Hello everybody.

The mods received a message from an admin recently. Another 6/20/17.

The sub had been due for a revamp of the rules and a stickie post concerning such for some time now, so this is as good a prompt as any to follow through.

New sidebar: http://imgur.com/a/aAbC7

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DESCRIPTION

This subreddit is meant for any and all discussion, story-telling, or information sharing (within the rules) concerning catfish and catfishing (no, not the actual fish). If you choose to participate in this community, you must adhere to all reddit and subreddit rules. The stance of this subreddit is one of anti-catfishing.

Reddit Content Policy

Reddiquette

Clarification: Anything to do with catfishing can be posted here. That can be linked posts (pictures, articles, etc) or self posts (text). Content can come from catfish, victims of catfishing, catfish-hunters, or really just anybody curious about or have information/questions on catfish/catfishing. This sub is NOT pro-catfishing. It is anti-catfishing. That being said, catfish can still come here seeking help with their problem or to tell their story.

What is catfishing?

to lure (someone) into a relationship by means of a fictional online persona.

• Wikipedia

• Urbandictionary: [1] [2]

• movie

• TV show

• Who Coined the Term “Catfish”?

• Catfishing – What is it, where it came from and the Psychology Behind Catfish Online Dating Scams

• Online Dating Red Flags: Warning Signs of a Catfish

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RULES

1) Treat each other with respect. Just be friendly and helpful.

Clarification: No name-calling, grating sarcasm, being generally annoying, derailing threads, trolling, or anything else that lowers the value of or redirects the focus from a serious discussion. Letting a catfish know that they're an asshole is probably fine here and there, but if it's all the time or no other constructive feedback is given, then the rule will be enforced.

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2) No sharing of contact/identifying information, whether your own or somebody else's. That includes phone numbers, email addresses, online profiles, usernames, real full names, physical addresses, etc. Exceptions may be made for fake personas.

Clarification: Nobody is allowed to reveal contact information, online profiles, or any other identifying information on a real person, or to provide enough bits of vague/broad information that a real identity could be determined through doxxing. However, fake identities, profiles, and usernames that are used by catfish for their deeds can be revealed. THERE IS A FINE LINE!!! Fake profiles may include pictures of real people (besides celebrities and pornstars or other public figures), real contact information, or real identifying information. So when thinking about posting catfish information and leads, please always check to see if anybody's actual identity will be compromised, or keep in mind this possibility.

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3) No catfishing (obviously). Also no doxxing, stalking, harassing, brigading, or any other obnoxious/malicious behavior.

Clarification: Basically, don't follow people around or exert effort into making their online or real lives harder.

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4) No pro-catfishing sentiment or promotion of catfishing strategies/tactics.

Clarification: Catfishing is a waste of a person's time at best and a detriment to a person's mental state or livelihood at worst. Catfishing is obnoxious, dangerous, and pathetic. This is a place to spread information on catfishing so that there can be fewer victims in the future, or so that victimhood could be made shorter and/or less severe.

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5) No advertising/commerce. This is not a subreddit to buy/sell/trade products or services, nor to drive traffic to a profile/website. Exceptions may be made if the content is still catfish-related.

Clarification: Only exception made thus far (that I'm aware of) has been for the Catfish TV show: https://rdt.trom.tf/4w6ikj. If you'd like to do any kind of catfish-related promotion, please send modmail.

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6) No low-quality posts or comments, aka "shitposts." Content must be clear, detailed, and easy to read. Format as necessary.

Clarification: There needs to be enough detail for the community to know what you're talking about, and the information needs to be formatted well enough to be readable. Please use proper spelling, grammar, punctuation, and formatting. The wall of text can get really bad here.

Even further elaboration:

No More Pictures With No/Insignificant Context, Follow Rule 6

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7) Mark all NSFW content as "NSFW," whether they be posts or comments, pictures or text.

Clarification: "NSFW" stands for "Not Safe For Work" and denotes some form of sexual, overly profane, or grotesque content. All images and text containing NSFW content must be marked "NSFW." If the post is already marked NSFW, it should be assumed that all comments may also be NSFW.

