Sen. Maggie Hassan led a bipartisan congressional inquiry into romance scams on online dating platforms after victims described losing money through relationships with people they met on the internet.
The investigation by the Joint Economic Committee examined Match Group services including Tinder, Hinge, Match and Plenty of Fish. Its findings were released in October after a yearlong investigation led by Hassan, the panel’s top Democrat, and Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., who chairs a Senate subcommittee on consumer protection and data privacy.
Romance and confidence schemes caused nearly $1 billion in reported losses in 2025, according to the FBI’s Internet Crime Report for that year. The congressional inquiry focused on how scammers use dating services to establish trust, create false emergencies and persuade victims to transfer money.
A victim lost more than $700,000
One case described to investigators involved a woman who joined Tinder last year after her husband died. She matched with a user who said he was from New Jersey. After gaining her confidence, the person fabricated several emergencies, including a heart attack and an arrest in Mexico, according to the committee’s findings.
The woman sent money to the person she met online. After the fraud was discovered, another group contacted her and offered to help recover the stolen funds. That offer led to a second fraud involving cryptocurrency, according to the findings. The woman ultimately lost more than $700,000.
“A romance scam takes more than money. There are wounds nobody sees. You question every conversation, every promise you believed. Some lose savings, homes, and futures. Some lose faith in love.” — the victim, whose name was not released
Hassan discussed the inquiry in an interview about the committee’s work. She said online platforms need to understand the size of the criminal networks operating through them and connected the spread of scams to advances in artificial intelligence.
“It’s really important for all of these tech platforms to understand the scale of the criminal enterprise that is the global scam industry. We are seeing scams just explode as AI has developed and become more and more effective.” — Sen. Maggie Hassan
Questions about platform detection
The committee’s examination included the technology Match Group uses to identify suspicious accounts. As of the second half of 2025, Tinder had not updated most of its machine-learning models in years, according to the findings. The inquiry included the experiences of victims as well as the companies’ systems for detecting fraudulent activity.
- The investigation covered Tinder, Hinge, Match and Plenty of Fish.
- The FBI recorded nearly $1 billion in losses from romance and confidence schemes in 2025.
- The committee’s work was led by Hassan and Blackburn as part of a bipartisan investigation.
The inquiry places Hassan among federal lawmakers examining how dating companies respond to scams that can involve both financial losses and lasting emotional harm. The findings also document how an initial romance fraud can be followed by a separate recovery scam targeting the same victim.
