夜雨聆风📖 【导读】
本文是2026年6月17日发表在《经济学人》上的专栏文章，由书评延伸讨论“杀猪盘”式爱情诈骗的社会根源。作者通过记者Carlos Barragán的调查，揭示西非贫困与西方孤独如何在同一块屏幕两端相互驱动，并探讨AI时代对这类诈骗的冲击。
🎭 标题
Why Westerners are falling for love scams
为什么西方人频频坠入“爱情骗局”
Romance fraud is driven by poverty in west Africa and loneliness in the West, a new book argues
一本新书指出，情感诈骗的驱动力是西非的贫困和西方的孤独。
A cyber cafe in Lagos, Nigeria
尼日利亚拉各斯的一家网吧
Photograph: Eyevine
图片：Eyevine
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It was love at first sleight. As with many relationships, Brian’s and Silvia’s courtship started on Tinder. Brian, a dashing American soldier, sent Silvia, a Spanish dentist, passionate affirmations of love: “I want you to be a happy wonderful woman, someone I would love to share more than my life with.” Brian said he was coming to Spain, and Silvia bought two rings.
这是一见钟“骗”。和许多恋情一样，布莱恩和西尔维娅的求爱始于Tinder。布莱恩是一位英俊的美国士兵，他给西班牙牙医西尔维娅发去热烈的爱情宣言：“我想让你成为一个幸福美妙的女性，一个我愿意与之分享我生命之外一切的人。”布莱恩说他要去西班牙，西尔维娅买了两枚戒指。
📖 生词短语
· sleight /slaɪt/ 伎俩，手法（此处双关“爱情骗局”）
· dashing /ˈdæʃɪŋ/ 风度翩翩的，潇洒的
· affirmation /ˌæfəˈmeɪʃən/ 肯定，宣言
· courtship /ˈkɔːtʃɪp/ 求爱，恋爱期
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But Brian was not a real soldier; he was a scammer posing as a suitor. He told Silvia he had found bars of solid gold while on deployment in Syria. Silvia’s son grew suspicious. He thought it might be a scam and that his mother would be asked to send money to cover the shipping. They used an IP-address tracker to find out where Brian’s emails were coming from: the fraudster was in Lagos, Nigeria.
但布莱恩并非真士兵；他是一个伪装成追求者的骗子。他告诉西尔维娅，自己在叙利亚服役时发现了金条。西尔维娅的儿子起了疑心。他认为这可能是个骗局，母亲会被要求汇款支付运费。他们用IP地址追踪器查出了布莱恩邮件的来源：骗子在尼日利亚拉各斯。
📖 生词短语
· scammer /ˈskæmə/ 骗子
· suitor /ˈsuːtə/ 追求者
· deployment /dɪˈplɔɪmənt/ 部署，服役
· suspicious /səˈspɪʃəs/ 怀疑的
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Silvia is not the only lonely Westerner to be wooed by a phoney Romeo. Romance scams are one of the most costly types of fraud in America, according to the Federal Trade Commission: people gave away nearly $1.5bn to so-called “love scammers” in 2025. In Britain reports of romance fraud jumped by nearly a third last year, with people losing as much as £1m ($1.3m).
西尔维娅并不是唯一被假罗密欧追求的孤独西方人。据美国联邦贸易委员会统计，情感诈骗是美国代价最高的诈骗类型之一：2025年人们向所谓“爱情骗子”送出了近15亿美元。在英国，去年情感诈骗的报案数跃升近三分之一，受害者损失高达100万英镑（约合130万美元）。
📖 生词短语
· woo /wuː/ 追求，求爱
· phoney /ˈfəʊni/ 假的，虚伪的
· Federal Trade Commission 美国联邦贸易委员会
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Silvia’s son, Carlos Barragán, was distressed and baffled that his mother had been duped. So in 2022 he flew to Lagos to search for the scammer. Though it proved impossible to find the real Brian, Mr Barragán discovered the “criminal underworld” of romance fraud. In an engrossing new book he takes readers from Kentucky to Lagos to explore how loneliness in the West and poverty in west Africa are “two sides of the same screen”.