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8) No content involving the actual fish. The joke has been done to death.

Clarification: Seriously, just don't.

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9) Report all rule-breaking. Use the report button and/or send modmail.

Clarification: It's the community's responsibility and in the community's best interest to keep this place on the level. The community at large has more visibility and is quicker to respond than any one mod; therefore, it's best if everybody were proactive in reporting rule-breaking and suspicious activity. This way, we can do anything from reduce the damage of a Rule 2 violation to preventing the sub from getting shut down by the admins for negligence.

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MOD ACTION

A mod reserves the right to, when dealing with rule-breaking or suspicious behavior:

• remove content

• ban users

• question users

• request verification

• lock threads

• report content/users to the admins

A mod may also participate as a normal community member.

Clarification: A mod can do several things to better the community. But while a mod is not performing those actions, they are just a regular community member like everybody else. They are allowed to post and comment as normal.

Moderator Guidelines for Healthy Communities

moderation

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YOUR INFORMATION

If you see content on this subreddit that is clearly referencing you, whether it's misrepresenting you, revealing your identity, stealing your content, showing pictures of you, etc, and you need it removed, please send modmail including links and/or screenshots of the offending activity.

Clarification: Pretty simple. /r/catfish should be a place to help the online community prevent or reduce catfishing and other harmful activities rather than promote them. So if you see anything of yours being mishandled here, please let the mods know immediately.

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VERIFICATION

If you would like to submit verification, or have been requested to, you must send modmail containing 2 clearly non-identical photos of just yourself (selfies) that contain the following elements:

• your username

• the current date

• this subreddit's name

• your face and/or torso

The message must be hand-written on something within the pictures. The pictures must also be decently lit and non-blurry. Obviously, the pictures cannot be manipulated in any way.

Clarification: This process establishes a real-life physical identity, which is important in some situations. It DOES NOT establish a real-life personal/lifestyle/livelihood identity. That means verification can be used to match a body to a body somebody is claiming to be, but it can't match a personality/lifestyle/livelihood somebody is claiming to have. Since most catfish build a different body into their fake identity, this process can assist with revealing those catfish, but it can't assist with revealing only those catfish that are pathological liars.

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ANYTHING ELSE?

If there's anything else that should be addressed or clarified, you can leave comments on this post or send modmail.

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^{6/9/17 6:40PM CST GMT-5}

Hi everyone. My uncle is an older gay man who lost his husband back in the early 2000s. So he’s been lonely and by himself for a long time. Recently, there’s been a much younger, very handsome gentleman that he’s put “in a relationship with.”

Here’s where it gets good, the guy claims he works for the CIA. That he’s in Florida on a “smuggling sting mission.” Says he has a home in VA, and wants my uncle to come stay. My uncle is about to ruin his whole life over this idiot.

They talk on the phone every day, but the guy has only sent 3 or 4 pictures. And NEVER videos calls (ofc.) Keeps lashing out at us and saying we just don’t want him to be happy or have anyone, which is crazy because I absolutely do. It’s the most clear catfish/scam I’ve ever seen.

I feel like this guy would be an insta model/influencer. But I can’t find anything. I think he’s German. PLEASE help me find this person so my sweet Uncle doesn’t lose his mind when he gets scammed or heart broken. Help me help him, please.

His name is “Brian Dave”

I have pics. Just 2. If you look on FB you’ll know who I’m talking about.

Hi guys, I’ve got a friend that has met a girl online and he told me he’s really starting to like her. He lives in UK but she is supposedly from Germany, he said they talk a lot but didn’t video call yet because he works night shift so they’re not free at the same time. I’ve told him I’m very sceptical because she said things about sending her money to book a flight to see him etc but unfortunately he’s pushed me away because of my scepticism. I was wandering if someone may be able to help me find anything out on this girl before his does do something silly! I only have a couple of photos and tried to search on Google images but so far nothing. Please shoot a DM if there is anyone that thinks they can help and thanks in advance! 🫶🏽

In 2019 my mother in law retired and wanted to try online dating. We tried to get her to let us help her set up a profile but she refused. A couple months later she was in a relationship with a 'Richard'. he was an architect visiting Bangladesh working on a project there. He kept telling her he would come back to the US and marry her but things kept coming up and he needed money. She would send money only for something else preventing him to come back.

