In search of cupid, men conned in crores

CHENNAI: Developed in organised crime group/gangs of Asia, it initially targeted individuals in China, moved to the US and now, in India Official training with procedure manuals is used to execute scams Conmen are human trafficking victims who are forced to perpetuate this scam for money or other financial gains

Anew kind of ‘dating app horror story’ is doing the rounds in Tamil Nadu, the kind that would rarely be found on Reddit or social media discussions. The ones in which those who swiped right end up losing crores to cyber fraudsters. In the last three months, the state cybercrime headquarters have received complaints from a bank official, an IT worker, a NRI- all losing crores of rupees to cyber fraudsters, whom they met through dating apps.

Police said that fraudsters had siphoned off Rs 8 crore from these 3 men alone and suspected that there were several more who have lost a lot of money but haven’t yet come forward.

While romance frauds through dating apps have been around for years, in these cases, financial losses are in crores, as scamsters lure the men into investment scams, which in the cyber fraud industry, is a separate vertical.

Across the world, this hybrid cyber scam model of romance-investment scam is on the rise and is called ‘pig butchering’, which has origins in China, according to law enforcement agencies from across the world. The crude terminology was named by scammers themselves after the Chinese term ‘sha Zhu pan’ (to fatten a pig before slaughter).

“In romance and matrimonial scams, victims lose a few lakhs before they realise they were conned. On the other hand, those who lose crores to cyber fraudsters usually click on links they see on social media promising high returns on investments and get trapped by fraudsters,” a police official said.

Crypto trading

Chennai resident Manohar (name changed) who works in a nationalised bank was one of the victims of ‘pig butchering’; he had lost over Rs 4.5 crore. In February this year, the 55-year-old had downloaded a dating app, Lovely, and became friends with a ‘woman’, who claimed to be from London. They exchanged phone numbers and began chatting on WhatsApp.

“The messages come from a number with London’s calling code, which lead the men tend to believe they are talking to a real woman. Often, scamsters operate from compounds in Southeast Asia,” said a senior police officer. “After a week of talking everyday, exchanging pleasantries, conversations about everything, ranging from weather to the man’s area of interest, scamsters slowly gain his confidence.”

In Manohar’s case, after a week of conversation, the woman claimed that the photos and name in the dating profile were fake as a precaution and claimed that her real name was something else and shared another set of photographs. Ironically, this move convinced Manohar and the scamster gained his confidence.

The two then spoke about the paths they travelled so far and the scamster spun a sob story that she had lost both her parents and was living with her ‘uncle’. Manohar was drawn into this web of deceit and after a week of WhatsApp chatting, she gradually introduced him to her ‘uncle’, saying he was a cryptocurrency trading mentor and suggested that Manohar take his advice to grow his funds exponentially.

The ‘uncle’ made Manohar register in a crypto trading company, Coinexx, and persuaded him to invest. To convince him that the platform was genuine, the scamsters made him invest a small amount and made him withdraw the profits.

In Manohar’s case, he was made to sign a trading agreement stating that every participant had to complete a certain number of trading sessions and the 15 % of the profit earned in each session to be paid as commission. At the end of the sessions, his trading account reflected assets worth over $1.1 million (Rs 10.5 crore).

Manohar also paid the agreed upon commission after which his ordeal began. When he was unable to withdraw his profits, he was told that his account was locked due to violation of trading rules and was demanded over Rs 2.6 crore to unlock the account.

This was in the first week of March; in the next 3 months, Manohar withdrew his savings, borrowed money from relatives, pledged his properties to pay the fraudsters, as per his complaint. He believed that his profits would compensate for his losses.

By the end of June though, the communication stopped and the trading website became inaccessible

TN Police has been appealing to recent graduates to be wary of agents promising jobs in southeast Asia as instances of gullible youth being engaged in cyber slavery to defraud their own citizens have been reported after which Manohar realised he was cheated. He registered a complaint with the National Cybercrime Reporting Portal (NCRP) after contacting the helpline (1930).

Ethereum, Forex

Like Manohar, a 51-year-old divorcee, Prasanna (name changed), a manager at an IT firm in Chennai, too lost about Rs 1.85 crore to such fraudsters. “They exploited my vulnerability as a divorcee,” the complainant stated. In November 2025, he had befriended a woman on Facebook, who portrayed herself as caring and emotionally supportive.

After he lowered his guard, the scamsters went for the jugular by luring him into Ethereum Trading (ETH). Ethereum is said to be the second-largest cryptocurrency by market value after Bitcoin. The usual ordeal of showing initial profits followed and over time, the IT executive ended up investing Rs 1.85 crore – his savings and loan from his family and friends and even withdrew his PF (provident fund). In July, he filed a complaint with the NCRP.

In another case, a Coimbatore-based NRI (non-resident Indian), lost Rs 1.6 crore to fraudsters who deployed the same modus operandi. In March this year, the 40-year-old man was connected with two women through ‘OkCupid’ dating app and they shifted conversations to Telegram.

After a week of conversations about daily life, work, family, future plans, current affairs, the women had gradually discussed forex trading with him and lured him to forex trading. One of the ‘women’ shared screenshots showing significant profits she earned through forex trading.

