Pig Butchers and Other Issues
It's important that men and women who subscribe to an online dating site to read this. Especially retired men over sixty because they're the biggest target for scams such as Pig Butchering.
Criminals running Pig Butcher scams will like or heart someone on dating sites, on some sites the other person also has to like or heart that person back, on some the other person can send a text to anyone who likes or hearts them. That's when the scam begins.
People running pig butcher scams will then spend days to weeks getting their target to trust them, then they'll mention that they invest in crypto, they'll then convince their victim to invest but they get account information from their victim and will drain their savings accounts or other accounts the victim shares with them.
If you're still reading this, and are wondering how I know about this scheme, it's because I've been using Tinder since June 2026 to find a mate for a long term relationship and so far I've had four people try to scam me, three running the Pig Butcher scam and one trying to steal my Tinder account in order to give them another account to run their scams through.
Here's how the Pig Butcher scam works
A user of a dating site, such at Tinder searches Tinder for potential mates by creating filters concerning what they're looking for, they also enter data about themselves, including profile photos.
It's very likely that some of the potentials the man sends a Heart to is a scammer, who then also sends a Heart and now both people can text each other on the Tinder site.
They'll introduce themselves, maybe even send the man a few alluring photos, then two or three texts into the conversation will give the user either their Whatsapp ID or their Signal ID and ask the potential victim there because the scammer doesn't feel comfortable with texting on Tinder.
Whatsapp and Signal are popular with scammers because messages are sent encrypted end to end without being saved on a companies server. I haven't checked Whatsapp, but Signal users can wipe the texts from their computer.
After the scammer has you texting on a secure texting site they delete their Tinder account. Sometimes they'll ask their victim to do the same.
When texting with the scammer there are red flags. They may say to their potential victim where they live, and if you ask about something local to that area they tend not to answer that question. The last person who tried to scam me said she lived in San Francisco, I used to live in the San Francisco Bay area so I started asking about things and places I'd either seen or visited and ask that person if they were still there or if they had been to these places themselves, I got no answer to my questions.
In fact you'll quickly notice that you're the one holding up the conversation, the scammer barely talks about themselves other than their names and maybe what they'd eaten that day or what they do for a living. If you're over 60 keep an eye on the scammers age on their profile, in my case all four scammers who tried to scam me were between 30 and 39 years old. When you mention how much younger you are than them they're typically reply with things like "Age differences don't mean anything to me. Are you okay with our age difference?"
Some of these scammers are like soap opera stars, people who live well but never seem to go to work. Some of these scammers will text their potential victim a number of times a day when they should be working.
A patient scammer will lead a potential victim on for weeks, then they'll mention that they invest in crypto and usually say they learned all they know about buying and selling crypto from a close family member, usually their mom or grandmother.
An impatient scammer will likely tell you within two or three days that they invest in crypto. I had one scammer tell me she had three accounts each with $100,000 in them. This is a serious red flag, women that wealthy are very unlikely to subscribe to online dating sites.
Then, if the potential victim is still texting with the scammer the scammer will soon ask the potential scammer if they invest, and how much liquid assets they have in their trading account, and they'll also ask how much money they have in savings. This is when I tend to get ghosted.
I worked in IT in a school district and you don't get wealthy as an hourly employee in the IT department in a public school district. When I respond with how much money I have available in my trading account and savings account these people disappear.
The last person who ran this scam on me told me she invested in crypto, then asked me about my investments, which are very meager. I knew this was going to happen in less than five minutes when we started texting four days earlier. So I asked if she was running a Pig Butchering scam and at first she claimed she didn't know what that was, then she got angry that I would think she'd ever do anything like that and a few texts later she, who turned out to be he texted "How did you know?" He also wanted to know when I figured it out. Not wanting to give this person any help in his scamming success I said "I can't tell you that."
This post is getting long, but I need to mention another scam.
Tinder used to have a way to video chat with potential mates, but no longer does. If someone asks you if you want to video chat and a security code suddenly ends up in your email inbox, no matter what they say, do not post that security code to them, ever. You will lose control of your Tinder account and no matter what you do, you won't be able to stop that person from changing your profile photos and use your account to scam others. The only thing you can do is delete your account email Tinder support then create a new account. Never link your Google email account to Tinder. Tinder support will not help people who's accounts have been compromised.
It's estimated that Tinder is made up of about 70% men, so finding a mate there who's a woman takes a lot of patience. I've never been contacted by anyone but scammers. Also Tinder is the most popular dating site on the web with twice as many subscribers than their leading competitor. Also Tinder owns two more online dating sites.
I'd like to quickly discuss Ashley Madison. Ashley Madison is free for women to use and free for men to join, but very nearly everything a man wants to do to find a mate including sending likes, and texts. More than half the women on that site are actually bots asking men to view their profile, which costs coins. Since the wording on all those messages is identical I think Ashley Madison is behind it, but of course they'd never admit it. It takes no more than a day for Ashley Madison to pull $150 from their male subscribers, I canceled my account a day after I opened it. Also mor than 70% of their members are men, all of whom are being treated like piggy banks.
What to Remember
- If a person you match with on a dating site asks you within a few texts to meet them on a secure texting site, block them.
- If a person you match with ever asks you to tell them your security code, don't. Block them.
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