Web of deceit in murky world of online affairs sites

Not that it really matters, but just out of curiosity, what size are your feet?"

This was just one of the messages that our undercover reporter encountered when she dipped one of her size sixes (not that it matters, ahem) into the perverted and bizarre world of online cheating.

• Affairs ‘guaranteed’ for £214

• 1m Brits on cheating website

• More than 100 Black Country women looking for fling

In their foray into secret web trysts, our girl along with a male colleague encountered randy pensioners, salacious images, and downright smut.

Posing as Isabelle from Brisbane, Australia on sites Ashley Madison and IllicitEncounters, we received sexual advances from married men within seconds. After just 15 minutes there were 20 messages and 'gifts' – so-called virtual presents – from male users.

And it seems he was right. Aside from glancing at a few headlines and intros surrounding the Ashley Madison data leak, and some awkward/disturbing/hilarious tales from friends about their misadventures with Tinder, I had no idea what I was getting myself into when I set up a profile for an online dating site.

So I turned to Google.

Signing up to IllicitEncounters, which claims to have more than one million users across the UK with a fairly even female to male ratio, I filled in the bare minimum of profile details. Using a combination of clichés and statements copied from a 'female online dating profile'.

I also included a few details that could be applied to thousands of girls fitting the Brisbane or Gold Coast, Australia, stereotype. It sounded much more exciting than a 37-year-old from Telford.

Hitting 'save', I waited for the profile to be activated. Within minutes, the notifications had started popping up.

So-and-so has sent you a message, it told me. Joe Bloggs viewed your profile. Such-and-such has sent you a virtual rose, or a teddy bear, leather whip, pink fluffy handcuffs or another cheeky digital gift that the website allows it's users to send.

Within a quarter of an hour, 'Isabelle' got close to 20 messages, 'gifts', and men sharing their passwords to unlock their secret, hidden photos. There's a reason they're behind a password wall.

By the next day, the number of men pursuing me online had quadrupled, with some sending a follow up message when their initial contact had been marked as read, but not responded to. Even after weeks of inactivity, the messages start to roll in after just a few seconds of my profile showing up as 'online'.

The messages range from polite and chatty intros, asking more about 'Isabelle' – the 30-year-old, married Brisbane native who enjoys yoga and high street shopping – some detailed their upcoming business trips and days they would be in the West Midlands for, well, illicit encounters, and others wanted to know more information. Like the size of my feet.

Aside from the multiple 'g'day Sheila's and jokes about how things are going 'Down Under' – all very original material – there were plenty who seemed genuinely interested in getting to know Isabelle better, and shared a lot of their own backgrounds.

How many children they had, what they did for a living, how they were hoping to replace some of the spark that had died in their marriage by embarking on an extra-marital affair.

And while the speed and brazenness of the messages shocked me a bit at first, it is a site specifically designed for people looking for something outside of their relationship, so it's not surprising many of them cut straight to the chase. Truth be told, it was nowhere near as sleazy as I had been expecting.

What still surprises me is how many messages are still rolling in, despite having minimal details on the profile and absolutely no interaction with many of them. Maybe the mystery of it all added a bit more excitement to their online fantasy world?

While I am definitely not looking for an illicit encounter myself, I can see why an estimated 90 million people around the world turn to dating apps in their search for a fling or something more long-term.

You're exposed to a massive pool of potential candidates, far more than you come across on a Friday night at the pub, and can start up a bit of banter and narrow down your short list without even leaving the house. In some cases, you barely have to say a word and suddenly you have admirers beating down your virtual door.

"I'm looking for discreet fun times, preferably with a younger lady." said 42-year-old Nick from Birmingham. Pretty tame so far.

"So how has Brisbane's hottest export ended up in the industrial Midlands?" asked 39-year-old Jimmy. You're such a charmer Jimmy.

But then it turned seedier.

Some men wasted no time with an introduction, they wanted to get straight down to business.

"I will be in your area next month for a day if you are available for a discrete meet?" said one.

"I'd love to meet up at some point. I'm based in Gloucester and can also travel. Days are best for me and I'm desperate to keep this confidential so will also respect your privacy," said 45-year-old Peter.

A 49-year-old said: "I live in London. However, I was up north a number of times this past month, including to and through the West Midlands and the northwest. I am up north quite often due to my job."

