Fraudsters are increasingly using middlemen to handle goods fraudulently purchased online. These so-called parcel mules are being recruited through dating sites by unscrupulous conmen posing as potential partners for the lonely and gullible or via bogus job adverts.

A lower rent version of money mules - the intermediaries in phishing scams who receive money taken from compromise bank accounts and transfer it to fraudsters abroad - parcel mules handle fraudulently purchased goods instead of cash transfers.

By using a middlemen, the orchestrators of scams find it easier to get goods delivered to overseas location while minimising the possibility that they might be arrested for their misdeeds.