西尔维娅的儿子卡洛斯·巴拉甘对母亲被骗感到痛苦和困惑。于是2022年他飞往拉各斯寻找骗子。虽然最终找不到真正的布莱恩，但巴拉甘发现了情感诈骗的“犯罪地下世界”。在一本引人入胜的新书中，他带领读者从肯塔基到拉各斯，探索西方的孤独与西非的贫困如何是“同一块屏幕的两面”。
📖 生词短语
· distressed /dɪˈstrest/ 痛苦的，忧虑的
· baffled /ˈbæfəld/ 困惑的，不解的
· duped /duːpt/ 被骗，被蒙蔽
· underworld /ˈʌndəwɜːld/ 地下世界，黑社会
· engrossing /ɪnˈɡrəʊsɪŋ/ 引人入胜的
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Many love scams are run by crime syndicates in South-East Asia. Mr Barragán expected to find a “sophisticated network of fraudsters” in Nigeria, too: instead he encountered unemployed young men in rough neighbourhoods, who use copy-and-paste scripts rather than complex manipulation tactics. Many work alone, staying up all night to avoid their parents’ prying eyes.
许多情感诈骗由东南亚的犯罪集团操控。巴拉甘原以为尼日利亚也会有“复杂的骗子网络”，但他遇到的却是贫困街区的失业青年，他们使用复制粘贴的话术脚本，而非复杂的操纵策略。许多人单独作案，熬夜工作以避开父母的目光。
📖 生词短语
· syndicate /ˈsɪndɪkət/ 犯罪集团，财团
· sophisticated /səˈfɪstɪkeɪtɪd/ 复杂的，精密的
· manipulation /məˌnɪpjəˈleɪʃən/ 操纵，控制
· tactic /ˈtæktɪk/ 策略，手段
· prying /ˈpraɪɪŋ/ 窥探的，爱打听的
🌍 背景知识
· “Yahoo Boys” 源自早期尼日利亚骗子使用雅虎邮箱发送诈骗邮件，现泛指这类网络诈骗群体。
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A small boy who had previously worked as a scammer sits in a chair in Ikotun, Nigeria.
一名曾做过骗子的男孩坐在尼日利亚伊科敦的一把椅子上。
Photograph: Carlos Barragán
图片：卡洛斯·巴拉甘
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In Nigeria Yahoo Boys—a nickname that nods to the email addresses scammers once used—say they rely on fraud to survive. Between 2022 and 2025 Mr Barragán spent months in Ikotun, a poor neighbourhood in Lagos, witnessing the effects of high youth unemployment and rampant inflation. He saw that for scammers like Azeez (pictured), a 14-year-old tailor’s apprentice, a $10 gift card from a British victim is worth more than his family pays in rent a month. (With some of their earnings Yahoo Boys prop up local businesses, splashing out at fancy boutiques and nightclubs.) Mr Barragán asks workers, policemen, academics and Yahoo Boys themselves to estimate the share of young men who are involved in such scams in Lagos: their answers range from 45% to 80%.
在尼日利亚，雅虎男孩——这个绰号指向骗子曾使用的邮箱地址——说他们靠诈骗生存。2022年至2025年间，巴拉甘在拉各斯贫困街区伊科敦度过了数月，亲眼目睹了高青年失业率和恶性通胀的影响。他看到，对于像14岁裁缝学徒阿齐兹（见图）这样的骗子来说，一张来自英国受害者的10美元礼品卡，比他家一个月的租金还值钱。（雅虎男孩用部分收入支撑本地生意，在高端精品店和夜店挥霍。）巴拉甘询问工人、警察、学者和雅虎男孩本人，估计拉各斯青年男性参与此类诈骗的比例，答案从45%到80%不等。
📖 生词短语
· rampant /ˈræmpənt/ 猖獗的，失控的
· inflation /ɪnˈfleɪʃən/ 通货膨胀
· apprentice /əˈprentɪs/ 学徒
· prop up 支撑，扶持
· boutique /buːˈtiːk/ 精品店，时装店
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The Yahoo Boys call their victims “clients” to make their work seem legitimate; some see their relationships as transactional, providing companionship in exchange for cash. They share tactics with each other for finding vulnerable victims online, as well as the latest pickup lines and plausible scenarios to ask for money to be wired. Some pretend to have a sick child who needs help; others blackmail victims, threatening to share intimate pictures if they do not pay up.
