Everything has a downside to it and one of the biggest downsides of online dating is becoming a victem of fake profiles. I really don’t understand why people feel the need to pretend to be something they aren’t but what makes me mad is when people who use fake profiles think they can get away with it. Don’t they know that sooner or later the conversations will have to go beyond e-mail or the telephone? Don’t they realize that once a person finds out they aren’t really who they say they are that the person won’t be able to trust them anymore? Well enough of my anger, let’s get on to how you can avoid falling for these malicious users.
The first type of fake profile isn’t really that bad, but it’s still a lie. Of course i’m talking about the profiles who use pictures from 5 – 10 years ago and try to pass themselves off as still looking that way. The first obvious sign of an aged photograph should be the quality of the picture, these days digital cameras are everywhere and even cheap cell phones are capable of taking higher quality pictures than most disposable cameras. If a picture looks grainy or has poor color quality than chances are it was taken before the year 2004 and you’re dealing with an old photo.
The second type is much worse, and it’s the profile that uses somebody else picture when they look nothing like that. I honestly don’t know how these people expect to get away with it but one thing you can do to avoid this one is to ask if they have more photos of themselves. Typically these fake profile users will go on another dating site or social networking site and just grab 3 or 4 photos of a random person and then try to pass themselves off as them, when you ask for more photos chances are they won’t have any because they won’t remember from which other profile they took them from. If somebody is hesitant to provide you with more photos than it should be a warning sign that they may not be who they say they are.