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You Could Be Flirting On Dating Apps With Paid Impersonators (qz.com) 193

Posted by BeauHD from the digital-deceoption dept.
Chloe Rose Stuart-Ulin sheds some light on the world of paid impersonators on dating apps like Tinder. Here's an excerpt from the report: Every morning I wake up to the same routine. I log into the Tinder account of a 45-year-old man from Texas -- a client. I flirt with every woman in his queue for 10 minutes, sending their photos and locations to a central database of potential "Opportunities." For every phone number I get, I make $1.75. I'm what's called a "Closer" for the online-dating service ViDA (Virtual Dating Assistants). Men and women (though mostly men) from all over the world pay this company to outsource the labor and tedium of online dating. The matches I speak to on behalf of the Texan man and other clients have no idea they're chatting with a professional.

It shouldn't come as a surprise that these ghostwriting services exist. Tinder alone produces more than 12 million matches a day, and if you're a heterosexual American, you now have a one in three chance of meeting your future husband or wife online. But as e-romance hits an all-time high, our daily dose of rejection, harassment, and heartbreak creeps upward, too. Once you mix in the vague rules of netiquette and a healthy fear of catfishing scams, it's easy to see why someone might want to outsource their online-dating profile to a pro, if only to keep themselves sane. But where does the digital social assistant end and the con artist begin?
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You Could Be Flirting On Dating Apps With Paid Impersonators More

You Could Be Flirting On Dating Apps With Paid Impersonators

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  • Weird (Score:5, Informative)

    by war4peace ( 1628283 ) on Saturday April 28, 2018 @03:28AM (#56518137)

    I did this once, non-professionally, when a couple American friends came to visit me last year. One of them gave me his phone and asked me to help him talk to Romanian women on Tinder. While that didn't lead to getting his dick wet (due to lack of time, they only spent 3 days at the seaside), it was fun to talk to them as him and realize how much locals change their attitude and willingness to talk and meet if the person on the other end is an American.

    Eventually he got his dick wet through means of a professional :) but that's offtopic.

    • Re: Weird (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward

      'Got his dick wet by a professional'? Does that mean a waiter spilled his drink on his lap?

  • On colleague of mine showed me some talks with chat bots on Tinder. It was interesting to see they can fool you through the first stages of the conversation. However, at some stage you notice something is off. At that point my colleague started foul mouthing, something that the bots do not usually respond properly. It was a fun read.

  • Every once in a while (Score:5, Insightful)

    by 93 Escort Wagon ( 326346 ) on Saturday April 28, 2018 @05:08AM (#56518289)

    I run across a story that makes me glad I’m an old guy... and this is one of them. I don’t know how you young’uns navigate these waters. I had a hard enough time just asking my now-wife out, way back in the day - and that was before all these peripheral complications existed.

    Oh Brave New World, that has such people in it!

    • Well, I'm an older guy too, and totally agree with you (for once).
      After my divorce some 15 years back I put myself on the market the only way I knew worked for me - I hit the beaches, the bars and social events.
      Been happily re-married now with a kind, smart, funny and really beautiful lady.
      We did not meet on-line, but in a jazz-dancing class.

      I don't believe in this online dating crap; get out from behind the screens, girls and boys, and hit the floor. Learn to dance, you'll love it. Top tip - people tend

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by zifn4b ( 1040588 )

        I don't believe in this online dating crap; get out from behind the screens, girls and boys, and hit the floor. Learn to dance, you'll love it.

        I guess you haven't heard of the latest new dance craze? It's called the touch screen finger tap boogie. All the cool kids are doing it.

      • Re:Every once in a while (Score:4, Funny)

        by arth1 ( 260657 ) on Saturday April 28, 2018 @10:00AM (#56518879) Homepage Journal

        Learn to dance, you'll love it. Top tip - people tend to make love the way they dance....

        Wot, you think I make love with bells on my legs wielding a stick and handkerchief?

      • Well, I'm an older guy too, and totally agree with you (for once).

        If we (all) were in agreement on everything all the time, it would be pretty boring - even though the disagreements can sometimes be maddening.

        But I’m glad to hear we found something we agree on!

      • If you go to a bar you are going to meet people that like to drink and hang out in bars. I have zero interest in doing either.

        If I go on-line, and filter for "technical/scientific/engineering" in the "profession" field, I can see pages and pages of nerdy women. Just to be sure, I ask for a code sample before the first meet-up.

