How dating app frauds are making Indians cautious of every match

The suspicion is driven by the variety of frauds now attached to online romance, from fake profiles and inflated café bills to financial manipulation and extortionFor those using dating apps, the uncertainty of meeting a stranger has always been part of the experience. But increasingly, the question is not simply whether there will be chemistry. It is whether the person, the invitation and even the venue are genuine.Dating and romance scams in India now range from fake profiles and catfishing to inflated caf bills, financial manipulation, extortion and robbery. The numbers help explain why users are becoming more cautious.A 2026 McAfee survey found that 75 per cent of Indians surveyed had encountered fake profiles or photographs that appeared AI-generated on dating apps, websites or social media; 46 per cent had discovered they were communicating with a bot or fake profile. One in seven said they had lost money to an online dating or romance scam, with the average reported loss at about Rs 2.8 lakh.The problem is particularly visible among younger adults. According to the survey, 48 per cent of Indians aged 25-34 said they encountered potential romance scams at least once a week while one in three respondents in this age group reported having lost money. Separately, the government’s Indian Cybercrime Coordination Centre has warned that fraudsters are using both dating and matrimonial platforms to create false identities, build emotional trust and eventually push victims towards bogus investments or other financial transactions.For 32-year-old Gurugram advertising professional Shyam Malhotra, those stories have changed the mechanics of going on a first date. “Earlier, if someone said, ‘I know a great bar, let’s meet there’, I would just go,” he says. “Now, if the person is extremely insistent about one particular caf or bar, that itself feels like a red flag.”Malhotra now suggests well-known public venues himself, checks whether a match has a believable social media history and prefers a short video call before agreeing to meet. “You feel slightly silly doing background checks before a coffee,” he says, “but dating apps have reached a stage where you have to confirm the person is real before you even start wondering whether you like them.”That caution is partly driven by the variety of frauds now attached to online romance. Authorities have warned of fake profiles that cultivate relationships before asking for money, directing users towards fraudulent cryptocurrency or trading schemes or soliciting personal financial information. Other scams move offline: a match may insist on a particular restaurant where the victim is presented with an inflated bill, while still others involve threats or extortion after a meeting. The wider fraud environment has also deteriorated sharply. McAfee’s broader 2026 survey found that 87 per cent of Indians had encountered an online scam of some kind and 51 per cent reported losing money.Pune-based dating counsellor Naina Kapoor describes the behavioural change as “defensive dating”. “People are still interested in meeting strangers, but they are inserting layers of verification before the date,” she says. “They video-call first, check LinkedIn and Instagram, refuse unfamiliar venues and share live locations with friends.”“Earlier. those things were primarily about physical safety, particularly for women. Now men are doing many of the same checks because they are worried about financial scams and organised rackets,” says Kapoor.The downside, Kapoor says, is that the fear of fraud changes the emotional starting point of dating itself. “A first date requires some openness. But if you enter every interaction looking for inconsistencies, checking whether photographs are genuine and wondering why someone chose a particular restaurant, suspicion comes before attraction.”The new challenge for dating apps may, therefore, extend beyond helping people find compatible partners. For many users, the first hurdle is increasingly more basic: proving that the person on the other side of the screen is real.Subscribe to India Today Magazine- EndsPublished On: Sep 2, 2026 19:09 IST