Multiple Faces Detected
January 24th, 2022
Terry is a woman who lost $20,000 in a romance scam. She fell in love with someone named James who claimed to be an oil rig worker off the coast of Califonia.
The breakdown
The very first red flag, in this case, is James’s occupation. Scammers often claim to be oil rig workers because it provides a perfect excuse for why they can’t engage in certain activities. For instance, Terry aid that James told her that he can’t call her because “the static would make the oil rig blow up”
Insights from the victim
Terry told us that she is highly suspicious of James, and she has been for some time, but she was unable to let go because James was so romantic and she made her feel like no man ever has. Terry was looking for confirmation. She needed just enough information to be able to walk away if she had the strength to.
There were a couple of signs in our interview with Terry that we know we could explore to be able to get her the answers she was looking for.
First, James claimed that his passport was expired and he was stuck on the oil rig. Because of this, Terry would have to take care of him financially. First, he wouldn’t have been able to travel to a foreign country without his passport. He said because he lost his passport, he would have to hire a police escort to take him around the country. The problem with this is, he would have never been able to leave the country without a valid passport.
What James Claimed Was His Immigration Document
There are a few red flags here. First, the signature doesn’t match his name. Second, there is no such thing as an agency called the “Diplomatic Service Authority” that appears as the issuer of this “official document”. The closest agency that resembles this one is “The Diplomatic Service Office”. It seems as though someone tried to forage this document and got confused.
Lastly, the document makes reference to the “FRO” which stands for Foreign Registration Office, which is an organization that appears to only exist in India.
Who Is The man in the Photos?
We had difficulty determining who exactly is the man in the photos. Among other things, this is because the scammer seemed to have altered the images.
This Lysol can in this photo seems to have been inserted via photoshop. This makes it difficult for reverse image search technology to be able to identify the original image. Although we were not able to find the original man in the photos, we can confidently conclude that James is not a real person and that Terry is the victim of a scam.
Don’t be a Victim
At Social Catfish, we give you the tools to be able to search anyone online. do a search on any image, username, phone number, or email address to find the truth about the person you’re talking to.
