The last person with a real chance to stop a romance scam is often not the victim. It is the teller processing the wire, or the fraud analyst who notices a retirement account being drained in slices. That is not an accident. The federal government has spent years training financial institutions to spot these scams in progress, and the checklist they use is public.
The scale explains the effort. In an analysis of one year of reports filed by banks and other institutions, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network found about $27 billion in suspicious activity tied to elder financial exploitation, a category where romance scams play a leading role. Banks themselves filed 72 percent of those reports. And this February, FinCEN reminded institutions again, as part of the multi-agency Dating or Defrauding campaign, to stay alert to what it calls relationship investment scams.
Knowing what your bank is watching for is useful twice over. It tells you why a teller might slow down a transfer you request. And it gives you a professional-grade checklist to run on your own situation, or a parent’s.
The behavioral warning signs on the checklist
FinCEN’s 2022 advisory on elder financial exploitation lays out behavioral red flags that front-line bank staff are told to notice. The pattern is remarkably consistent from case to case:
A new online relationship with someone never met in person. The customer mentions a new friend, fiancé, or business partner who lives overseas, is deployed with the military, or works on an oil rig or distant job site. There is always a reason a face-to-face meeting is impossible.
Urgency and emotion at the counter. The customer seems anxious to send money immediately, often citing a sudden emergency: a medical crisis, a customs fee, a plane ticket, a legal problem that only cash can fix.
Secrecy and coaching. The customer is reluctant to say what a transfer is for, gives explanations that sound rehearsed, or reads from notes. Some victims are explicitly coached by the scammer on what to tell the bank if questioned. A customer on the phone during a transaction, apparently taking instructions, is a classic sign.
A sudden interest in cryptocurrency. A customer with no trading history who abruptly wants to move large sums to a crypto exchange or kiosk fits the profile of what FinCEN calls pig butchering, the investment variant of the romance scam.
The transaction patterns that trip alarms
Software watches for what people do, not just what they say. The same advisories describe transaction red flags: wire transfers to individuals abroad from a customer who has never sent one, multiple transfers in round dollar amounts, large gift card purchases, early withdrawal of certificates of deposit despite penalties, new names added to accounts, and steady drawdowns of savings or retirement money in a way that does not match years of normal behavior.
None of these proves fraud on its own. Together, they are why a bank may ask questions that feel intrusive when you send money. Under the Bank Secrecy Act, institutions that see these patterns are expected to file suspicious activity reports, which law enforcement uses to build cases.
The investment twist that raised the stakes
The traditional romance scam ends with a request for money for an emergency. The newer and more expensive version ends with an investment opportunity. FinCEN’s alert on pig butchering describes how scammers spend weeks or months building trust, then introduce a fake trading platform, usually for cryptocurrency. The victim sees fabricated gains, invests more, and sometimes is allowed a small withdrawal to build confidence. When the victim tries to cash out in earnest, the platform demands taxes or fees, and then everything disappears.
The romance framing is the delivery mechanism, not the point. That is why regulators now use the broader label of relationship investment scams, and why a sudden crypto enthusiasm in someone newly in love is treated as a five-alarm signal.
If your bank starts asking questions
A hold, a delay, or a series of pointed questions about a transfer is not the bank being difficult. Staff are often required to escalate exactly the patterns described above, and in many states they can pause suspicious transactions involving older customers. If this happens to you or a relative, treat it as free, unsolicited advice from people who see these cases weekly. Answer honestly. The scripts scammers hand victims are written precisely to defeat this checkpoint.
It also matters because recovery is hard. A wire or crypto transfer that leaves the country is usually gone. Prevention at the counter is often the only prevention there is.
Run the same checklist on yourself
The scale of the problem keeps growing. The Federal Trade Commission reported this spring that people said they lost $2.1 billion to scams that started on social media in 2025, with romance scams accounting for $298 million of it. Nearly 60 percent of people who lost money to a romance scam said it began on a social media platform, not a dating site.
The FTC’s consumer guidance compresses the defense into one rule: never send money, cryptocurrency, gift cards, or wire transfers to someone you have not met in person, no matter how long you have talked or how convincing the story. Reverse-image-search profile photos. Talk to someone you trust before sending anything; scammers work hard to isolate their targets, and embarrassment is part of their business model.
If money has already moved, contact your bank immediately to attempt a recall, then report the scam to the FTC at ReportFraud.ftc.gov and to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center. Fast reporting occasionally claws money back, and it always improves the checklist for the next person at the counter.
This article was produced with AI assistance and reviewed by a human editor. Figures are linked to their primary sources; where a claim could not be verified from the public record, we say so.
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