Rock Rapids, Iowa — A recent internet scam that preys on peoples’ need for companionship has reared its ugly head in northwest Iowa.
Lyon County Sheriff Stewart Vander Stoep says it has already affected a number of people in the community. He says the scam itself is not brand new but has become increasingly more common over the last few months.
(as said) “This one is quite concerning because it’s happening over social media… Facebook Instagram, Snapchat… where all of a sudden somebody that’s really good-looking is saying hey, I would really like to get to know you can we talk on a private site or whatever and it’s turning out that they’re getting really flirty and making them feel like this is a going to be a real romantic wonderful thing and they’re getting those people to take pictures that that most people would be embarrassed if other people saw it. And once that picture is sent then they turn around and say okay. I’m going to use this against you or I’m going to blackmail you for a certain amount of money or I’m going to release this to everybody that that is a friend of yours.”
Vander Stoep says at that point, the victims’ reactions vary.
(as said) “Some people are calling us at that time and some are paying the amount. One person ended up losing $1,200 to make sure that this didn’t happen. So all scams are bad, but this one really has me concerned that there’s going to be a lot of embarrassment and a lot of sadness that they’re working on people who think this is really wonderful that this really good-looking person is interested in me. When in fact, that’s not the truth at all.”
Sheriff Vander Stoep advises northwest Iowans not to add people you do not know or have zero to few mutual friends with.
He says sometimes instead of, or in addition to pictures, a video chat application such as Skype or Zoom may be involved.
He also advises people not to send explicit images or videos of themselves to anyone, let alone to anyone you don’t know or aren’t comfortable with. He reminds us that once the picture or video is sent, there’s no getting it back. You may think that it will be deleted in a moment on applications like Snapchat, but scammers can take a picture of one phone with another or take a screenshot.
He says by the time they ask for payment they’ve probably already obtained personal information about the victim such as where the victim works or lives, the victim’s family, or the victim’s other social media accounts. Even if the victim does pay the ransom, that still does not make the images or videos go away, says Vander Stoep.
He says the Lyon County Sheriff’s Office took reports of over $57,000 lost in internet scams in 2020. He says, unfortunately, that number is just what gets reported and is only a drop in the bucket of what people are actually losing to scammers, as victims are often too embarrassed to come forward. He reminds us that if something seems too good to be true, it usually is.