    • I run across a story that makes me glad I’m an old guy... and this is one of them. I don’t know how you young’uns navigate these waters. I had a hard enough time just asking my now-wife out, way back in the day - and that was before all these peripheral complications existed.

      Oh Brave New World, that has such people in it!

      Same here.

      My wife and I still laugh about the humorous "list" of requirements she passed around to her friends, when she asked them to steer someone her way.

      These days, some fool would claim they had algorithms to actually try to fulfill the list ...

    • Can I get in on this?

      *Ahem* Back in my day, most people met through mutual friends/acquaintances. Somebody knew somebody that was just "perfect" for you and you dated and dated until something clicked. At least that's one version.

      These days, alas, if I were young single and lookin', I'd just write a Python script to automate the whole thing until I ended up finding a real live girl. I know. Romantic.

    • Lol, same here. Yes, I'm an old guy, happily married, and I shudder at the thought of going back into the dating pool these days. I'd fuckin' hate it and I'd probably just not participate.

      Dating seems much, much shallower and more commoditized now, but that may just be my perspective.

      The enormous expansion in potential mates brought about by apps like Tinder, Hinge, Bumble, etc has actually worked against the people that use them- they're buried in way, way too many choices.

      The mechanics of using the app wi

  • Chloe should be named Roxanne then.

  • I think this has been going on for many years. This can't possibly be new news as I am sure there have been paid impersonators for match.com and others.

    • Professional matchmakers have always existed for the wealthy. To me, the news is that these services are moving downmarket. Dating apps make it easy to automate much of the time that used to go into building (real life) social networks, keeping in touch with a stable of clients or opportunities from both sides, etc. Now it's just one dude with mad texting skills taking on ten clients in an hour. The price point has dramatically changed.

  • Being single has always sucked. Being single in the internet age sucks even more than ever. Whenever I hear stories like this, I remember how happy I am to have gotten married before all this crap.

  • Nothing new here - was same on French "Minitel" (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Bearhouse ( 1034238 ) on Saturday April 28, 2018 @07:40AM (#56518525)

    I once visited a potential software agent in France. They had a good accounting suite for IBM S/36 at the time, but I could not figure out how they had such an impressive office complex based on their small customer base.

    So, I got the technical manager sauced-up one evening and its turns out the basement was full of "Minitel rose" (pink, i.e. pron) servers. This was the 1980s, and it seems that online "Johns" were spending hours - and hundreds of bucks - every month hammering away on a tiny keyboard and getting all steamed-up over scrolling black and white horny text on an equally small screen. Rather sad.

    The joke was, the "best" online "sexters" were.....men! Easy money, working from home. Kinda like Chinese theatre I guess - women's roles are traditionally played by men, since "only a man knows how a woman is supposed to react". Equally sad.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]

    http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/c... [chinadaily.com.cn]

  • Why don't profiles on dating apps have user reviews like restaurants on Yelp or similar? It really would be helpful. Things like [ 40 lbs more than her picture ], or [ put's out on first date ] would be great to know. I really would like to know why this feature is missing?

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tomhath ( 637240 )
      On the internet, the women are men and the children are FBI agents.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mentil ( 1748130 )

      Because people with undesirable reviews would delete/abandon their account and make another. Or jump to another dating site/app, if they're unable to do that. Also, someone with many reviews would be implied to date lots of people, therefore one's chances of something long-term are lower than with someone who only has a few.
      Also, the reviews would be filled with endless drama/bitching/doxxing/overly personal stuff/creeper posts and it'd be impossible to moderate. At best you'd get some kind of star rating i

  • I am shocked, shocked that there might be deception on online dating sites!!

    {your duped user winnings sir}

    Thank you.

  • I just closed all my dating accounts (Score:5, Informative)

    by slaker ( 53818 ) on Saturday April 28, 2018 @09:14AM (#56518733)

    I had a Match.com account for 21 years. I paid for it for about 10 years of that. I'd go to cancel and magically someone would start messaging me. Nothing ever came of it. I joined OKCupid and Plenty of Fish within a year of their launch and, by last February, I was to some degree active on 10 dating services.

    I've read books about how to game the systems. I've paid photographers and tried to get feedback on my dating profiles from tens of friends, acquaintances and even total strangers. I tried all manner of strategies in making first impressions, created multiple profiles and basically I've spent two or three hours a day trying to meet someone for over two decades.