雅虎男孩称受害者为“客户”，让工作显得合法；一些人视这种关系为交易，以陪伴换取现金。他们互相分享在网上寻找脆弱受害者的策略，以及最新的搭讪话术和要钱的合理借口。有人假装有生病的孩子需要帮助；有人敲诈受害者，威胁不付款就公开私密照片。
📖 生词短语
· legitimate /lɪˈdʒɪtɪmət/ 合法的，正当的
· transactional /trænˈzækʃənəl/ 交易性的
· vulnerable /ˈvʌlnərəbəl/ 脆弱的，易受伤害的
· pickup lines 搭讪语
· plausible /ˈplɔːzəbəl/ 看似合理的
· blackmail /ˈblækmeɪl/ 敲诈，勒索
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Mr Barragán wonders how credulous Westerners can fall head-over-heels for such smarmy scripts. He looks “for a con so intricate it might justify” his clever mother believing it. But he finds something alarmingly simple: the scammers are successful because they provide attention to lonely people.
巴拉甘困惑，为何轻信的西方人会为这种油嘴滑舌的话术神魂颠倒。他寻找“一个足够精巧的骗局，好让自己聪明的母亲上当也情有可原”。但他发现了一个令人震惊的简单事实：骗子之所以成功，是因为他们给了孤独的人关注。
📖 生词短语
· credulous /ˈkredjələs/ 轻信的，易上当的
· head-over-heels 神魂颠倒地
· smarmy /ˈsmɑːmi/ 油滑的，谄媚的
· con /kɒn/ 骗局
· intricate /ˈɪntrɪkət/ 精巧的，复杂的
· alarmingly /əˈlɑːmɪŋli/ 令人震惊地
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AI will complicate love scams. It could make it easier to target a much larger number of victims with personalised correspondence, without relying on teams of boys and men (and growing numbers of women) in Nigeria or elsewhere. But AI could also offer safer ways for people to feel less lonely. Various apps now provide virtual lovers that are even more fawning than fraudsters. As Mr Barragán puts it, AI partners provide “a fake relationship without the betrayal”. Yahoo Boys may struggle to compete with that. ■
人工智能将使爱情骗局更加复杂。它可能更容易以个性化通信瞄准更大数量的受害者，而无需依赖尼日利亚或其他地方的大批男青年（以及越来越多的女性）。但AI也可能提供更安全的方式，让人们减少孤独感。各种应用现在提供虚拟恋人，比骗子更会献殷勤。正如巴拉甘所说，AI伴侣提供“一段没有背叛的虚假关系”。雅虎男孩可能很难与之一较高下。
📖 生词短语
· complicate /ˈkɒmplɪkeɪt/ 使复杂化
· personalised /ˈpɜːsənəlaɪzd/ 个性化的
· correspondence /ˌkɒrəˈspɒndəns/ 通信，信件
· fawning /ˈfɔːnɪŋ/ 奉承的，谄媚的
· betrayal /bɪˈtreɪəl/ 背叛，出卖
🌍 背景知识
· AI虚拟恋人如Replika等应用，提供情感陪伴，可能成为未来“反诈骗”的替代选择。
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🎯 重难点总结
· “love at first sleight” 是对 “love at first sight” 的仿拟，意为“一见面就上当”，妙用“sleight”（伎俩）。
· “two sides of the same screen” 形象说明诈骗双方虽远隔千里，却在同一块手机/电脑屏幕两端，互为因果。
· 文中“clients”“transactional”等词揭示骗子自我合理化的心理机制。
· 数字“45%到80%”反映诈骗在拉各斯青年中的高渗透率，体现社会经济压力之深。
