How to Avoid “cat Catching” When Dating Online
Online dating can be fun and exciting , but it can also be a playground for identity thieves, hackers, and other nasty people. Here are the telltale signs of a catfish – or someone online pretending to be someone they are not – and how best to approach people you meet online who seem a little suspicious.
Examine and look for red flags
Once someone contacts you, it’s best to do a little investigation . It might sound a little creepy, but you need to take care of yourself first. A good attack will be your best defense. Check their dating profile and make sure it looks like someone has spent time with him. Google their name and check if they have social media accounts or anything else that suggests they are real people.
With a little observation, you can find many of the most obvious red flags:
- They don’t have social media accounts like Facebook, Twitter or Instagram. Or, conversely, they have more than one profile for each service.
- They have an exceptionally low number of friends on their social media accounts.
- In their photos, only they are in model shots, not events.
- Their photos do not show other people, such as family or friends.
- None of their photos are tagged.
- Constant games for your sympathy and requests for help.
- They unexpectedly contact you outside of your online dating service.
- They confess their love to you quickly and before you meet in person.
Google Reverse Image Search is your best friend when it comes to quick and easy background checks. Right click their photos, copy the url and paste into the box at images.google.com (in Google Chrome, you can just right click the image and search from there). If their photos match the profiles of people with other names, that’s a serious red flag.
It’s also important to look at the text on their profiles. Start by looking for persistent spelling and grammatical errors. A few mistakes are fine, but if it is obvious that they do not understand the language at all, warnings should sound. If the spelling and grammar are correct, but something still doesn’t feel right, use Google search again:
- Copy some sentences from their annotations, biographies, or other profile characteristics.
- Then paste them into Google search to see if multiple profiles appear.
Dr. Phil’s website suggests that some scammers will use the same information for multiple profiles instead of wasting time creating something new. Or they could have copied someone’s real profile. If you see the same phrases and sentences that appear in multiple profiles, you are probably better to retreat (especially if all duplicates are on the same site).
Ask for a face-to-face meeting sooner rather than later
If everything seems to be going well during the chat, feel free to ask if they would like to video chat or meet in person. If they are not interested in face-to-face communication, but want to continue to “learn more about you,” this is a bad sign. Nev Schulman, host and co-creator of MTV’s Catfish: The TV Show, explains how asking for a meeting can help you avoid a common pitfall:
If you don’t meet them in person relatively quickly, and it turns into an online relationship and not an online meeting and then a personal relationship, you kind of start to take a step back and say, “Okay, wait a second. , I asked about the meeting, I asked about video chat, it hasn’t happened yet … How much am I going to allow my emotions to connect with this person I don’t know yet?
It’s easy to fool yourself into thinking that you are in an intimate relationship because you are probably constantly exchanging messages, text messages, and emails. You may feel connected to them, but you still don’t know who you are connected to (or if they are real). It is not necessary to start the conversation with an offer to meet, but if you think this is the right thing to do, sooner rather than later. Making a date for a cup of coffee within the first week after talking to them is perfectly acceptable if they seem to be addicted to it. It could be even faster if both of you were on board. However, if your chats last for several weeks and there is no meeting, then something is wrong.
Be careful and protect your personal information
As fun as it is to get a response from someone through your dating service of choice, it’s important that you don’t abandon the simple logic that usually keeps you safe online. Finding love can do funny things to your head , and your judgment can be clouded when someone takes an interest in you. As computer forensics professor Jonathan Rajewski explains , they should be treated the same as everyone you just met:
If a complete stranger approached you in a store, would you start a serious relationship with him? Would you like your real friends to know that you are chatting with strangers? If your answer is no, why would you do this on the Internet? ANOTHER DANGER! If our children understand this, why can’t we?
They are strangers and should be treated accordingly. It is also important that you keep your personal information to yourself. Make sure that your information on social networks is not open to the public, and do not divulge information that could lead to theft of your identity.
Som loves to ask a lot of questions to try to find out about you, but they won’t give up on a lot of information about themselves. Don’t be afraid to answer questions. If they seem suspicious, ask questions that might give them away. If they say they live nearby, ask them about local attractions. If they comment on how much they like what you are talking about, dig a little deeper. Not everyone on the web wants to get you, but if you see warning signs, you need to raise those shields.
Finally, be honest with yourself to avoid these blinkers. As the eHarmony staff explain, if something seems too good to be true, it is probably:
People can create images of their dreams on the Internet. If your virtual date is a slanting model showing off his Lamborghini and claiming to have invented a bionic prosthesis, he’s probably lying – if “he” is even one. If something sounds strange or unbelievable, ask questions. If the person is defensive, you probably noticed something.
Use your intuition and trust your instincts. You can probably tell when someone is trying to quickly impose on you in real life and the internet is no different.