Use of technology has transformed how people establish relationships; however, as a byproduct of this transformation, dating sites and other online dating platforms have become the primary entry point for one of the fastest-growing forms of financial crime in the world: romance scams.
Based on aggregated reports from consumers, law enforcement, and large-scale forensics investigations, approximately 60% of all romance scams begin on dating platforms; although the financial loss actually occurs outside of the dating platform, the conditions for exploitation are established on the dating platform.
The Lionsgate Network studies show there are thousands of actual cases of romance scams, and the consistent theme across all case studies is that romance scams are not created by poor user decisions but rather systems built without any behavioral risk considerations, and also demonstrate through in-depth investigations and the use of a structured crypto scam recovery service, Lionsgate Network can identify the loss, follow the path of the scam, and hold the perpetrator accountable.
This article outlines the structural, technical, and ethical implementations that online dating platforms need to implement in order to decrease user harm in this ecosystem where love itself has become a weapon.
Romance Scams Are No Longer a Moderation Issue
The dating platforms treated scams as content issues for many years.
The examples of this include:
- Fake Photos
- Suspicious Biographies
- Keyword Filters
- User Reporting on a Reactive Basis
That way of thinking is obsolete!
The scams used in modern romance scam situations are successful because the scammer will not act like the “scammer” at first; they act just like an attentive, empathic, and emotionally present partner. By the time they engaged in the financial manipulation, there had been an established trust.
That means:
- Your safety can no longer be reliant on your profile review (prior to you dating someone).
- Your safety can no longer be reliant on user reporting after the harm is done.
- Your safety can no longer be reliant on your account being removed after the harm has been done.
Romance scams are a type of behavioral crime and must have a type of behavioral defense.
1. Dating Apps Must Shift to Behavioral Risk Detection
Why current systems fail
Scammers act a certain way on an online platform during the initial stages of operation. Generally, these actions do not violate the Terms of Service for a platform:
- They follow community standards/guidelines.
- They avoid using prohibited terms, and
- Most of the time, they will use images and bio content that appear authentic.
- They will take their time to create a rapport with potential victims.
As a result, traditional methods of moderation take between 8 and 12+ months before detecting scammers based on their normal method of operation.
Platform Feature Set:
Dating services need to adopt a behavior risk score system to evaluate users’ on-platform use/risk based on their behaviors rather than on message content (i.e.,
- Accelerated emotional development,
- Recurring conversation patterns between matches,
- Extremely high success rates for moving users off-platform,
- Reusing script content/account user accounts,
- Matching users’ temporal behavior patterns with verified scamming behaviors.
The above will be accomplished without reviewing private messages; only metadata, timing, frequency, and likeness of behaviors.
2. Platforms Must Intentionally Slow Down Trust Formation
Romance scams are effective as they shrink emotional timelines down into manageable chunks.
The hard truth.
To date, designers have been rewarded for creating products that promote:
- Quick matches
- Quick engagement
- Quick migration to non-application platforms
- These three design principles also benefit scammers.
What needs to change?
Dating apps should implement friction in a way to help users protect themselves.
Some examples of friction include:
- Gentle warnings to users when they try to migrate quickly to the off-app platform
- Subtle hints to users besides long-term relationships that occurred during emotional escalations
- Push notifications at reasonable and clear times, reminding the consumer that most financial scams start with emotional attachments.
Friction is not poor UX when it protects the user from danger.
Speed advantage for scammers, deliberation advantage for consumers.
3. Off-Platform Migration Must Be Treated as a Risk Signal
For most romance fraud cases, a scammer will only begin to financially manipulate their victim once they’ve transitioned their communication to a private messaging app like WhatsApp, Telegram, or SMS to communicate.
Current platform view
Off-platform migration is viewed as either neutral or inevitable.
Why it’s dangerous
For the scammer, off-platform migration will not have
- No moderation
- No visibility
- No friction
- No intervention
What dating apps should do
- Track the time it takes for users to migrate off-platform.
- Identify the accounts that consistently migrate users off-platform early.
- Warn users prior to migrating them off-platform instead of after they have lost money.
This is NOT surveillance.
This is risk disclosure.
