The perfect girl on Facebook

It doesn’t matter whether you’re a woman or a man: the perfect girl on Facebook has surely sent you at least one friend request and contacted you with messages clearly translated using Google Translate.

Let's talk about the scam of girls requesting friendships on Facebook: a phenomenon that affects this social network that accounts for nearly two billion active users around the world, including 28 million Italians.

Each one of us must have received friendship requests from beautiful girls (much less frequent are the cases when the profile shows a handsome man, however that’s becoming common too): we all love attentions, but let’s be clear on this: in most cases this is the beginning of a scam.

The identikit of the perfect girl on Facebook

We’re obviously talking about fake profiles: in some cases plainly so, in others they’re well-designed, created by real users who get material from models’ portfolios, actresses or gorgeous girls. These profiles not only show a few pictures of the girl's perfect features, but also of pictures supposedly taken during parties and birthdays, even with descriptions, stolen online here and there.

How to recognize them? Firstly, take a look at the information. Generally, personal information about these perfect Facebook girls is not reported or incomplete: and by scrolling through their feeds you’ll see only pictures and posts about love, with the obvious messages left by other users who were fooled by it. Ever wondered why the perfect Facebook girl is always "single" or "separate”?

As funny as it may seem, behind these profiles there are unfortunately hidden bots capable of exchanging a few words via chat with the unlucky prey, and here comes the sexual bait: when the "girl" offers virtual sex, usually On Skype or similar platforms, many do not resist and eagerly accept.

If the victim gives up and turns off the video chat, he’ll end up being blackmailed and risk the disclosure of this material. Very often, even if the user rejected the "girl’s" proposal, criminal organizations behind this diabolical form of blackmail will edit pictures, even in poor quality, but that will surely scare the user.

The latter will then be forced to pay a ransom through Bitcoin or money transfer, and failing to do so will result in the publication of fake or genuine pictures under each post of his Facebook friends.

As strange as it may seem, the users who fall into this trap are far more than you can imagine - many pay, others get sick. For the authorities it’s almost impossible to find these users as most of the times they’re located in remote parts of the world which are difficult to control.

Protect yourself from the perfect Facebook girl

In order to protect yourself from this threat, be careful and follow some rules:

1. Never provide your phone number or home address;

2.  Use a complex Facebook password, even on your smartphone app;

3. Do an image research on Google of this "perfect girl" profile image to verify her authenticity or if it’s a case of identity theft;

4. Inform the police, and don’t pay. We know it can be humiliating, but it’s the best way to avoid other people being fooled by it and permanently stop this kind of illegal activity;

5. Copy and paste the name of the potential fake profile on Google and see if there's more information online: the profile might be authentic. Google will give you the answer by providing results from other social networks or posts from other people who too sensed the danger behind this profile.