Romance scams cost victims almost $350 million in 2021

According to analysis by secure VPN service Atlas VPN, heartbroken victims lost upwards of $343 million in the first three quarters of 2021 – a big jump from 2020’s annual figures.

Online impersonators have found the pandemic to be a treat - they have a legitimate excuse as to why they cannot meet up in person, at least for now. This allowed fraudsters to carry out romance scams on a larger scale than ever before.

As of yet, there is no data for Q4 2021. But based on the information already collated, it is safe to assume that romance scams caused somewhere around $500 million in damages throughout the entire year.

The figures for the research were extracted from the official Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) website. The FTC has a website where romance scam victims can submit their complaints and receive further help.

In 2020, impersonators swindled $268 million from victims of all age groups. In Q1/Q3 2021, monetary damages exceeded $342 million, representing a 27.7 percent growth.

Perhaps the most surprising finding is that elders aged 60-69 lost significantly more money than all other groups in 2020 and 2021 ($84 million in 2021). This was the case in 2019, as well.

However, younger Americans are not immune to romantic impersonators, far from it. Individuals ages 20-59 lost $130 million in 2020 and $187 million in Q1/Q3 2021, a growth of 44 percent even without the data on losses in Q4.

Interestingly, although the youngest age group in the research – 20-29 year olds – were one of the least affected, with $18 million in losses in Q1/ Q3 2021, this figure nevertheless represented a big leap from losses of $10 million in 2020.

2021 one of the loneliest years

For those who have been monitoring their emotional health, it might be obvious why there is a rise in romantic scams.

Newly disclosed statistics from a recent government telephone survey of 11,000 Medicare members, reveal that 40% of respondents felt less socially connected to family and friends than they did in November 2020. Moreover, 28 percent of respondents said they were more stressed or anxious, and 22 percent said they felt lonely or depressed.

According to the Atlas VPN researchers, “having a single core principle of not sending money to anyone you have not met in person will keep most of the troubles away. If your romantic interest shows a negative reaction towards this principle - that’s a huge red flag.”

“Another dead giveaway is when someone asks for money via gift cards, money transfers, or even worse - cryptocurrency. All of these are virtually untraceable, which makes them popular amongst impersonators.”

Building relationships online is a wonderful way to stay connected, they stated. “Our advice is to keep your heart open, but your wallet closed at least until you meet them in person.”