SHE is the world’s most famous victim of romance fraud but has the woman behind The Tinder Swindler documentary finally found her happy ever after?
Cecilie Fjellhøy tells about her new life eight years on from being defrauded out of more than £188,000 at the hands of a sophisticated conman.
Cecilie Fjellhøy was scammed out of £188,000 by the Tinder Swindler Credit: E4
Cecilie says shat she was swept off her feet by Simon Leviev Credit: ABC
The handsome, charming son of an Israeli banking magnate, swept Cecilie clean off her feet when they matched on back in 2018.
The then 29-year-old Norwegian had moved to London from to study for a master’s degree when she swiped right on the popular dating app, with the couple meeting for drinks at the capital’s swanky Four Seasons Hotel on Park Lane.
The son of a the well dressed businessman soon introduced his smitten new girlfriend to a life of , luxury hotel stays and extravagant gifts, with his bodyguard in tow.
In reality, however, Simon Leviev was a sophisticated con man skilled at extracting money from people as Cecilie revealed in 2022’s jaw dropping Netflix documentary, the Tinder Swindler which became the platform’s most watched documentary, ever.
Today Cecilie still struggles to secure credit cards or rent properties Credit: ABC
Cecilie was wooed by Leviev’s private jets and millionaire lifestyle Credit: ABC
“I’m still searching for love,” she tells The Sun.
“I am still single, it takes a certain individual to be able to handle the work I do now and everything.
“I’ve learned what’s important in life and that is not male love – there are many types of love and I have friends in my corner, plus my family.”
Today, technology graduate Cecilie works as a global anti-fraud activist, keynote speaker and television host, recently fronting Netflix documentary Love Con Revenge which saw her turn investigator to help other victims of romance fraud.
Fraudster Shimon Hayut, who would style himself Simon Leviev, has never been charged in relation to defrauding Cecilie and is estimated to have conned women across Europe out of a staggering £7.6 million in total.
Hayut was convicted of unrelated fraud, theft and forgery in Israel in 2019, serving five months of a 15-month sentence and previously served time in Finland back in 2015 for conning three women.
Last September, the conman was arrested in Georgia at the request of Interpol, with his lawyers announcing he was released without any sanctions.
“I am still suffering from the long term effects,” says Cecilie, who went bankrupt after taking out £200,000 worth of loans for her ex.
“I’m trying to rent a place six years on from what happened and I need a guarantor.
“I can’t even have a credit card.
“There’s a lack of trust in yourself: how can I trust anything ever again?”
At the age of 26, Cecilie had just moved to in 2019 when she met on Tinder in 2018.
HELP SPOTTING A DEEPFAKE SCAM
Digital bank Starling’s in-app Scam Intelligence AI agent can detect scams including romance, pension, deepfake and investment scams.
When it comes to romance scams, for example, a customer could say they’ve been asked to transfer £3,000 for a plane ticket for their new partner.
Starling Assistant will detect the initial signs of a romance scam and ask a series of questions, such as why their partner can’t fund it themselves, where they met, and how long they’ve been in a relationship.
Following these questions, the AI agent will advise the customer on whether it’s likely to be a scam and suggest a call with the bank’s support team to discuss further.
“When friends and family try to break that spell, it can cause huge rifts that push you away from the people who genuinely care and even closer to the scammer,” says fraud advocate and scam victim Cecilie.
“Sometimes it needs someone or something objective, like your bank, to help you see the scammer’s behaviours for what they really are.
“It’s great to have been involved in helping bring this feature to life and see it make a difference to people’s lives.”
“I right swiped on a man who I met up with in person very quickly. And he was the CEO of a big diamond company,” she previously told The Sun.
“It started quickly, moved into a relationship that was incredibly nice, he was super attentive, charming.”
For Cecilie, it started as a whirlwind romance – he showered her with hundreds of roses delivered to her door, but within a matter of weeks, Simon would ask Cecilie to help him out financially.
Besotted with the image of her perfect man, Cecilie was happy to help out the man she loved and pay for his travel as competitors of the diamond were hunting him down.
The conman promised to pay her back but her balance went up and up.
He then spent the money on plane tickets, hotels and dinners that were booked under her name to throw off suspicious ‘enemies’.
Cecilie said she filled out documents for an American Express platinum card on his instructions and he told her to file an income of £200,000.
