Are Senior Dating Sites Actually Safe?

Senior dating sites are designed to give seasoned singles the opportunity to find love later in life. If you’re here, most likely you’ve seen a commercial or an advertisement for a senior dating site, or maybe you had a friend share a success story with you that piqued your interest. Sites like OurTime, SilverSingles, and SeniorMatch tend to be popping up a bit more frequently these days.

But, you’ve lived enough life to know that while sometimes new things can still be safe, there still may be risks you need to be aware of. Especially in a world dominated by Artificial Intelligence (AI), taking the time to ask these three questions first makes the most sense.

1. Are senior dating sites safe?
2. If they are, which senior dating sites are the best?
3. If they’re not, what other options are out there to find someone special?

A Safer Option for Over 50 and Over 60 Dating

Our goal isn’t to scare you away from senior dating sites. However, a lot of over 50 singles and over 60 singles may decide that sites and apps just aren’t worth the potential risk (keep reading to see why).

If that’s you, then what can you do?

Well, one option is to consider going ‘old school’. Hire a professional matchmaker. Get a professional who understands how to help seniors find love, who can protect you from the technology (you never have to download anything), and will help vet your matches so you know you’re not getting taken for a ride. 

If this sounds amazing, it’s what we specialize in here at Three Day Rule. If you have questions, we’d love to set up a free (actually free) consultation call to discuss how we might be able to help.

Click the link below and fill out the form with your basic information so that a member of our team can get in touch with you. It’s a great first step for senior singles who are looking for an effective option outside of the standard senior dating sites.

4 Critical Safety Concerns with Senior Dating Sites

The best way to continue framing this discussion is to look at the four biggest safety concerns when it comes to choosing to use a senior dating site, or choosing which senior dating site to sign up with.

Let’s be real…technology may not be your strongest skillset.

Being safe sometimes requires being blunt, so here we go. If you’re in the over 50 dating or over 60 dating camps, you didn’t grow up with technology like today’s generation. This means that your experience and proficiency with technology is probably not going to be your strongest suit unless you’ve spent years catching up with it.

Guess what? That’s okay. There is nothing wrong with it. However, realizing this is what’s important.

If you’re honest with yourself about how much you know about technology, it can help to lower your risk substantially when it comes to finding love online.

AI has really made things interesting (and potentially scary). 

Speaking of AI, it has really made things challenging on senior dating site companies when it comes to protecting users. Here are some of the ways this is happening:

• Scammers can make fake pictures that look real to trick you into thinking they are someone else.
• Bad actors from foreign countries (where a large percentage of online scams originate) can use AI to translate languages, so you don’t notice any broken English as a red flag.
• AI can even be used for fake voices on phone calls, fake video messages, and more.

Some senior dating sites (not all of them) are trying to stay ahead of the scammers, but it’s expensive and not a perfect system. The reality is if you choose to use senior dating sites, no matter if the site is the best at protecting users, you’re still going to have to do your part to spot romance scams.

Romance scams may be nearly $20 billion annually.

According to the FBI, romance scams account for nearly $1 billion in losses annually. However, additional data shows that based on low reporting numbers from victims, actual losses could be closer to $20 billion annually. 

This is heartbreaking, but it’s a reality. 

People know seniors may be more vulnerable.

Here’s the worst part. When you look at the FBI data, the group that is the most susceptible? Over 60 singles. Nearly a quarter of all cases in the referenced year were from singles over 60. If you include over 50 singles, it’s over 40% of the cases.

Important Safety Tips for Choosing a Senior Dating Site

We understand that personalized matchmaking isn’t always going to be the best fit for everyone (though, we’d encourage you to at least take advantage of the free call to find out). If after that you decide it’s not, here are some safety tips for choosing the best senior dating site for you.

• Do your research. – Take the time to check out the claims that the senior dating site is making. Just because they say something on their website doesn’t mean you should automatically take it as correct.
• Ask friends. – You have to be careful here because one person having a good experience doesn’t automatically make something safe. That said, getting some insight from someone who has tried a senior dating site before you is always better than going it blind. 
• Remember who is in charge of your safety. – While senior dating sites should do their part to keep you safe, at the end of the day, your safety is your responsibility. Spend some time studying up on senior safety tips (this guide from the Healthy Framework Center for Digital Safety is a good start), learn a bit about the capabilities of AI, research the most popular romance scams, and be prepared.
• Have a plan. – Have a deliberate plan in place of what you’re going to do if you encounter something that feels wrong. Create a list of people you know who are great with technology (like maybe a kid, grandkid, friend, etc.) that you can share with. And when something feels off? Don’t be scared to reach out to one of these trusted confidants before you do something you aren’t comfortable with. 
• Make sure you’re talking to a real person. – Unfortunately, the root of most romance scams is someone pretending to be someone they’re not. Sometimes, it’s not even a real person, but a computer (called a bot) designed to scam people. Sadly, we’ve personally heard horror stories from clients who have lost millions of dollars from using senior dating sites. Do your best to ensure you’re talking to a real person. Don’t let them continue to use excuses as to why they can’t video chat or meet in person.
• If someone asks for money, run. – The number one rule to keep yourself safe is that if someone asks you for money (no matter how heart-wrenching their reason may be), run. Scammers are masters at building a connection with their victim and then knowing exactly how to pull at their heart strings in a way that gets them to send money. If someone asks for money for any reason at all, just run.