The worst part of an online romance scam isn't the money. It's that it breaks a person's trust in the world.
A friend's parent was scammed.
The money was only a small part of it. The deeper wound was what happened after — he stopped trusting people. He felt foolish, embarrassed. Even a friend's joke could hurt. He went quiet, then closed off.
The root of it is the digital divide
For our generation, doing a reverse image search on a photo isn't hard.
For him, it was.
He knew how to use LINE — or he believed he did. That belief, the "I know how to use it," is exactly what made him tap the strange message the moment it arrived.
I looked for tools that already existed
There were reverse-image tools — but none built for "the same face used under different names."
- Google Lens — finds images that are visually identical. But scammers re-crop, adjust color, or add logos. The original is easy to evade.
- TinEye — strong on stock and copyrighted images. Weak on the same face surfacing across social media accounts.
- PimEyes — does face matching, but at USD $15–30/month subscription with a credit card requirement. A high friction barrier for any non-technical family member you'd want to help.
Nothing was designed for the use case I needed — "this face, under a different name, somewhere else on the open web" — at a price you'd pay for a single check, like USD $1.
So I built VerifyAI
An iOS app that does one thing:
One face photo in. A report out telling you where that face — that exact image — has appeared on the web, and what other names it's been used with.
Pricing is intentionally micro-spend:
- Single check: NT$30 / ≈ USD $1 (3 checks for NT$60, 10 for NT$220)
- No subscription, no credit card required
- New users get 3 free checks
- Uploaded photos are deleted immediately, user data isn't stored, nothing trains third-party models
Who tends to use it
Most people who open VerifyAI are already suspicious. A few patterns:
- Suspicious about an online romance — someone on LINE or a dating app, photo looks fine, but money asks come at suspicious moments
- Worried about an aging parent — a parent chatting with an "investment teacher" or a friend they've never met in person
- Checking a profile photo for a friend — something feels off and they want a second pair of eyes
- Checking themselves — wondering if their own selfies have been scraped and reused as a scammer's profile picture somewhere
This post isn't asking you to download
You may not need it.
But if there's an older relative in your life — talking to an "investment teacher," getting close to someone they've never met, and not telling you about it —
You can install this for them. They don't have to ask anyone. They can just check.
The simpler the tool is, the fewer of those "felt foolish in front of a friend" moments need to happen.
Download VerifyAI (iOS, App Store)
3 free checks for new users · NT$30 per single check · no subscription, no credit card, upload-then-delete