Each year, more and more people are turning to the Internet to find romance. At the same time, cyber-criminals continue to seek opportunities to exploit the vulnerability of singles on a global scale. Security is a major challenge for internet dating sites, which can attract scammers, spammers, stalkers and predators, not to mention fraudsters there to mine other members' identities.
In order to keep fraudsters out, romance sites must deploy effective solutions that look at information independent of what is supplied by users. A device fingerprinting solution such as iovation ReputationManager provides unique insight into the computers being used to create multiple accounts and exposes hidden device-account relationships that identity-based fraud solutions often miss.
w h i t e P a p e r
online dating:
Keeping Your Members Safe from
Online Scams and Predators
A White Paper by iovationOverview
Each year, more and more people are turning to the Internet to find romance. At the same time, cyber-criminals continue to seek opportunities to exploit the vulnerability of singles on a global scale. Security is a major challenge for internet dating sites, which can attract scammers, spammers, stalkers and predators, not to mention fraudsters there to mine other members' identities.
For dating sites to succeed, they must maintain a high-quality prospect pool in order to retain their members. And if they do provide a satisfying environment, chances are high that some members will purchase premium services in the future. To keep the quality of their prospect pool high, they must find ways to prevent and detect fraudsters, and block them from future attempts. These unwanted members on dating sites range from misbehaving users to large and organized fraud groups. They spam members, run romance scams to obtain funds from members, phish for identity information, engage in cyberbullying and even predatory behavior.
In order to keep fraudsters out, romance sites must deploy effective solutions that look at information independent of what is supplied by users. A device fingerprinting solution such as iovation ReputationManagerT provides unique insight into the computers being used to create multiple accounts and exposes hidden device-account relationships that identity-based fraud solutions often miss.
Device fingerprinting helps identify the bad guys so online dating sites can eliminate their accounts from the network once and for all. Working in conjunction with exist-ing fraud detection techniques, a device fingerprinting solution provides Internet dating sites with a comprehensive solution for closing the door on repeat offenders. This white paper will help you understand what new and innovative techniques can be used to protect the reputation of your business, keep your members in a safe and trusted environment, while keeping the fraudsters out.
Online Dating: Keeping your members safe from online scams and predators page 2Organized Fraud Targeting Members: Online Dating's Greatest Threat
Online dating sites attracted more than 22 million people looking for love in 2008. According to Forrester Research, that number was a 10% increase over 2007. As more people turn to the Internet to find romance, cyber criminals seek out opportunities to exploit the vulnerability of singles on a global scale.
Today's organized criminals pose a greater threat to online dating sites and their members than ever before. They use the Internet as a conduit for mining, buying and selling people's personal information such as their name, address, social security number and credit card details.
Within online communities, fraudsters work together to perpetrate a number of illegal and abusive activities.These can include financial fraud, romance scams, phishing and email spam, account takeover, chat abuse, cyber bullying and predatory behavior. While online dating sites use various techniques to detect suspicious accounts, Internet-savvy criminals attempt to mask their true identity by changing account information to circumvent conventional methods, such as IP address and geo-location verification, in-house country block lists, manual photo reviews, profile analysis and other backend administrative tools (see Figure 1).
Separate ID Queries Customized Backend Admin Tools Registration/Profile Analysis Manual Photo Reviews IP Address / Geo-location Verification Country Block Lists
Figure 1: With more personal information accessible over the Internet, fraudsters are getting better at defeating conventional methods of fraud detection.
Fraudsters are not necessarily out to defraud online dating businesses. Their goal is to take advantage of the existing platform and scam the members of the community. While the National Consumers League reports the average loss for an online dater is more than $3,000 per scam, Internet dating sites also suffer from a multitude of setbacks including loss of members' trust and satisfaction, tarnished reputation, possible government intervention and ultimately hindered business growth.
Online Dating: Keeping your members safe from online scams and predators page 3Stop The Revol... [download for more]