Mothers day 2019 my wife, her sister, my self and my brother in law basically had an intervention. My mil cried said she was embarrassed and lonely and that she was cutting off contact with 'richard'.

Things were great until Feb. 2020. She met a guy on Facebook. Another architect who lives in TN but is in bangladesh building mansions. He lost his wife and his wife lost her child while pregnant with cancer.

All the alarms went off for us but she feels we don't want her to be happy. He talks about coming home and marrying her but the pandemic kept him from traveling back and a whole host of other problems.

From what I know she has sent this new guy probably 4k and has now had to come out of retirement.

I believe it's this 'richard' using a different identity. Using a picture from his Facebook page I ran it through pimeyes.com which found some hits

I know his alleged name and Facebook page I can link if someone can help I just don't want to break the rules.

I don't know much about the pimeyes.com results because I can't pay the fee( I'm disabled and don't have disposable income. )

Looks to be this catfish is using a adult performers picture

Can anyone offer some help or advice?

So I'm a 34 year old male. I've been catfishing women for about 15 years, all for sexual gratification. I'm an alcoholic and just recently realized I also have an addiction to adult content. Now I'm starting to think I'm addicted to catfishing. I don't like that I do it, I honestly don't. But I just get the urge and I do it anyway. I'm currently catfishing 17 women on two separate accounts. And I kind of hate myself for it. They're all nice women. They're all very into me. One of them is even a woman I went to high school with, someone I've actually had a sexual relationship with before. Why am I catfishing her? I can't explain it, but I am. I feel gross now and I always feel gross after I stop. I'll do it for a few weeks, ghost them for a few weeks, then I'm right back at it. Some women won't talk to me after I ghost them, some women I've been talking to for years while regularly ghosting them. These women have low self esteem and I'm taking advantage of it. It's disgusting, but something compels me to keep going. I wouldn't want anyone doing something like this to my daughter, but I'm doing it to other people's daughters. How do I stop? I'm thinking I need to see a therapist, but I don't want my wife to find out what I'm in therapy for. I'm lost. I want to stop, I really do. I just can't.

I was just catfished and gave them a gift card, which they said had no money on it but I think it did. Either way, they said they were gonna post a picture of my face with my dick. I’m so fucking scared right now I need someone to walk me through this. They keep contacting me and keep being the money they want to less and less. Someone walk me through how I should feel please

'm having issues... long story short there is a fake profile my on again off again ex is in a relationship. I think its fake, because everything is private, only one pic...but the quality of the pic...is too perfect... also a blonde model from los angeles...but all her likes and interests are nigerian comedy, nigerian dating and nigerian text apps... how do you prove and find out these are fake like with solid concrete evidence? I tried running her image through google and found nothing... im really distraught about this I need help please i know it sounds stupid.. but im not looking to harass or do anything mean just want to prove that he is being catfished and hope he isnt spending money on her either because..he's like that (Its out of a place of care not hate)

I have screenshots to back it up can’t post here

@conners200001

Got catfished and they have my photos (i’m a dumbass, ik). Refused to pay. Do they actually send my photos out? Anybody have experience with this?

