Details on the scam site and method

Details on how I was scammed and method 

I dislike that this world says to not talk to others, but how do we get to know each other and support each other if we do not?

Don't just take my story, what happened to me is similar to what the FBI has already noted, I just had not known about this.

https://www.fbi.gov/scams-and-safety/common-scams-and-crimes/romance-scams

When I talk to other folks on this, they mention they too have not heard of this scam, so I want to share in efforts to help out others.

This all has been an emotional roller coaster and I am still coming to terms with a  lot having to keep it together and move forward. I want to share this as it appears this is not talked about enough. 

- I can not stay quiet on this scam and what is going on and the tactics. 

I am revising my first posting of this, as I was very emotional when creating it and posting, and wanting to get information out to the world.

Initial Contact:

The scam all started on Match.com, where initial contact happened and reaching out to me. I had many other men wanting me to text them on the side, so when they asked to do this I had not thought much on that.

Emotional connection:

While the scammer tried to get emotionally connected with me quickly (within a week) I had not fallen for that. They did take the time to "get to know each other more". I am realizing he used my situation and life, as means to manipulate me. 

After a while , I had gotten emotionally attached to this imaginary figure.

I may have been too understanding of there are jobs that people have that they do travel for work and projects that need to get done and "we stay till the end" (to be honest part of my job has those aspects too).

This scammer, for me was very encouraging - I wanted to travel, so I did go get apply for my passport, they encouraged that, and explained how we would travel; which has been a dream of mine. 

They even encouraged to see if I could get a home loan and how we would live together and build a future together.

Leading to the "short term investing platform"

The talk on the short term investment did not come first, and to be honest, it was a bit of a flirtful goating  me to get on the site and try it. Which I bought into the whole lie.  I bought into also they would teach me how to do this, and was so very nice and encouraging to me. 

Below are screenshots of the "trading platform " that was used to scam me.

False Security of pulling out some short term earnings:

With the scam that was pulled on me, I was able to pull some money out after the first "profit of short term earnings". However, later even to pull out 10th of the earnings later, I could not. The scammer also encouraged me and used my hopes, dreams and goals to put in more of my own money or money lent to me to make a profit. 

New Love lent 10K so we could trade higher

"My new love" even let me borrow 10k after I had put enough in, to earn more money--- it was all part of the scam, and ties in later.

Trading platform 

Service help

I hadn't thought much of their site using whatsapp,  line, telegram etc for communicating.. but after this all, it is strange they kept switching and numbers from whatsapp would get discount. 

Transactions 

When this message came up the service personal told me that I hadn't traded enough and it was a mechanism to stop money laundering, which I was confused on but did not question much on because if that was their mechanism to avoid money laundering , that's a good thing right?

"My new love" of course helped me out with trading, always promising he would teach me this trade.

Taxes due

In retrospect I have called myself a moron and very dumb for falling for this:

And worst,  I took my 401k the last of what I had to pay this "tax".. 

Yes, while I expected to pay tax.. this isn't how the crypto currency tax works. 

After the taxes are paid

Then after I paid "the tax" that would take 2-3 business days to clear- On the 3rd day I was told by the Service personnel of the platform that they were contacting the authorities and taking legal action as they stated again that I was money laundering on their site.

The service personnel also mentioned that the 10k transaction (mentioned earlier from "my new love") incorporated me in with their money laundering,  and that their account had a lot of money for me; and I needed to prove for both accounts that weren't laundering money and also to pay additional risk fees. 

That for some reason is where my logical self kicked in and was like that makes absolutely no sense!

--- And of course "my new found love" , their phone disconnected over the weekend prior to the "3rd business day" on a Monday for the tax transaction to clear, and days prior to us scheduling to meet.