Phone scammers are now targeting people in Irish, a garda has warned.
Michael Walsh took to social media to warn people about the scam, which sees the gang send WhatsApp messages as Gaeilge to try to snare innocent victims.
The con is a so-called romance scam, where gangs send messages to unwitting targets to try to build up a personal relationship with them – and then fleece them for cash.
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Hundreds of people receive such messages every day in Ireland, but they are usually in English – and this is the first publicised case of a text in Irish.
Gda Walsh, who is a crime prevention officer in Galway, posted an image of the text on his Linkedin account earlier this week – and warned: “Romance scam that I received this morning on WhatsApp and in the Irish language.
“Scammers will exploit all opportunities to #scam people.”
He also posted a link to how to avoid being snared from the FraudSmart website, a fraud awareness initiative developed by Banking & Payments Federation Ireland.
In the message, the scammers sent a photo of a young woman – and then tried to sweet talk the recipient in Irish.
It said: “we haven’t been in touch for a long time, I don’t know if you still remember me, so I sent you a photo now.
“I miss you, how have you been? I have changed to a new Whatsapp account. I hope you can add my new Whatsapp account so we can keep better contact there.”
Gardai say signs of romance scams include:
- Trying to move communications away from dating websites to messaging apps
- Asking a lot of personal questions
- Avoiding answering personal questions about themselves and the details that they do tell you seem made up or do not reflect reality.
- Try to establish a bond quickly
- Asking for financial help. They may tell you about money problems in the hope that you’ll offer to help, and
- Never meeting you in person.
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