Suddenly, our reporter was bombarded by requests to meet up for sex. Amid the flurry of lustful advances, there was the desperate, the strange, and the creepy.

"I really do hope that my initial warm heart/gut feeling about you being both serious and genuine, is indeed correct," said Barry from Oldbury.

And another was really keen to find out about our feet. To each his own, we suppose, but we weren't sharing pictures of them – these little piggies will not go to the sleazy online market.

Elsewhere, a user called Keen777 said: "Please ask me anything you like, I promise I don't bite. . . not unless you want me to that is." Yikes.

In the space of a fortnight our reporter received more than 100 messages from men looking for sex.

Every time she logged online, a new wave of fresh messages would arrive.

She was sent passwords to view what were intended to be raunchy pictures the men had taken of themselves – some explicit.

The interest was so frantic that she was forced to turn off the notification setting which automatically sent her an email alerting her to the messages as her inbox filled.

The experience of our male reporter was nowhere near as full-on.

Whereas female users of Ashley Madison and IllicitEncounters can use the site for free, men have to pay. And it's not cheap.

For Canada-based Ashley Madison, an introductory membership costs £46 plus a £15 initial admin. An advanced membership known as 'affair guarantee' costs a cool £214.

Gold membership on IllicitEncounters ranges from £59.99 to £199.99. Our male reporter received a modest seven messages from women looking for affairs on Ashley Madison and six on IllicitEncounters. And he had to pay the hefty premium to even read and reply to the women who had shown a passing interest.

One was a 42-year-old from Featherstone. She said she was looking to 'replace the passion' missing from her marriage.

Alongside a series of sexually explicit pictures she gave a small disclaimer: "Just a bit of honesty, my boobs may look great in the pic but they look nothing like that when there not being held up. The spring has gone out of them so to speak!"

And the type of guy she hoped our reporter would be?

"I'm looking for a dominant type of person who can teach a beginner all about being a sub as never done anything like it before. More so want the bondage than the whips etc but would also like to do normal things like go on dates etc."

(Sub meaning she wants to be submissive in bed. How very Fifty Shades!)

"I can drive, so if we need to we can meet half way if you live far away or at hotels," she said.

Who would have known that cheating on your spouse would benefit society so much?

Since the 2010 general election, 525,248 new members have joined IllicitEncounters seeking affairs. Currently, there are now more than one million members worldwide on the site.

"Our members have greatly contributed to the nation's economic strength," Simon Francis, CEO for IllicitEncounters.com said.

"Affairs inject huge funds into society. Hotels, dinners, drinks, flights, presents and extra phones all add up.

"Smaller, struggling hotels and restaurants benefit the most from adulterers – their popularity is because of their discretion. Bigger, more popular hotels and restaurants are busier and have an increased risk of lovers being seen by someone they know. Affairs should be silent, hidden and discrete but the great affairs, the ones to remember, don't come cheaply, which is why most of our members are richer, better educated and more successful than the average person – and pay more tax. Osborne's budget has hugely benefited from all of the adulterers across the UK."

A room at the Ramada Hotel in Birmingham can cost £200 a night, Travelodges in the Black Country start from £78. The average IllicitEncounters member spends £3,255 a year on their mistress which reportedly adds £1.2 billion to the UK economy.

A Midlands hotel was named the most popular affair stop-over. The site surveyed more than 6,000 of its unfaithful members who revealed the Metropole Hilton Hotel at the NEC, Birmingham, was the most common stay.

The Old Bank Hotel in Oxford and The Hide, London, were named second and third most popular.

The website has dubbed 2015 the year of the affair.

It claims that in January more than 3,500 female members joined – a record in the site's 11-year history.

Spokeswoman Claire Page said: "There has been a clear change in attitudes toward adultery in the last few years, but 2015 indicates something much bigger.

Our man described himself as a 30-year-old government communications professional with a 'cheeky and outgoing' personality.

In all, there were more than 100 women from the Black Country with online profiles on Ashley Madison. There was Laurie, aged 35, from Bilston.

She said: "I'm looking for excitement in my life as it's well overdue and whatever that may or may not lead to. Open for all kinds of possibilities."

