a bus station/airport and needs you to wire $5,000 immediately so he can fly into your arms. Or his child needs an emergency operation.

Of course, he/she keeps this up until you run out of money.

Millions of dollars are scammed and hearts are broken by Nigerian scammers each year. Lonely singles are especially vulnerable in America, Canada, Britian and Europe.

None got a penny out of me. I reported and blocked them. Of course, they popped up like daisies with a different username.

With online dating, if a photo looks too handsome or beautiful to be real, it's probably stolen from a modeling website. If you feel suspicious...

1. Copy and paste the photo into Google Image Search.

2. VOILA! The photo appears on websites that expose dating scammers, or on modeling websites.

3. Also, there are websites that expose dating scammers. You can enter his/her phone number, photo or profile text.

Wow! Scary stuff! It's amazing what some people will do. I think men are better at compartmentalizing than women. Do women do this to men in any kind of significant numbers? Do the men who live this way have ANY sort of real relationships?

If you abide by this one simple rule when you are online in any and all situations, you will never be scammed.
"I have one strict rule when I am on the internet. I will NEVER, under ANY circumstances, send money or gifts to ANYONE for ANY REASON."
Good luck to you all and stay safe.

I came VERY close to getting scammed! I had run into a few others, but most of them were pretty easy to spot and tripped themselves up early in the game. But one, on a legitimate foreign dating site (one of my friends met his wife on it) came very close to costing me a lot of money. Fortunately, at the last minute I started doing some research and all it cost me was depression and a little heartbreak (not major, because in the back of my mind, I knew it was too good to be true). My guess is the article made it seem lopsided to women getting ripped off because a lot of men would be too embarrassed to report it or file a complaint.