    I'm not messaging models. I'm not holding anyone to any ridiculous standard; my sole filtering is that my partner be childless (which, admittedly, is much more difficult as I am now a person in my forties). But across platforms and years of effort, I might get a reply to one out of approximately 300 messages sent on a dating site. One out of ten of THOSE might lead to an ongoing conversation.

    I've been on seven dates in my entire life.

    And before anyone says that I need to work on myself: I have over the last 20 years gone from an obese BMI to a healthy one. I do work out and dress like an adult. I have solid academic achievements, a good job and a life-long interest in fine arts. I can carry a conversation. I'm not terribly attractive but I'm also not ugly. Fundamentally, I would call myself unremarkable but certainly not unacceptable.

    I did finally outsource Tinder, Bumble and Coffee Meets Bagel to a sympathetic friend, albeit mostly because I refuse to agree to Facebook's terms of service. I paid for her to get a new phone in exchange for her work on my behalf. It didn't help. No better luck was had.

    I cannot think of an activity less rewarding. Dating sites seem to be actively hostile to almost everyone who uses them. Women are barraged with harassment. Ordinary guys might as not even exist. No one is happy with the state of affairs, but I'm not a person who is going to do well in a bar or other traditional meeting-space and I already teach adult education, I don't see what other choice might be available. I have a great deal of free time now that I don't spend time on dating sites. I get a lot more reading done, but I also have a lot more anxiety at the parts of life that I have failed to experience. There doesn't seem to be a way out of this particular loop. I wish I could have those many thousands of hours and all of the hope of my life back.

    • This and similar stories make it sound like there is a real market for a breakthrough dating app that actually works at matching people. Its hard - but maybe no harder than self-driving cars and computers that teach themselves to play go.

      Maybe humans are getting involved too early in the process. Really - people can be extremely shallow and pick partners based on the wrong sort of things.

      Some sort of multi-person optimization might work - it doesn't just try to match individuals but looks at entire sets of

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by slaker ( 53818 )

        I thought very highly of the OKCupid approach, when it was run by its creators. I thought they were on to something with the data-driven tools and matching. I believe most of its user base ignores all or most of that in favor of simple profile creation and chat, but to the extent that someone has put data science forward to address compatibility, I think OKC did.

        I'm also fairly convinced that humans don't actually know what they want or, in my case, lack the experience to properly say. It may be that nothin

    • One of the fundamental problems with dating sites is that it is not financially good for them if you find someone. That is a lost customer. Their highest revenue will be when you don't find someone serious, but it still looks like you have a chance. That is how you stay a customer the longest.

      If they display ads it is also important to get as many page views as possible. There are many ways that dating sites could be improved, but most of them would involve creating less activity, i.e. less income from ads.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by slaker ( 53818 )

        I've also come to this conclusion, but as far as I know there's nothing to be done about it. The only online alternative (was?) Craigslist, which was also a wonderful way to get dick pics and had approximately the same sketchy vibe as writing your phone number on wall of a public toilet.

        I really don't think online is the right way to meet people. Maybe it works for attractive people in urban areas. Maybe it works for someone who ONLY wants to get laid. But dating apps seem to encourage the worst behavior fr

    • I've read books about how to game the systems. I've paid photographers and tried to get feedback on my dating profiles from [...] total strangers. I tried all manner of strategies in making first impressions, created multiple profiles [...] Ordinary guys might as not even exist. ... I also have a lot more anxiety at the parts of life that I have failed to experience. ... I wish I could have those many thousands of hours and all of the hope of my life back.

      Well that's not creepy. That's not creepy at all. That doesn't sound the least bit creepy and there's not one bit of creepy vibe here that a woman would pick up on. My friend, this is the kind of neckbeard/nice guy talk that makes woman of quality run the other direction. If this is any indicator of how you communicated in the online dating sphere, you have nothing more to do than read what you've written here to understand what the problem is. Luckily there are a lot of ways to fix it, but believing it ha

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by slaker ( 53818 )

        For what it's worth, I was trying things recommended by dating coaches and recommendations of experts of various sorts with regard to online dating. With over two decades of working at it, I wanted to demonstrate that I had put time in to trying to make the services work. I've never been the guy who just writes "Sup?" and expects a response.

