As internet use increases in Australia, so do the numbers of people who are defrauded online.

Online dating sites continue to be favoured by scammers. One of the reasons is that many people who use them are emotionally vulnerable, and therefore conducive to manipulation. Thousands of Aussies have been tricked into handing over money - sometimes huge amounts - and the problem has risen by a factor of 30 percent from last year.
 
 
Contrary to commonly held stereotypes about users of online dating sites being more likely to exaggerate their achievements while online, in truth there seems to be little such a tendency, or even none at all. Apparently those who "big note" themselves in their online profiles are just as likely to do so in real life.
 
 
You can find lots of information about how to write dating site profiles, and what sort of photos are the best to use. But there's one ingredient that people often give little thought to which can still be quite influential. That's your username.
 
 
I just learned about another niche dating site, probably one of the most unusual ones out there. (And that's saying something.)

It's for people with chronic diseases.
 
 
If you want to maximize your chances of success in online dating, then you should write the best profile possible. Of course, a small percentage of people find this very hard to do. Considering the hugeness of the online dating industry, that adds up to a lot of people! Which is why the profile generator ProfileWiz - which costs just under 5 dollars to use - could end up being a very big money spinner if it takes off.
 
 
Considering how popular online dating is these days, one would have thought that traditional offline personal matchmakers would be going out of business at an ever increasing rate. However, this has not happened at all. Actually, their turnover has actually increased.
 
 
Most online dating scammers just want to relieve their victims of their money. That's bad enough. But sometimes their deception goes way beyond that, and becomes something truly horrifying. Take this example, in which a Briton was tricked into traveling to Nigeria, and subsequently kidnapped and held for ransom.
 
 
Online dating scams are now extremely common. And you'd have to pretty naive to fall for one, since they are usually so obvious. I'd imagine that scammers tend to have a lot less success these days since people are much more aware of them than they used to be.

However, some scammers are much more thoughtful and dedicated. Take Justin Brown, a 24 year old in Texas, who set up an elaborate ruse in which he posed as a famous model online, and even impersonated her in telephone conversations! Using these techniques over a two year period he managed to trick numerous very rich and successful men into sending money and gifts to him.

Sounds like he had a real talent. Pity he used it in this way. He might have had a lucrative career as an actor or voice over artist!
 
 
The Aussie online dating industry continues to boom as it catches up with other countries such as Britain and the USA, where it is an even more established and accepted method of meeting people.

The ongoing growth here and continued widespread use elsewhere is interesting, because not long ago was a lot of talk about dating sites being made redundant by free social networking sites like Facebook. But I think the reason this ultimately hasn't happened is that people do like to keep their quest for love and sex separate from the rest of their lives and therefore prefer to join sites dedicated solely to that purpose. This is generally a good idea, since there have been so many cases of people suffering personally and career-wise from the unwise posting of photos and intimate information on social networking sites. After all, in trying to learn more about job applicants prospective employers are highly likely to search Facebook, but will tend to steer clear of dating sites. They know that a person's sex life is their own business, even if it is on the net and publicly available in a sense. (And people don't use their real names on these sites anyway, so there would be little point in searching them, even if the will existed!)
 
 
Britain is experiencing a cold snap at the moment. One of the unexpected consequences of this is a steep increase in the numbers of people using online dating sites.

If this is the case, then it would follow that consistently higher temperatures would make such sites less profitable. I wonder if this possibility will be added to the already long list of negative consequences of global warming?