Police say romance fraud has ‘soared’ but true extent unknown as many victims do not come forward
Police have warned online daters of the risks of fake celebrity profiles after a woman lost about £5,000 to a romance fraudster posing as TV chef James Martin.
Nottinghamshire police said the scam is part of a trend where fraudsters pose as celebrities on dating profiles to lure fans.
Continue reading...Rise in online abuse a concern for regulator, who says investigators will be on the lookout for racist behaviour during voice to parliament referendum
Dating apps must cooperate to share information about “bad actors” using their services to abuse and harass other users, Australia’s eSafety Commissioner said, as new data shows three-quarters of Australian adults reported at least one negative online experience in the last year.
Julie Inman Grant said her agency may soon issue legal notices to online dating services, compelling them to report on how they are responding to violence and threats – and also said the agency’s investigators would be actively looking out for misinformation and abuse of First Nations people during the Indigenous voice to parliament referendum.
Sign up for Guardian Australia’s free morning and afternoon email newsletters for your daily news roundup
Continue reading...Michelle Rowland, state and territory ministers and representatives of dating apps to discuss ‘unacceptable levels of abuse and harassment’
The scale of sexual violence linked to online dating is “difficult to comprehend”, the communications minister has said, with representatives of Tinder, Bumble and Grindr due to join a national roundtable in Sydney on Wednesday.
“People who cause harm in the digital world must be held accountable as they would for their actions offline,” Michelle Rowland said.
Continue reading...Romance scams robbed Britons of nearly £100m last year. Thanks to online dating and the pandemic, these cruel crimes are more sophisticated and prevalent than ever
In February 2019, Anna, a finance professional in her 50s, joined the dating website Zoosk. She had been single for four years, recovering from an incredibly difficult, abusive marriage. “I was finally ready to meet someone,” she says.
So, when she met Andrew, a handsome Bulgarian food importer living in London, she was thrilled. The pair were soon spending hours talking on the phone each day. Anna was smitten. “He showered me with love and affection,” she says. “If you imagine candy floss, I was the stick and he was the sugar wrapped around me. I felt as though I was floating.”
Continue reading...Ten years after my dad died, I felt rudderless – a manchild still making sense of life. But suddenly, surprisingly, I met someone with whom I had an immediate bond
For most of the winter of 2011-12, I was a slightly reluctant member of the Guardian’s spin-off dating site, Guardian Soulmates. I was still in my 20s, just about, and pouring the energy and naivety of youth into a busy social life, a career as a writer of newsprint ephemera and a room in a shared flat. I think I was also a bit lonely and rudderless – a manchild still making sense of life 10 years after the sudden death of my dad. Whatever it was, something was missing.
By late February, I had been on half a dozen first dates – and no second dates. I was getting tired of the whole thing. It was all so procedural. But I’d agreed to meet a girl called Jess, whose profile handle – “good_grammar_is_hot” – had somehow not entirely put me off.
Continue reading...Eighty per cent of American men say sex is less important to them now than it was before the pandemic. What’s going on?
Name: Flaccid fall.
Age: It is a relatively new thing, since the pandemic.
Continue reading...For many who use dating apps to find their ideal partner, the willingness to have a vaccination is becoming a deal breaker
Before the pandemic, Neha knew exactly what she was looking for in a date: an athletic, liberal-minded guy who liked healthy living but wasn’t too outdoorsy. Ideally, he would be Indian like her. Party types were a no-no, pets were a turn-off. Now, multiple dating apps, three lockdowns and a handful of real-life dates later and Neha’s adding a new, elusive quality to that list: Covid vaccination status.
Related: Dating apps: is it worth paying a premium to find love?
Continue reading...Romance scams on social media and apps are on the rise – but there are steps you can take if you fall victim
The dating game is full of the unexpected: it can quickly become apparent that photographs might have been in rotation for a few years or that someone listing their height as 5ft 10in could only achieve that height on tiptoes. But while those deceits may be forgivable if you hit it off with your date, at the other end of the spectrum are far worse cons.
In 2020, with more of us stuck at home, often desperate for some company or conversation, the number of romance scams reported to the crime body Action Fraud rose by 15%. Over the past 18 months it has received reports of more than 7,000 cases, with losses totalling £69.7m – an average of almost £10,000 a victim.
Continue reading...Lockdown has triggered a boom in the exchange of intimate shots – and now a new book called Sending Nudes is celebrating the pleasures and perils of baring all to the camera
Have you ever sent a nude selfie? The question draws a thick red line between generations, throwing one side into a panic while the other just laughs. And yet, as far back as 2009, that fount of moral wisdom, Kanye West, was advising how to stay safe. “When you take the picture cut off your face / And cover up the tattoo by the waist,” he rapped in Jamie Foxx’s song Digital Girl.
As the pandemic forces relationships to be conducted remotely, more people than ever are resorting to the virtual exchange of intimacies. Last autumn, a poll of 7,000 UK schoolchildren by the youth sexual health charity Brook put the figure at nearly one in five who said they would send a naked selfie to a partner during a lockdown.
Continue reading...The plethora of dating apps has bolstered society’s obsession with sex, but many people find that a period of abstinence makes them happier and healthier
In a world where you can get a sexual partner faster than a pizza delivery, it has never been easier to play the field. Yet, despite all that swiping right, a surprising number of people are not having sex at all – not for religious reasons, or because they can’t get a date, but because they find that celibacy makes them happier.
Some have never had much interest in sex, while others are taking a break to address personal problems, recover from bad dating experiences or change the way they approach relationships.
Continue reading...Sex counsellors have a unique insight into our shared concerns and insecurities. Where once they focused on physical issues, now they are tackling psychological ones
Denise Knowles, a sex and relationship therapist with the charity Relate, says patients often say to her: “There are so many options, I don’t know where to start.” Thirty years ago, Knowles was mostly approached with physical problems: erectile dysfunction, painful intercourse, issues with ejaculation. Now she describes the scope of her work as “bio-psycho-social”. That is to say, everything has got a lot more complicated.
“I think it has gone from being very much: ‘This is the problem; this is how we resolve it,’ to: ‘How do we approach sex? What does it mean to you? How does it fit into the relationship, and how have you got to this place?’” She laughs. “Then we can start to deal with it.”
Continue reading...