When it comes to online dating scams, we all like to believe we learn from our own, and others, experiences. But according to new statistics on Romancescams.org, a website dedicated to fighting online romance scams, the average loss per person involved in a romance scam has climbed to a staggering $11,500. That’s up from a 2007 report where the advocacy group cited the average loss per victim was $7,900.

According to the article, “Website offers forum on avoiding romance scams,” fraudsters continue to successfully scam unsuspecting lonely hearts by using stolen credit cards to join online dating sites and set up fake profiles. From there, they quickly lure their victims off the dating sites and onto more personal lines of communications such as instant messaging and email before romance sites can discover the stolen credit card and pull their fake profiles. (more…)

Online retailers are losing on average 1.2% of their total revenue to online fraud. That’s according to a recent survey conducted by the Merchant Risk Council and reported in the article, “Fraud is costing online merchants 1.2% of revenue, survey finds.” Not surprising, the more automated fraud screening tools a company used, the lower their fraud rates were.

For large online merchants that used 7.9 fraud tools, fraud losses dropped to 0.9% of their revenue compared to the 4.7 average tools for all survey respondents. Reported fraud rates for international orders were also lower for large online retailers by a 1.4% to 2% margin, compared to all companies who participated in the survey. (more…)