After almost two years being alone, i have registered on one dating site. My profile was there active few hours. And my scammer has found me in less then 10 minutes. Making a long story short, I wasted about three months and 1,000 euros to find the real world behind online socializing. Now, i consider both as educational fees, since my fake romance has helped me to learn a lot of new things.
I know how hard can be for a former victim to talk about his/her scam-experience and how hard is also to expose himself / herself in the process. But everyone can find their own way to deal with that. My way was to learn all that i have found useful and to use this new learned things while helping others who may not have the time or knowledge to find out what´s going on. I have read all that i have found about the topic, i have registered on an anti-scam site and i have reported scammers or i have researched to find fake online identities. Being frustrated because lack of information in reports made by persons who don't return after first report to post details, i have start baiting. I must say "thank you" to Wayne and Slappy for that... Together with another baiter, they have told me so many times that i can do it until I thought that i have learn enough to do it safely. I can say that i was "baited" to become baiter, but i am grateful now for that
.Baiting was also something new for me and I watched with suspicion such actions, believing it is just waste of time for the sake of trophies. But i have seen victims coming to report scammers after one baiter reported the same used picture or the same email address, and i realized that´s more than a trophy or fun there.
Funny thing is that i was familiar with research to find real people in my former life, long before the Internet or mobile phones were assets. Now i spend almost my all free time searching just to find fake people, and for that i am also fake. As online-ghost, it seems that we can help real people as long as those people are ready to accept that is better to hear the truth instead of living in a fake fantasy world you need to pay for.
No matter how hard it is and how long it will take, i can dream of a world where there will be an international law able to punish this worldwide crime.
In the meantime, i can just try to do my best with all that i can to expose scammers and to provide necessary details about the scammers, with the hope that is useful and can help someone before being scammed. The great irony is that i do what i do now because one stupid scammer pushed me to find a way to stop him and others like him from stealing money and destroy lives of innocent victims online. As long as what I and others are doing in this area is useful for someone it is worth it.
