In fact, it was part of a continuing scam that cost US victims more than $429 million in losses last year, according to the Internet Crime Complaint Center, the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s clearinghouse for consumer complaints about online crime.
Three months after beginning a conversation with the person who texted her, Ms. Yan had lost more than $1.6 million, the victim of a wave of messages that have flooded onto mobile devices this year via text message and social media, according to law-enforcement officials.
In Santa Clara County, Calif., complaints about these scams have skyrocketed over the past two years as people have become more accustomed to meeting and doing business virtually, said Jeff Rosen, the county’s district attorney.
The scam preys on basic decency—the impulse to help someone who sends a message by mistake—and loneliness, Mr. Rosen said. “There are a lot of lonely people out there, and while the vast, vast majority of people are not going to respond to that kind of text, a few will,” he said.
The average losses reported from these scams are $300,000, Mr. Rosen said.
The scammers are often based in Asia, where the con is known as “pig butchering”—a reference to the practice of first “fattening” the victim’s cryptocurrency account with fake gains before the scam ends, according to advocacy groups and…