EXCLUSIVE: Sometimes the love you find on dating websites really is too good to be true, with platforms like Hinge and Feeld seeing an alarming uptick of fake AI bots posing as attractive women
Brits looking for love are falling for AI bots posing as potential suitors on dating websites. Picture the scene – you’ve just matched with ‘Jenny’, 28, on Hinge. On the surface she looks like a beautiful woman who’s into interesting art and environmental stuff.
You can’t believe your luck. Perhaps you even map out a potential date idea at your local pub. But then…upon closer inspection of ‘Jenny’s’ Hinge profile you realise things aren’t quite what they seem. The flowing hair, symmetrical face and super-model physique are a bit “too good to be true” – almost not human.
This scenario – which befell Daily Star journalist and author of this piece, Tom McGhie, last month – is becoming increasingly familiar on dating apps like Hinge and Feeld.
After the bombshell realisation that ‘Jenny’ might be artificially generated, we used legitimate AI detection tools to work out if the profile was real or not. “This image is AI,” read the prognosis from several websites.
It was over. All the yearning I’d done for ‘Jenny’ over the preceding three hours suddenly evaporated. My heart turned to a shard of ice and shattered on my kitchen floor. How foolish I’d been to fall for a bot.
Dating expert Nichi Hodgson said AI bots on dating websites were “going to be an increasing issue for users”. On ‘Jenny’ she said: “Well done for trusting your gut! She’s just too perfect.”
I wondered how many other men out there shared my experience. It turned out I wasn’t alone.
Security experts Norton told Daily Star “nearly a third of UK online daters have been targeted by a dating scam” with “nine in ten victims” losing money.
Preying on lonely men – and women – looking for love, these ‘attractive’ bots strike up a conversation before “sending links or files to install malware or take over accounts”.
And even though something might seem awry, Norton’s experts said “over a third of us would go through with it” because we wouldn’t want to turn down an offer of potential romance.
I hastily unmatched with ‘Jenny’ before starting a conversation which would inevitably lead to me paying through the nose for some made up cause.
Luis Corrons, Security Evangelist, Norton, told us: “Dating apps connect people who don’t know each other, so scammers see them as an easy place to find victims. AI has made fake profiles much quicker and cheaper to create. In the past, a scammer would usually steal photos from a real person’s social media.
“Romance fraud is often run by organised criminal groups rather than individuals, with Southeast Asia, particularly Cambodia, Myanmar and Laos, a major hub for large-scale scam centres.
“These groups are well organised, with different people responsible for creating profiles, messaging victims and moving money.”
Sorry ‘Jenny’ – I know you might have been the one.
But I think it just wouldn’t have worked out, you being a bot, and all.
Hinge did not reply to a request for comment.