And there was Carol, 29, from Wolverhampton. She described herself as: 'a hot dominant female' looking for 'someone male and submissive to satisfy my voracious sexual appetite and willing to obey and serve me as your mistress'.

And she told our reporter she was not fussy about appearance. She said: "Overweight and hair don't matter, I'll shave what I don't like and put you on a diet and exercise programme if I decide you need it."

It's like a stylist and dietician all in one!

"Message me if you're interested," she invited.

There was also Louise, 30, from Wednesbury. She left little to the imagination in her list of things she would like to do in bed. But, unlike the others, she was single.

"Why am I here? Because I don't know if I want a relationship," she admitted. "Conventional relationships have the pressure of moving onto something more. I don't know what I want, or when I want it."

And Sara, 35, from Oldbury, was far too graphic in her detail to repeat.

Both her and our reporter share the Aries star sign. And that was all he wanted to share with her after reading her message.

And he found it was not just coupled-up middle-aged people missing their mojo who were on the prowl.

He found four people over the age of 65 from the Black Country and one from Birmingham looking for affairs. There were two 70-year-olds from Dudley and Walsall looking for new men, a 69-year-old from Smethwick, a 65-year-old from Wombourne, and a 72-year-old from Birmingham.

And the other extreme, an 18-year-old from Highley, Shropshire described herself as a 'sugar baby'. Sugar babies are young women who are bought expensive gifts by older richer men in exchange for sex.

A 20-year-old from Birmingham was also clear that she was after a rich older man. Her profile, which included four posed pictures, read: "I am exclusively looking for a sugar daddy/sugar baby relationship with allowance."

Despite its motto being 'Life is short, have an affair', Ashley Madison denies it advocates cheating.

In the not-so-distant past, such sins were the domain of office workers who'd sneak off together after work in the cover of the night. But now, if the stats are to be believed, it's more widespread than ever.

A user from Maryland in the United States is suing the parent company of Ashley Madison for reportedly using thousands of fake female accounts, according to legal papers filed to Maryland District Court.

Christopher Russell, who says he joined Ashley Madison after separating from his wife, spent $100 in credits to chat with real women on the site, only to find his chat partners were mostly so-called 'fembot' fake profiles, the lawsuit states.

These fembots were revealed after the personal information of Ashley Madison users was leaked by hackers in August, according to the file.

The lawsuit claims that Ashley Madison hired employees to generate thousands of bogus female profiles and more than 70,000 female robots to send male users messages.

Ashley Madison had marketed its site as having 5.5 million legitimate female profiles, the lawsuit alleged, when in fact hackers say 90 to 95 per cent of female profiles are fake, according to reports.

"Defendants' fraudulent and deceitful acts were designed to wilfully and knowingly mislead customers into signing the customer agreement, joining the website and spending money," the lawsuit states.

Now, an affair is readily available at the click of a mouse or the press of a button on a smart phone, and we discovered that it's an eye-opening and astonishing array of sexual peccadilloes.

Ashley Madison was propelled into the limelight this summer after the personal details of 37 million customers were hacked and published online.

Many predicted the demise of the website but owner Avid Life Media claims hundreds of thousands of new users signed up for the site, including 87,596 women, last month.

The company said: "Ashley Madison does not encourage anyone to stray or have an affair, despite our trademark, 'Life is short, have an affair'.

In fact, if you are having difficulty with your marriage or relationship, you should seek counselling. Despite, stereotypes about philanderers abound, most unfaithful people do care about their spouse, despite looking for certain fulfilment outside of their current relationship."

IllicitEncounters describes itself as a 'non-judgemental, no-pressure environment'.

"Unlike other sites, our sign-up ratio of female to male members is around 45:55 – which means no one is going to be outnumbered or bombarded by messages.

"We take the safety and anonymity of our members very seriously, which is why we offer special features, such as password protection on photographs, to protect their identities.

"We will also never share any of your personal data or contact information with other dating sites – when you sign up to IllicitEncounters.com, that's all you're signing up to."

The experience, rather than leaving our female reporter appalled, actually left her feeling sorry for the hordes of desperate men.

Some are trying it on, others are just lonely.

Our male reporter, who would not be described as prudish by any stretch, was shocked by the brazen nature of the sites.

But he's also slightly miffed that he's still waiting for a reply to his messages.