4. Dating Apps Must Address the Financial Dimension Directly
Many platforms avoid discussing money to stay “romantic” or “light.”
This silence has consequences.
Reality check
Romance scams are financial crimes.
Avoiding the topic does not protect users it protects criminals.
What effective financial safety looks like
Dating apps should implement:
- Neutral financial-safety prompts
- Contextual warnings when “investing,” “trading,” or “profits” enter conversations
- Mandatory friction before external financial links are shared
These do not accuse users or matches they inform at the moment of risk.
5. Safety Must Be Measured by Harm Prevented, Not Accounts Removed
Most platforms evaluate safety using metrics like:
- Accounts banned
- Reports resolved
- Content removed
These metrics measure reaction, not protection.
Better safety KPIs include:
- Time-to-first user warning
- Reduction in rapid off-platform migration
- Decrease in high-risk behavioral patterns
- User engagement with safety prompts
- Reduction in financial harm reports per active user
The only meaningful success metric is harm avoided.
6. Reporting Systems Must Match Victim Psychology
Victims of romance scams often delay reporting because:
- They feel embarrassed
- They fear being wrong
- They are emotionally attached
- They worry about judgment
Traditional reporting tools are poorly designed for this reality.
What must change
Reporting flows should:
- Use non-accusatory language
- Offer options like “I’m unsure” or “Something feels off”
- Encourage early, low-commitment reporting
- Avoid framing reports as accusations
Early signal saves users and platforms.
7. Dating Apps Must Share Intelligence Across Platforms
Scammers aren’t limited to using only one application and instead will work across different systems.
What is wrong today?
Every system is fighting its own type of fraud and does not share information with other systems, while fraudsters will:
- Share scripts between different systems.
- Change the account they use.
- Use weaknesses in the system to move from one platform to another.
What collaboration is required?
- Anonymous behavioral identifiers
- Common identifiers of scam activity
- Early warning signs across platforms
- Safety standards for the industry
Fraudsters may work as a team.
The defense systems need to do the same thing.
8. Seasonal Risk Must Be Acknowledged Publicly
Indicators of Romance Scams Grow in Cycles:
- Valentine’s Day
- Holidays
- Major social occasions.
What Should Platforms Do?
- Publish Transparency Reports;
- Recognize that there are seasonal increases in risks; and,
- Proactively warn users of risks during seasonal periods.
Users have an assumption of safety from platforms; honesty builds trust; silence destroys trust.
9. Platforms Must Invest in External Expertise
Dating apps are not fraud investigators and they shouldn’t pretend to be.
Romance scams sit at the intersection of:
- Psychology
- Financial crime
- Social engineering
- Technology
Effective platforms partner with:
- Behavioral analysts
- Financial-crime researchers
- Cybercrime specialists
- Blockchain forensic experts
This is a multidisciplinary problem requiring multidisciplinary solutions.
10. Regulation Is Coming Platforms Can Lead or React
Globally, regulators are beginning to ask:
- What duty of care do platforms owe users?
- When does negligence become liability?
- How should financial harm be addressed?
Dating apps that proactively implement meaningful protections will:
- Reduce regulatory risk
- Build long-term user trust
- Strengthen brand credibility
Those that don’t will eventually be forced to react.
The Core Insight Dating Apps Must Accept
Romance scams succeed because:
- They exploit human behavior
- They move faster than moderation
- They weaponize trust
Dating apps do not need to become law enforcement.
They need to become risk-aware environments.
Final Takeaway
The safety model used by online dating is not keeping up with the increasing dangers associated with dating online, and it continues to generate new victims every single day because dating platforms are doing the following things:
- They are still focused on profiles and not on detecting patterns.
- They are treating off-platform migration as a neutral event.
- They are avoiding the financial risk.
If any of the above three issues are not corrected, dating platforms will continue to create new victims every day.
For users to be protected, one very difficult truth must be accepted: love is now an attack surface, and platforms must therefore treat and defend it as such. This truth is further validated through the work of Lionsgate Network, where legitimate investigations are illustrating how emotional trust is being used as a weapon by a large number of people. Additionally, Lionsgate Network provides professional crypto recovery assistance for those who have been defrauded via a crypto scam and also provides structured assistance for those wanting to get their losses back from a crypto scam.