        As for the content of what I would write, on services where there's a profile to read (e.g. OKCupid), I'd most likely read what's available and formulate about three sen

  • It seems that lots of these services don't actually have very many women online. So they create fake profiles, and - no proof, just suspicion - probably pay other professionals to keep those profiles active: to chat with guys and give them false hope they might actually be speaking with an actual woman. Given the huge number of fake profiles, it is understandable when the guys to pay another professional to weed out all the fake profiles. Of course, it's a shame for the real people out there, whose time is

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by arth1 ( 260657 )

      Alternatively, one could try to meet women in the physical world. What a concept...

      Scary. Give me Solaria.

  • Cyrano something.
    Cyrano...de Bergerac.
    Yeah, that's guy.

  • And what happens when a paid flirter interacts with other paid flirters? Can an entire relationship be developed by paid proxies?

    • Can an entire relationship be developed by paid proxies?

      Yes, they'll exchange phone numbers very rapidly, stop talking, and consider it a wonderful relationship.

      Relationships have stages, and this only exists at the pre-phone-number phase.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mentil ( 1748130 )

      And thus we come full circle to Blind Dating.

  • Timeshare arrangements (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday April 28, 2018 @11:03AM (#56519125)

    I'm a high class escort in the UK and have used dating sites to find love in my personal life but buy and large most dating sites are full of men looking for a free fuck or men I wouldn't look twice at.

    The way I view this is simple.You could spend hundreds or even thousands chasing love online via an agency or pay a defined amount for the GFE (Girlfriend Experience) I offer. Like, imagine me as a timeshare girlfriend. I always wear decent makeup and something nice with style and taste. Sex is not an issue. If you want to stick your cock in stick your cock in. If you prefer a chat or watching a movie or visiting a museum I'm more than fine with this to. I'm as genuine a person as I can be and do the best I can for you on the clock. If... If a guy wants an exclusive relationship similar terms apply. The only difference is how and how much.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by slaker ( 53818 )

      One of my close friends is a well-regarded queer sex worker in Chicago. She contends that I just need to partake of a similar service, much as you and she provide. Here is my counter:

      What I want is not just sex, or to have a dining or public companion. What I want is emotional engagement. I want the support and access to intimacy that can only be found in free will. I want to be considered genuinely worthy has a companion, to share a bed and a washroom and to be able to touch another person freely and witho

  • I find this whole thing to be very sad and disheartening. If I wasn't already happily married I'd probably stay the hell away from online dating, since 99% seems to be bogus.

    Paid shills wasting your time by dangling a possible relationship in front of you for weeks or months? Sad and hurtful. Death to them for the misery they cause.

  • ZZ Top (Score:2)

    by PPH ( 736903 )

    "I been in love ten thousand times,
    All you got to do is remember my line."

  • The dating sites aren't working for women either. In my area, Ottawa, Canada, the median age of an active POF profile of slim or athletic woman between 30 and 40 is 300 days. (You can sort the profiles by newest first, find the oldest profile that was on in the last 30 days and then message the women halfway between and ask them when they created their profiles)

    Create a crappy woman's profile, see how many messages it gets bombarded with. Now imagine trying to get this woman's attention and keep it. I

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mentil ( 1748130 )

      I recall reading about how a large portion of adoptive parents end up 'giving back' older children that they adopt, due to supposed 'behavioral problems' with the child that can't be reconciled. Turns out these problems are generally with the parents, being unable to adapt to life with that child, rather than anything inherent about the child themselves.

      Dating websites revolve around the concept of 'compatibility' without daring to question the related assumptions about the mechanics of romantic relationshi

  • I met my wife on ICQ. That was 17 years ago.

  • Been going on for years (Score:3)

    by seoras ( 147590 ) on Saturday April 28, 2018 @08:28PM (#56521503)

    I did some consultancy work for an online dating company several years ago.
    The alarm bells started going off when I discovered they weren't interested in marketing it to women. They were entirely focused on men.
    I got access to their database for some of my work and couldn't find a single, real, female profile. All the female accounts were all "test" accounts.
    I was also aware of a huge "marketing" work force in the Ukraine who's job descriptions were ambiguous and when I met one or two of them they wouldn't tell me what they did (they were all women).
    One of them later confided in me that they had to sign an NDA about their job roll which was why they couldn't talk about it.
    Most of the marketing they did was through the porn websites and they also re-marketed to the cam girl websites.
    I'd guess that the "dating" websites are the main source of the online porn industries revenue.

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