Insta-scam: Catfish scams grieving woman before ‘private investigator’ from Quora makes vile threats

The Auckland woman lost at least $34,000 in just a few months to the love scammer - who also stood her up at the airport. Photo / NZME graphic

A grieving woman says she lost her inheritance falling prey to scams and a supposed saviour found online ended up threatening to kill her and her family.

The Auckland woman in her 50s has still not told her family about the Instagram scammer who fleeced her, or the “private investigator” she found on the Quora website.

“I’m a bit naive about the internet. I have no idea about romance scams,” she told the Herald.

It seemed she was the victim also of what cybersecurity experts called a recovery room scam.

Still grieving from a family member’s death, she started talking to somebody on Instagram in October. He went by the name Harry Lugard* and claimed to be 59.

He also claimed to be working on an oil rig - a favourite cover story for some scammers.

“He said he was a German who lost his wife three years ago to Covid.”

After they seemed to find some chemistry online, he said he wanted to visit Auckland.

“He said he was on a fixed contract so he had to pay to leave the country.”

She paid for his vacation, and he was supposed to arrive on March 6.

The pair had a videochat but she couldn’t hear Lugard during that chat and now suspected he doctored the video or used a stolen image as a stand-in for himself in that conversation.

Still, she was looking forward to meeting Lugard.

“I turned up at the airport. I waited two hours.”

She was devastated when he didn’t arrive, and still distraught when she went to work.

“I was a mess. They sent me home.”

One of the threatening emails received in the apparent recovery room scam. Photo / Supplied

On arriving home, she opened an email from Lugard saying he’d got arrested in Dubai on the way to New Zealand, and she should email his employer.

“So I did that. They sent a lawyer to Dubai, supposedly. So they stopped him from going to jail.”

Lugard said he needed to pay the lawyer.

She paid, for a while.

“Then there were threats from the company because I stopped the payments.

“The lawyer said the payment was too late and sorry, we can’t get him off the hook.”

She said the combined stress of a major operation, bereavement, and the Lugard fiasco hurt her deeply.

“I’ve lost my career.”

She said she lost her inheritance too.

Scammed again

To try get some money back and track down the scammer, she sought help from private investigators, using Google and the Quora website.

She said she enlisted someone who claimed to be Harper Jeff Zoellers*, who appeared to have 266 followers on Quora and be a cyber security expert.

“I hired this PI guy.”

She said Zoellers - whose Quora page includes some lengthy rants, grandiose claims, and broken English - said he managed to track down Lugard.

But the Auckland woman said Zoellers then started demanding more money, then threatening her.

“RIP in advance,” one email stated.

She went to police this week and said they were now investigating.

All up, she said she lost $34,000.

“My family doesn’t know. It has all been so traumatic.”

Harry the huckster

“Harry” joined Instagram in August and started posting on Facebook the same month.

Some biographical details on his Instagram page were in broken English and he claimed to be an engineer.

A reverse image search of one of his photos showed a person with a different name on LinkedIn.

On Instagram, attempts to click on his linked Twitter and Facebook profiles led to a pop-up saying “be aware of potential scams” but people could still open the links.

Harry told the Auckland woman he was German. On Facebook, he claimed to be from Kansas and living in England.

Recovery room scam

A Cert NZ spokesman said the second part of the Lugard and Zoellers saga had hallmarks of a recovery room scam - where a scammer posed as a saviour.

These scammers often used fake testimonials, fake ads and fake websites.

“When people have lost large amounts of money, sometimes they can be re-targeted.”

He said scammers often shared or sold information among themselves.

“They are essentially businesses, and they share data. They share lists of people they’ve scammed.”

Cert NZ, the Government cybersecurity agency, advised people to check their social media privacy settings.

“If you start talking on social media and say ‘oh, I’ve just been scammed’ the scammers can see that if you don’t have your settings set to private.”

He said any business claiming to be from New Zealand would have details on the Companies Office website.

“If you’ve lost a lot of money definitely come to us, talk to your bank straight away.”

He advised people to use Google Images or TinEye for reverse image search.

But even that was not always enough, with more scammers using artificial intelligence.

“AI unfortunately is also able to make fairly convincing photos of people.”

Although technology moved fast, one red flag remained.

“If you’ve never met them, if you’ve only ever spoken to them online, don’t send them money.”

Read more on scams and scam awareness at the Herald’s Scambusters series.

*Lugard and Zoellers are the names used online by people the Auckland woman interacted with. No identification with real people using those names should be inferred.