She claims he assured her no one was going to check it and took out huge loans for the card – with Hayut maxing out the limit.
Cecilie told Norwegian news site Verdens Gang that she took the handsome young Israeli at his word.
Hayut spent two million Norwegian krone ($224,220) in just 54 days and was racking up bills on paying for his two assistants, his bodyguard and flights across the world.
Her money was being spent on Louboutins in Bangkok, on Gucci in Barcelona, at the Ritz Carlton in Berlin and the Conservatory in Amsterdam.
Cecilie was not the only victim and the activist still hears from victims of The Tinder Swindler and says that nowadays, they are embarrassed to have been conned by such a notorious figure.
“As a society as a whole, we have a responsibility not to glorify these types of individuals and I don’t care to give him any attention because he likes it,” says Cecilie of the man himself.
“He thinks he’s special but he’s not, he’s quite evil.”
New statistics from UK Finance, the trade association for the banking and financial services sector, revealed romance fraud losses increased 23 per cent year on year, with investment frauds rising by 40 per cent in that time.
“I don’t think people realise how many ‘Tinder Swindlers’ are out there,” says Cecilie, who receives messages from people who have been scammed most days.
“I get so many messages in my channels and if they are real time ones, I’m on it, I’m so grateful that they’re reaching out.
“I tell them: ‘Please don’t send more money’ and it makes my heart so happy when I can help them.”
The activist has been working with Starling Bank on a new AI-powered scam feature that can detect romance scams, breaking the scammer’s psychological ‘spell’ and preventing victims from transferring money.
Cecilie Fjellhøy isn’t the only one who fell for his tricks Credit: Cecilie Fjellhoy Instagram
He used sophisticated tricks to scam his victims Credit: Simon Leviev/Facebook
Cecilie now believes getting close was just a part of his scheme Credit: Cecilie Fjellhøy
The Israeli man arrested in Greece over alleged defrauding of Scandinavian women Credit: EPA-EFE
Hayut went on to tell his girlfriend he was receiving death threats from enemies wanting to get to his fortune.
This meant that rather conveniently, he couldn’t use his own credit cards or book anything under his own name, so with her boyfriend’s life at risk, she stepped up to help financially.
“Scammers sometimes try to put us in ‘hot states’ where we’re not thinking clearly,” she says.
“Dopamine, adrenalin, everything is going through our body.”
“AI has a bad reputation when it comes to scams but talking to a tool rather than a human being, if you’re embarrassed you might lower your guard more,” she adds of the new banking technology.
“It could make people even more honest.”
Cecilie says that scammers are trying out new tricks all the time, with social media helping their efforts.
“People are portraying fake realities online – we’re living on social media these days, where you can rent a Ferrari or rent a space where it looks like you’re sitting in a private jet,” she says.
“It is a long grooming process over sometimes weeks, months and years that makes it feel like a safe space.
“You feel you can trust them, that’s what makes it so evil.
“It’s not only about the amounts of money they take but the lengths they are willing to go to.
“I spoke to the victim of one fraudster who pretended to be a doctor, he didn’t even work for a hospital, he would go out in scrubs at 11pm, with a stethoscope around his neck.
“This type of behaviour is wild.”
Cecilie is keen to point out that fraudsters like The Tinder Swindler aren’t just Casanovas: they’re happy to defraud anyone else too, from friends to business partners.
“I hope that by talking about it, other victims don’t feel alone anymore,” she says.
“Their lives aren’t over, there is a future and there is light at the end of the tunnel.”
The fraud advocate has never recovered any of the money she was conned out of by Hayut, who began committing minor cons in his teens and is not related to the Israeli businessman Lev Avnerovich Leviev, known as The King of Diamonds, despite claiming to be his son.
The fraudster is believed to still be living a champagne lifestyle and, just like Cecilie suspects, seems to be enjoying his notoriety with a memoir The Tinder Swindler: In His Own Words, released last year.
But despite her ordeal, Cecilie is not giving up in her quest to find romantic love and she also isn’t letting go of hoping that one day, her scammer will properly get his comeuppance.
“I have no idea where he is but there are things in play,” the activist, who was joined by fellow victims Pernilla Sjoholm and Aileen Charlotte in the original Tinder Swindler documentary, tells The Sun intriguingly.
“I know he has an open investigation so we will see in the future.
“I will always have a hope that we can get justice.”
Eze Chidiebere Paul
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