As Valentine’s Day approaches, Tenable Senior Staff Research Engineer Satnam Narang warns that romance scams have entered a “dark age,” evolving into highly organised, multi-billion-dollar criminal enterprises powered by frontier and open-source AI.

According to the FTC, investment fraud—often the “endgame” of romance scams—resulted in $5.7 billion in losses in 2024, a figure experts believe is conservative. Scammers now leverage AI to scale operations, targeting victims globally while operating from specialised forced-labour compounds.

“2026 marks our entry into a dark age of romance scams,” says Narang. “For the price of a cup of coffee, scammers can now generate linguistically perfect, emotionally resonant messages designed to ensnare victims across the globe.”

The Industrialisation of Deception: 4 Key Trends

  1. The AI “Frontier” – Scammers use large language models (LLMs) to eliminate traditional red flags such as poor grammar or inconsistent stories. AI automates the “grooming” phase, enabling dozens of persona-driven conversations simultaneously.

  2. The “AI Room” – Deepfake technology allows real-time, face-swapped video calls, letting scammers visually impersonate others and bypass traditional verification advice like “just hop on a video call.”

  3. The Investment Pivot – Romance is increasingly a hook for “pig butchering” schemes. Victims are systematically “fattened” with trust and staged financial success before losing life savings to fraudulent platforms.

  4. The Open-Source Threat – Unrestricted open-source AI models, such as DeepSeek and Qwen, allow scammers to operate without ethical safeguards. These tools rival paid “frontier” services and enable unrestricted generation of predatory content.

Human Cost Behind the Technology
Narang emphasizes, “These scams are often built on the backs of trafficked individuals forced to work ‘sales floors’ under strict quotas. Scammers even ring bells to celebrate when a victim’s life savings are stolen. The technology is new, but the psychological manipulation is as old as time—it’s just at an unprecedented scale.”

Guidance for Consumers

  • Be skeptical of screenshots or claims of high returns.

  • If a match discusses investments or money, cut contact immediately, unmatch, and report.

Technical Notes for Editors

  • AI Rooms: Scammers use virtual camera software and real-time face-swapping tools (e.g., DeepFaceLive) to impersonate individuals during video calls. Glitches are often masked as poor lighting or weak internet connections.

  • Open-Source Models: Unlike regulated frontier AI, open-source models run locally, removing safeguards and enabling limitless predatory content generation.

  • Statistics: $5.7B in 2024 losses pertains specifically to investment fraud, a secondary phase of romance scams. True total losses are likely higher due to underreporting.

About Satnam Narang
Satnam Narang is a Senior Staff Research Engineer at Tenable, specialising in social engineering and modern cybercrime trends. He has over a decade of experience exposing AI-enabled threats and educating consumers and organisations on emerging risks.