All Articles Tagged "scams"
The Time I Realized A Guy Who Wanted To Date Me Was A Professional Con Artist…
What exactly makes someone a “con artist”?
After checking out a few definitions on a couple dictionary websites, the best way to put it is that a con artist is someone who is “adept at lying, cajolery, or glib self-serving talk.” Sadly, I have been swindled by people in the past, but the type of con-artist I was dealing with this time around not only tried to swindle me with his lies, but he manages to swindle people out of money every day.
While going on a walk for exercise in my neighborhood one day during the summer, I had my headphones in, my jam was playing, and I was thoroughly enjoying working up a sweat and getting some sunshine at the same time. Maybe that’s why I was so disturbed when a very tall men came out of nowhere and decided to start walking next to me, talking before I even realized he was there and before I had the chance to speed up my walk and act like I was deaf. As he kept walking with me and the minutes passed, I thought that maybe I had dropped something, or hey, maybe there was a hole in my pants that I didn’t know about. So when I paused my music and said, “huh!?” I was disgusted to find that he was, of course, talking about NOTHING. He went on to introduce himself and ask me a series of questions that included answers that were none of his damn business:
“I saw you walking and I couldn’t help but notice how pretty you are. My name is *Mike, I live in this neighborhood. I actually live down there *points*. Are you from this neighborhood? You’re not? Where do you live? Oh, sorry, I was just asking. So what do you do for a living? Because I actually own my own business. So I was wondering if I could take you out for a date? Would you want to do dinner? You say you have a boyfriend? Does your boyfriend live around here? I’m just asking…If you say you have a boyfriend, why isn’t he here with you right now, huh? He’s at work? Aw okay. You want to take my number? Maybe we could be friends? Okay, nevermind then. Well, it was nice to meet you, I’ll see you around.”
As fast as reading all that probably was for you, in reality, this conversation took almost five long minutes. I was doing my best to shrug him off, but this guy wouldn’t stop following me. Funny thing was, I actually tried to call my boyfriend in the middle of our conversation so that I could pretend somebody called me and I would be saved, but that boy didn’t pick up the phone. WOMP. After a few minutes passed, I started to get a little scared, but luckily for me, this very tall man, dressed like the dudes who stand on the street from the AM to the PM, talking to one another while doing nothing, gave up on his macking attempts and decided to crawl back to wherever he came from. I was hoping it would be the last I saw of him, but sadly, it wasn’t. And the next time I DID see him, homeboy was a completely different person. Literally.
While coming home from church on a random Sunday a few months ago, this same guy, let’s continue to call him *Mike, hopped on the train car I was on, trash bag in hand, shirt and pants a little dingy. I didn’t know where he was going to or coming from, but when I recognized his face, I tried my hardest to keep my head down. But he wasn’t paying me any mind, he was trying to get paid. Mike dropped his trash bag on the floor and proceeded to talk in a range of creepy voices. that when audible, sounded like gibberish. He touched his fingers together as though he was putting together a well-thought out point, and he actually sounded like a sick version of Boomhauer from “King of the Hill,” but a lot less easy to understand. At no time did he stop and say that he wanted anyone’s money, but he walked back in forth in the car, hand out, collecting the dollars of sympathetic passengers who assumed he was homeless and maybe mentally unstable. My mind was blown. A couple months later, I saw him again, different outfit, same black trash bag, same act–same response from a few passengers. I found myself with my face so turned up by him when he would get on the train, I thought maybe I should stand up and scream “FRAUD!” But as I’ve come to learn in NYC, it’s best (for your safety) if you mind your business and keep your mouth shut. Clearly he wasn’t someone worried about right or wrong, so who knows what he would do if I jumped up and acted a fool to expose his trickery.
I thought to write this crazy story because just this past Sunday, I ran into him again. This time, he had changed it up. No longer was he playing the inaudible man, but this time, he was speaking clear English, stomping around and cursing like he had Tourettes. While some looked sympathetic, and others looked a bit scared, I just walked in the other direction, extremely happy that I had dodged a bullet when he initially walked next to me last summer, a nice, normal looking man who just wasn’t my type. Now, it’s clear that he was none of that, and that the “business” he owned was Scams “R” Us. I’m not sure how long he’ll keep this act going, and who knows, he could really have some serious issues that could use some help, but seeing as how is issues and ailments change as much as his outfits and the seasons do, I’d assume not. If you come to New York and run into this fella, walk fast, and keep your dollars to yourself. You’ve been warned.
Seniors Losing Thousands of Dollars, Scammed By ‘Free Lunch’
Image: Ron Chapple Studios
More bad news about people taking advantage of the elderly.
Seniors are being swindled out of an average of $140,500 after falling for all sorts of scams. The most common of them is a “free lunch” scheme, which promises a complimentary meal when older attendees show up. Ultimately they’re being sold fraudulent investments. The Certified Financial Planner Board of Standards surveyed 2,649 financial planners and 73 percent of them said they know at least one senior citizen who fell for this.
