Dr Shepherd said online scammers often claim to be in a location where meeting face-to-face or even a live video call are not possible.
“Oil rigs is one of the common ones – in the military on base, a doctor overseas – and then typically they build up that relationship and then say ‘there has been an emergency, I need some money for travel’.”
Nikki said she sent around £17,000 in total to the scammers.
Her bank and PayPal have been able to get around £7,000 of that money back, but she was persuaded by the scammers to send some of the money as personal payments – through the friends and family function on PayPal. This has not been recovered.
PayPal said they do not cover personal payments under PayPal Buyer Protection.
In a statement a spokesman added said: “We’re very sorry to hear this has happened to Ms MacLeod. Authorised Push Payment (APP) fraud, which includes romance scams, is a threat that has grown across the industry.”
He urged PayPal users to be wary of “unusual payment requests” and added “always question uninvited approaches in case it’s a scam.”
On their website, Steam warn of increasing reports of scammers coercing victims to purchase Steam wallet gift cards. The company said people should never give out a steam wallet gift card to a person they do not know.”
Police Scotland said an investigation is under way after the fraud was reported in October and inquiries are ongoing.
A spokeswoman added: “We would ask people to be vigilant and encourage anyone who believes they may have been victim to fraud or a scam to contact police on 101.”
Nikki told us the scammers are continuing to contact her, most recently sending her a newspaper article, claiming Alla Morgan is now in a Turkish jail and needs more money.
She wants others to learn from her experience.
“These scammers don’t have any empathy at all. It’s their job and they are very good at it,” she said.
“The documents looked real, the videos looked real, the bank looked real.
“With the introduction of artificial intelligence, every single thing can be fake.”
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