Instances of HU Platform Being Used as a Dating Site - Please Report Any Suspicious Messages Asking for 'Friendship'

[Foggyme]

All

Administrators’ in other HU fora have recently been submitting multiple reports of people joining their fora simply to use the platform as a dating site!!

Typical activity is that they join a forum and 'follow' multiple members - sometimes in the hundreds (mostly men following women but recently woman following men too).

They do not post or reply in the fora but instead send personnal messages to members via the chat function asking for...'friendship'.

If you get such a message, please report in via the mail report function and also, if possible, send a personal message to myself or Gambit with the users name so that we can take action and restrict the offender (we do not see the reports generated by 'chat' - these go directly to HU).

Don't think this has occurred in our forum so this is a 'just-in-case' warning 😉.

And while I'm here...the instances of people offering inappropriate, misleading, and sometimes dangerous advice in the forum seems to have increased slightly recently.

Hopefully this is just a 'blip'...but if you spot anything whilst wandering through the posts, please do send in a report so that we can take appropriate action (thanks to those who have been doing this 😉).

Reports can be submitted by clicking on the 'more' tab (at the bottom of the reply). Click on 'report' at the bottom of the pop up menu then enter details on the pop-up report screen (very quick process).

Thanks all 👍

[Nackapan]

That is awful. If you press 'community only' when posting does that help? Or are these people making out they have problems?

[Ritchie1268 in reply to Nackapan]

That's concerning.

I've had two people recently who have followed me & when I click on their profiles, they've never posted one single thing & have joined on the same day they followed me. They've never actually messaged me though.

I thought at the time it seemed really strange.

[Foggyme Administrator in reply to Ritchie1268]

Hi Ritchie1268. Sometimes people who join the site trawl through mails and follow anyone who has said something they find interesting, or anything that may be relevant to their particular circumstances, so may be nothing at all to worry about.

If you want me to check them out, message me this user names and I will take a peek (one clue is if they immediately start following an excessive among of members - high tens and even hundreds 🥴).

👍

[JanD236 in reply to Ritchie1268]

Yes I’ve had exactly the same Ritchie1268

[Foggyme Administrator in reply to JanD236]

Then likewise JanD236. If concerned, message me the names and I'll check them out. 👍

[JanD236 in reply to Foggyme]

Will do.

[Foggyme Administrator in reply to JanD236]

👍

[Foggyme Administrator in reply to JanD236]

Checked. Nothing suspicious. Sent you a PM 👍

[Foggyme Administrator in reply to Nackapan]

No, posting to community only doesn't make a difference - they join the community to enable 'following'.

Do they make out they have problems? No way of being able to predict that 'cause each individual will have their own pattern of behaviour.

The good news is that if these people are reported to Admins, we can restrict them immediately and ask HU to ban them from the entire platform - which they do very swiftly.

The best advice is to report anything that doesn't 'feel right' or or anything that makes you feel uncomfortable.

👍

[cocoa]

I do not show much information on my profile … perhaps that may help because I do not get any problems

[Foggyme Administrator in reply to cocoa]

These type of people seem to be drawn to those who use a personal photograph as an image in their avatar (but not exclusively so).

Good that you’re cautious - me too 😉😀

[pitney]

Thank you for the advance warning Foggy

[genesurf]

Also, romance scams target people online. People disclose personal details in forums so it's easier for scammers to trick them.

[pollianna]

I was going to say Romance scam. I posted in my local Gumtree for female friends over 50 recently and received a barrage of messages from men.