OSCEOLA COUNTY, Fla — Valentine’s Day is a time to celebrate love, but it’s also when crooks are working overtime on romance scams designed to steal people’s hearts and their money.
The Better Business Bureau warns the scammers often target vulnerable people who have experienced a recent breakup or other hardship. Then they play off that heartbreak to establish a connection before going after their money.
Looking for love online is more popular than ever and that’s where many of these scams start.
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“I clicked on a view. She looked interesting and she wrote back to me,” said Olavo Amado of Osceola County.
A couple of years ago, Amado thought he’d found true love on a popular dating website. He and his online girlfriend chatted and even did video calls over the course of months before she suggested he check out a cryptocurrency investing website. She used their budding romance as incentive to give it a try.
“That we could have a life together. We’d get married. We would buy a yacht. The money would come quick,” he said.
That type of ask is a giant red flag for romance scams, according to Better Business Bureau CEO Holly Salmons.
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“Whether it looks like a crisis or whether it looks like a financial investment opportunity. Asking you to get out your wallet will be part of this game,” Salmons said.
Unfortunately for Olavo Amado, that’s what it turned out to be. He initially put in $12,000 and the investment looked great. Within a few months, the crypto website showed he’d turned his $12,000 into $240,000. But there was a catch. To cash out, he’d have to pay taxes up front of more than $12,000.
Amado told Action 9 Consumer Investigator Jeff Deal, “I paid $12,000. I asked my mom for help, and she went along with it.”
Then he was told with such a high dollar amount, the website required another $5000 for a security fee. After he paid that, the people behind the scam demanded another $10,000 and that’s when he realized he’d been taken for nearly $30,000.
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Consumers have reported to the BBB more than $49 million dollars lost in romance scams over the past two years.
Holly Salmons said, “This amount of money is not insignificant, and especially to consumers who don’t have that money to lose. It could affect their entire life.”
In Olavo Amado’s case, it had a huge impact.
“I was scared. How would I pay my mom back? Would I ever get my money back? I had a breakdown,” he said.
Amado now believes the entire crypto business platform he was investing on was fake. Once he caught on, the website shut down and the woman never contacted him again.
He said, “They take advantage of your heart, and then they play with your mind.”
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Other red flags include asking you to leave a dating platform to communicate directly, isolating you from friends and family and avoiding meeting in person. The amount of money lost reported to Federal Trade Commission is even higher than the amount reported to the BBB. The FTC found in 2024 alone victims lost more than $1.1 Billion dollars to romance scams.
Other Valentine’s Day scams to be aware of include imposter websites for buying gifts, fake florist scams, and wrong number scams. The BBB has more information on those scams here: BBB Scam Alert: Top Valentine’s Day scams
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