Form received 2020-09-18 16:32:48
What name did the scammer use?: Allyssa Mehuest
How old did the scammer say they were?: 26
What site/app did you first meet the scammer on? Please provide a link if possible.:
www.seekingarrangments.comWho made the first contact?: I contacted them first.
If they asked you to leave the site/app and go elsewhere, where did they take you?: Skype
Any other social media profile links used by the scammer.: No
If they gave you a phone number, please add it here.: Na
Scammer's Skype name.: Allyssa Mehuest
Scammer's Skype username .: cid.efc265a2f89a700
How much money did they demand?: $4850 US
Name you were told to send the money to.: Contact Cut off prior
What country/city were you told to send the money to?: Contact Cut off Prior
How were you to send the money ?: Contact Cut off Prior
What steps, if any, have you already taken to block the scammer?: Blocked on Skype. Updated Google Alerts to be more comprehensive of all possible postings. Increased privacy settings on Facebook. Shared most/all details with family. Not shared details with professional contacts.
Are there any other details you wish to share? Anything you say may help prevent someone else from being scammed.: Met scammer on Seeking arrangments.com. Profile was in fact fairly vanilla and plain compared to many of the other young women there seeking arrangments with older men. While generally careful with identity, asked to move to skype where it auto linked to existing microsoft account. Scammer was able to collect identity data using simple search techniques. No compromising videos and very little compromising in chat other than desire to arrange a face to face to see if we "clicked". At point video image started to show her removing top terminated.
Extortionist moved to chat and threatened to expose chat (at worst PG rated) and alter to be embarrassing unless demands met with distribution principally to wife, wife facebook contacts and my work associated. Threatened to doctor video (see G/PG rated above) Told scammer to pound sand, terminated contact and blocked.
Subsequently reported activity to seekingarrangments.com and profile now seems to have been removed (or I would upload image). Increased facebook security. Contacted cyber forensic company but unhappy with their direct and aggressive business model and believed it likely to cause more harm (alerting the scammers to my capacity to pay several thousand dollars, no real believe in efficacy overseas) than good. Plus I didn't like the sales tactics (at all).
Have decided to wait it out but would love a little more connection to a community that has gone through this as it is isolating and raises anxiety level since you don't know if they are reaching out.