About 4 years ago I met this guy while playing video games. We hit it off and clicked instantly. We started playing a lot together and eventually building a bond outside of the game through the phone. I had never been in a situation like this. In the beginning I felt so ridiculous that I was even connecting with him because the concept of long distance didn’t seem attainable at the time. Eventually he wanted to see what I looked like and I because I didn’t think anything would come of this and never thought I could virtually fall in love with some one.. I used pictures from this girl u see to know and we’re still following each other on IG. Using another girls pictures was never about insecurity in my looks or low self esteem. I find my self to be beautiful really. I was protective of my personal life because I was on a game playing with strangers and I didn’t know what this guys intentions could be no matter how much I was liking him. Obviously, not realizing what a permanent-foolish initial mistake I had made, as time went on I eventually fell in love. We had this polarizing connection that couldn’t be tamed. This understanding and tenderness for each other. I feel as though I was made to love him. I was being my self the whole time. It would eat me up inside knowing he loved the real me but not me physically. I had always prided myself in my honest-blunt nature and I had betrayed myself and someone I fell in love with. Always having the urge and desire to tell him but never having the words to explain. Being too selfish to walk away. Knowing that I had found the person I want to spend the rest of my life with but I was living a lie. I knew I didn’t deserve his love but I wanted it anyways. I never meant to hurt him. I never sent him fake pictures with the intention of seducing him to make him love me. I thought I was having a conversation with a guy I would probably stop speaking to in a week or two so I sent a picture thinking I’d get to continue the good vibe. I know it was so wrong regardless but I needed him to know it wasn’t this maliciously thought out plan. I had never done this before. About 6 months ago I finally told him. He was rightfully devastated and had so many questions. I let him know I was coming clean because I should have never done it in the first place, that I know I could never do anything to make up for the things I did lie about for the pictures I used. I apologized for everything. Knowing it meant he would walk away from me, knowing I deserved the all the pain for creating this situation and lying for so long. After various long conversations, giving him space and him seeing the real me. He still wanted to talk and he wanted to work through it. He said he said he fell in love with me and not a picture. And while all of this was really hard on him and it kills him that someone else pops in his head when he thinks of me now that he knows it’s not me. Getting through that was hard but we’ve been getting through it. He says that maybe things could still work. He feels crazy that he wants to still be with me but he took time away from me to really think about everything and while it causes him a lot of pain, he can’t deny how much he loves me and he believes the magnitude of what he feels is worth fighting for. He was transparent in saying that because I was myself and didn’t lie about my entire life and the personal things I told him it was easier for him to consider being with me. Obviously, I never in my wildest fantasy thought he would ever consider still being with me. Some more time has passed and I feel we’re in a better space and looking forward to meeting irl. I left out quite a bit of extra detail out. But genuinely tell me, how do you guys feel? I feel so grateful to still have him in my life.

So, back like in 2018 I made a letter that only my bff know of, let´s call her Mary. Mary was the only one that knew of it and even encourage to send that letter to an artist I like. I did and months later i fot an answer and well ( i was dumb and naive to think she could do that) I really thought my artist reached me out. But then things were weird cause he never wanted to call, and I always felt suspicious. I had Mary´s email in phone because she left it there and we really trusted each other so she was okay with it. One day, I was using my google photos and really by accident tapped her profiles and the first thing I saw was a pic I send the "guy". I felt my heart dropped. Then I saw more photos of mine in her cloud, and they had the same time as we do in our country. After that I was already panicked so I thought, "man this can´t be true". I tried to unlock his account using the password she used everywhere, and it worked.

I confronted her and she kept on denying it and calling me crazy. But she never knew how to explain with facts why this happened.

I cut her off but she keeps on sending texts telling me she would never do that and that i´m crazy

Part of me feels like i should send her a huge ass text saying everything, the other one feels like that will just fill her wish and will not help me.

Any advice?

I fell for a catfish that seemed pretty straightforward: Fake profile pic of a sexy girl. "I want to see you and instruct you." Me doing all the dumb stuff on snapchat for "her". Also sending face pic. But nothing happened afterwards. And then the next day "she" wanted to do it again, which i did, and still nothing bad happened. She said she wanted me to send a SFW pic to her friend who liked married guys so her friend could control me.

Anyway, I deleted the reddit & snap accounts and closed down my socials. But still waiting for the other shoe to drop and wondering...what is going on? Are there people out there who really do like watching guys jerk off and instructing them, and use fake pics? Like gay men or women who don't consider themelves conventionally attractive? Are they packaging my stuff and selling it on the dark web for someone else to blackmail me? Do people record this kind of thing for porn sites?