According to his complaint, she had cited the heightened market volatility due to geopolitical tensions involving USA and Iran and advised him that it was the ideal time to invest. Over the course of 2 months, the NRI ended up transferring Rs 1.6 crore to the accounts guided by the women. He realised the con only when he was asked to pay Rs 50 lakh while trying to withdraw his profits. After this, he registered a complaint with NCRP in August.

A senior police officer said that scamsters do not target high net-worth individuals in particular but they cast a wider net. According to available data, between January 2023 to February 2024, money taken out of India amounts to Rs 10,188 crore, a statement from TN police said, citing the Ministry of Home Affairs’s I4C (Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre) report.

“If someone you met online yesterday is giving you investment advice today, they aren’t investing in you. You’re the investment,” the official said.

Who are these scamsters?

Scamsters mostly operate from compounds in the golden triangle region – Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia – as per TN Police.

In March 2025, TN Police’s Cyber Crime wing arrested four men, including a duo working directly for a Cambodian handler, for cheating a mill owner from Theni of Rs 88.6 lakh. The fraudsters got in touch with the victim through a fake matrimony profile, police said.

The special team went on a digital trail and found that the bank accounts were in the name of two women who are daily wage labourers and were paid a commission of Rs 2,000 by one of the accused, C Nandagopal (30) of Erode, for opening the bank accounts. Nandagopal had handed over the accounts to R Yuvarajan (33) of Erode and S Padmanaban (32) of Coimbatore who had direct contact with the Cambodian accused via Telegram, police investigations revealed.

In some cases, perpetrators are victims of human trafficking themselves. TN Police has been repeatedly appealing to recent graduates and job aspirants to be wary of agents promising jobs in southeast Asian countries, as instances of gullible youth being engaged in cyber slavery to defraud their own citizens through online scams has seen a rise in the last few years. Through ads in social media, unemployed youth with knowledge of computers and English are recruited through illegal manpower agencies. Those selected are taken on tourist visas to Thailand, Laos and Cambodia and detained in wire-fenced compounds.

“They are forced to commit cyber frauds related to Fedex, investment, lending apps, matrimony, etc. Their passports are confiscated, and they are subjected to physical abuse, torture and electric shocks if they refused to work. Ransom was demanded to release the victims to their own country,” an official release from Tamil Nadu Police stated.

Gift scam: High cost women pay online for love

Romance frauds, as they are commonly known, is a cottage industry where gullible men and women are targeted by organised cyber cons and at times, by lone-wolf operators.

The basis is emotional manipulation wherein swindlers play an elaborate con on the victims after acquainting with them through social media and matrimony websites and usurp money from them. The con can last a few days to months until the victims realise that they are being swindled and question their ‘lover’ only to be blindsided.

As recently as last week, the West Zone cyber crime wing of Chennai Police arrested a 33-yearold man who had posed as a woman, a trainee Indian Revenue Service (IRS) officer in a matrimonial website, and cheated a city based architect of over Rs 9.5 lakh. In 2023, a Chennai court sentenced two Nigerian nationals to 5 years jail for cheating a city woman of Rs 4.5 lakh. Police found that they had posed as a doctor from The Netherlands in a matrimonial website to swindle the money.

The city police had submitted in court that the duo were behind at least 6 similar cases in the city, of cheating by impersonation through social media, but could not substantiate their claims.

In February 2024, the city police arrested two more Nigerians – Augustine Maduabuchi (29) and

Chinedu Onyeaobi (36) – for cheating a city businesswoman of around Rs 3 crore using the same modus operandi.

The woman, who is into the pharma business, had registered her profile on a matrimonial website and got matched with a person named Alexander Sanchez in mid-2023. Shortly after they started talking on WhatsApp, Sanchez proposed marriage and promised to meet her in Chennai and told her that he had sent valuable gifts to her Chennai home.

The woman had then received a call from someone claiming to be

After acquainting with the women on social media or matrimonial sites, they would exchange phone numbers. The numbers they converse with will have an ISD code, which made the victims believe that they were actually receiving a call from a foreign nation

a ‘Customs officer’ from New Delhi, who demanded money to release the gift parcel. The woman ended up paying Rs 2.87 crore to various bank accounts as told by the fraudster and only after two months she realised that she was being taken for a ride when she could not reach ‘Sanchez’ either.

A common pattern in those cases was that the fraudsters who approached these women claimed to be from abroad. After acquainting with the women through social media or matrimonial sites, they would exchange phone numbers and the numbers they converse with will have an ISD code, which made the victims believe that they were actually receiving a call from a foreign nation.

The conmen would tell them that they have sent them gifts. “Victims then get a phone call from a person claiming to be from the Customs department at any of the major airports and the ‘official’ would tell them that they have to pay duty to receive the gift,” a police officer said.

In one of the cases, a 22-year-old woman ended up paying Rs 11 lakh. Since she was fresh out of college and recently joined work,

she drained the money from her mother’s bank account. The conman in this case claimed to be a marine engineer from Birmingham and got in touch with the victim through Instagram.

The victim fell for the gift trap. He sent a video of the gift parcel he had sent her. “He told me he had bought some gifts for me and as a friend I have to accept it. Then he sent the courier tracking link and number. A video from the gift box showed handbags, iPhone 11 Pro Max, watches and other valuable jewellery,” according to her complaint in 2021.