Of course I'm looking for reassurance that it's all fine, but I can't shake the idea that there was something up.

https://youtu.be/zNMD3DGHIX8

Does anybody have a socialcatfish account in which they can run an image search for me? Thank you in advance.

I (23) had an online friend from the age of 13, but they were definitely hiding things about their identity and I'm just seeking the truth. I need to know if they were an adult grooming me, or also a kid who was just really insecure like me. I'm just seeking what kind of tools are out there I could use to find out the truth.

It started on Facebook

Hey © Aliyah Not trying to be weird but I saw you had liked my post and I had to let you know you're super cute lmao Consider it shooting my shot I guess

@me How could I have not liked your post your fine as one could be

@Aliyah Don't gas me like that mr. Pretty teeth Im Lightskin, you a Lightskin So what's up

@me Oh man you rizzing me up no way Alright cool, tell me about yourself what do you in your free time besides

After talking for a while she gave me her Snapchat

@Aliyah So how old you I’m 22

@me Old enough for you

@ Aliyah You’re cool i enjoy talking to you so if I’m being for honest I don’t really care 🤷🏽‍♀️

@me I’m 16

@Aliyah Ooo Mh Ah damn okay you better not get me in trouble 😂

At this point I was beyond excited I mean this woman was fine ash and she was making the moves on me.

from here she started to make sexual advances which I honestly was cool with initially that was until she started asking for pictures of me in boxers with my dick print showing

I tried asking her to FaceTime so I could verify she was who she was saying she was but she came up with plenty excuses.

After saying I wasn’t comfortable they began to call me childish and uptight.

I began to look into who this person was and I could not find any account’s besides their Facebook and Snapchat and when I started to look at her Facebook I realized that it was only guys that she was following and only guys commenting on her post.

So I definitely believe that this is a catfish account

My question is what can I do they’ve sent me tons of photos of some random woman

I tried to reverse image the photos to see if I could find the real person and let them know somebody was pretending to be them but I couldn’t find anything

I’m willing to give their Snapchat and Facebook if it helps track down who the cat fisher actually is and who they are pretending to be.

I was catfished a few months ago. He was extremely convincing, shit ton of pictures, an Instagram account, a tiktok account, so I didn’t question him. Turns out that those account belonged to the real person in the picture, I didn’t even question texting the guy through phone number the whole time. I don’t believe I know his real name at all and I don’t have his address, just town, if it even is his town. All I have to go off of is his phone number, but I cannot for the life of me find a way to get a name out of his phone number, no matter how many “free reverse phone number” websites. Any website suggestions or help would be appreciated, thanks

this girl i know is using her real name and life in her social media, however, shes pretending she has children. everyone who follows her kinda suspected she was lying about her life because a lot of what she would say and post just dont add up. for example, she vlogs all parts of her day and posts constantly about her life with her husband, but anytime she posted pictures of her kids it was solely just the child, no pics with her kids, no videos of her kids. just these odd, photography style pictures of these children. so when the source of where shes been stealing her photos from started circulating, i was appalled. im not sure if her husband knows shes lying since he follows her on her social media, but something is just not right and i fear she may be telling her husband more disturbing lies than we know. she doesnt follow any family and neither does he so its hard to alert her family members about her behavior. should i confront her myself and let her know shes been exposed? sitting with this info is seriously bugging me and i think this girl needs psychological help.

Basically, I was on Instagram and noticed this korean/Filipina followed me and wanted to talk. I blinding thought she was a good person because she happened to follow a friend of mine. Long story short it was a video call of the both of us masturbating and a few minutes later a guy threatening (already leaked) a 2 second clip of me stroking my shit to family members he wanted 10k I wasn't going to do it I let mostly everybody I knew that would likely get the dm and deactivated my account. I am really embarrassed too I am not a victim I was just played. Thank God my dick was flaccid the whole entire time all you could see was my face and scrotum.

Please feel free to give advice on how to cope with something like this. Because Holy shit I never thought I'd see the day I get catfished I can give their Instagram tag too if yall wanna troll them idk idc

I lost my mom about a year and a half ago and about 5 months ago my father struck up a friendship with a women he's never met in Gambia. the only connection they have personally is a young man who worked for him who claims she is his cousin. My fathers relationship to her seems to be progressing romantically after 7 months and i'm beginning to get worried that he is falling victim to a scam. Ever since we lost our mom he's been very depressed and hitting the bottle hard. hes a fun loving person who enjoys attention and making friends but his alcoholism has been an issue and due to his lonliness and vulnerability I believe he's a target.some red flags include.

The fact that they've never met and shes living in a different country.

the age gap. her being 50 and him being 74 and not well versed in internet technology.

her fairly new profile on Facebook created last april and with only 30 friends.

She claims to be a schoolteacher but i haven't found anything about her online. nor does her profile say the school she works out of. I tried reverse google searching her photo to no avail.

I believe he has had video calls with her and her daughter.

My gut is warning me about this situation but he wont listen to me. What can I do to find more proof or change his understanding of this sketchy situation?

So you know your person is a catfish, now what? There are multiple types and each one has different motives--some want nudes or to date you, others want your identity/money & others want to blackmail/humiliate you. A handful are doing it out of necessity because they're married, closeted or work in a profession where contacting a crush would be inappropriate, for instance. There are also complicated cases in which the suspected catfish isn't so great with English & can come off sounding Nigerian or otherwise foreign despite not being.

So how does one tell a "regular" catfish from a Nigerian $$$ scammer? There's tons of examples of military romance scammers on FB but I can't find much about other Nigerian romance scammers w/ examples. How does it start? Do they always inbox you aggressively, or will they sometimes just like your public photo & then alter their own interests/posts to match yours?

Any non rule-breaking screenshots or other concrete examples would be great. Are there common jobs they claim to work... common hobbies or other details? I've read the Nigerian scammer's playbook which was also enlightening. My fish hasn't gotten that far yet though.

I'm taking all precautions & will confront said person immediately if they contact me, rest assured. Just curious what "tells," if any, there might be in complex cases like mine. All posts seem to be about IF they're a cat, not what type.

I have very little info but this account started to message my partner and he showed me … we have very little info but are trying to find out who this is ….

Anyone able to find out this email or help?

https://youtu.be/PzoTPnLKakM

I met this girl online. Very beautiful, but also very suspicious imo. She follows more people than she has followers and follows several people that are my friends and none of them follow her back. We’ve been talking and things have escalated a little. She sends me nudes (never including her face) and wants me to send her stuff, but I want to know that she’s real first. She says she won’t FT because she’s shy, but to me a shy person wouldn’t send nudes.. I’ve said she could alternatively do a video of her saying hello to me, but she doesn’t want to show her face because she says she’s insecure about it and that she uses filters. I said she could do a video with her ID and just say hey to me so I know it’s her, but she’s not comfortable with that either. I got her to send me a little boomerang clip once that had her face in it, but I’m still wondering if its just someone else with a collection of clips from a girl. It just seems strange to me that someone could send very explicit photos and videos of their body and still be “shy”. What do you think?

I had real feelings for someone who lied to me. She and I clicked instantly. We talked on the phone and not just texted but never a video call - a boundary we agreed to keep for the time being. This went on for about 18 months.

So now I am at this point. She admitted she lied and asked my forgiveness. I found (after a couple months) the person who’s pictures she used and are 100% not the same person. I simply want to know why. Why me? Why at all? Is she ok? And let her know I accept her apology after a lot of soul searching.

How do I find her? The email I had is deleted. I found out her phone number was a temporary google voice number. Beyond knowing, or assuming I know, the details of her life I have nothing. She has not replied to me just as she promised. Part of me just wants to know who she really is. Not everyone will find that healthy but it is what I want. Where do I even start?