More than half are also receiving cold calls and unsolicited emails with investment offers. Many are being overcharged for medical care. And they’re being tricked into participating in sweepstakes and contests that ask for personal banking information, which is used to siphon cash from the victims’ accounts.
Once again, this survey found that relatives and others that have a close relationship with their elderly victims are the committing these atrocious acts. But also, it’s a reminder that you must have a talk with your loved ones to make sure there’s no funny business going on.
Moreover, it’s worth it to sit down with older members of the family and warn them about the new variety of scams that they may fall prey to. Many older people don’t want to think they can fall for a financial trick, especially one that seems obvious. But the fact is there are some very creative people out there who have come up with new ways to get at people’s money. And they’re banking on an older person’s unfamiliarity with the Internet. It might not be something older and mostly wiser adults want to hear. But it’s worth more than $100,000 to try and send that message.
Don’t Fall For That! Five Scams and Ways to Avoid Them
Photo: Hemera
If some people can’t get their hands on your money or personal information by legitimate methods, they’re perfectly willing to use shady techniques to line their pockets. A quick Google search will turn up tons of articles about online scams, identity theft, and other cons that dishonest people are using to get your hard-earned cash.
We asked the folks at Scam Detector about five common scams they’re seeing out there and the best ways to avoid them. Scam Detector is a Web-based app that detects over 550 different acts of fraud, from financial ploys to social media trickery. This slideshow features the company’s responses and advice. Some of these schemes may seem pretty simple, but they’re successful nonetheless.
Single Ladies Beware: Romance Scams Are On The Rise
When the loneliness gets too hard to bear, many people seek comfort from the Internet. But be careful— romance scammers are waiting. We’re not talking about the kind that try to steal your heart and turn out to be just as trifling as the ones you met in person. We’re talking about the scammers that are simply out for your money. Reuters reports that romance scams are “long-term romantic relationships that thieves cultivate with a potential victim.” In the midst of the holiday season, they’re on the rise.
When it comes to romance scams there is no discrimination: victims range from 18 to 81 and come from all socioeconomic backgrounds. Although scam artists make it difficult to give romance scams an exact number, Western Union reports that these scams are one of the top five customer complaints. Since November, the company has observed a 30 percent increase in romance scam reports.
Barb Sluppick, who was almost a victim herself, tells Reuters that “if you are on the Internet and you have an email address and you are open to having a relationship with someone, you can become a victim.”
She founded the support and awareness internet group Romancescams.org, and has had more than 48,000 people join her site since 2005. 1,165 people on the site have disclosed how much money they lost to scammers lost with a total of $14.1 million.
The scam starts off simple enough with a friendly and innocent meeting on a dating site or forum. After weeks and sometimes months of communication over email, phone calls or instant messages, a trust begins to form between the two budding lovers, so that strong that they can begin to ask for money. Sometimes the person needs money to help pay for travel to see you, their newfound love. Sometimes they tell you they need help paying for holiday gifts or for a series of unfortunate events that have happened recently.
“I am not an ignorant person. I am educated and intelligent,” Jan Miller said to Reuters. The registered nurse and mother of three thought she had found a wonderful potential mate in a guy she met online who claimed to be living in Seattle.
“I told myself he has to be real, because why would anyone spend that much time talking to someone if they were not real?”
Her internet “friend” asked her for money after he had run into misfortune while on a business trip in London. Miller obliged and when it didn’t seem as if he was coming back to the US, she slowly began to realize she had been scammed, and found out he was part of a team of scammers in Nigeria.
According to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center, most of the scams derive from Nigeria, Ghana, England and Canada. In most of these international scamming cases, the money is never recovered and the thieves are hard to shut down.
Perhaps it’s best this holiday season to enjoy your singleness and your money. If you do choose to chat with someone online, keep in mind that until you’ve met this person, he/she doesn’t deserve a dime of your hard earned money. After all, we are still in a recession.
More on Madame Noire!
How ATM Skimming Scams Work
(Chicago Tribune) — On the last Sunday in May, federal agents watched as two men dropped off a third near a Citibank branch across the street from Our Lady of the Resurrection Medical Center in Portage Park. At the bank, the man installed a device on an entrance door that, when patrons swiped their card to enter, recorded their account data. Inside the vestibule, he installed keypads that fit atop the existing pads on three ATMs to capture the PINs customers entered, according to a court filing. Federal authorities allege the three men were part of an Eastern European ring operating in Illinois, New York, California and Florida that has stolen at least $1.5 million. Charges filed under seal in New York allege one member stole almost $550,000 and compromised 639 bank accounts over three months. While a major case involving craft retailer Michaels drew attention to ATM skimming last month, the crime is not new. A Tribune review of federal charging documents filed in Chicago since 2009 shows the range in how such schemes work, from restaurant servers or store clerks getting paid to skim customers’ credit cards to more sophisticated work by overseas groups.
Fighting Fraud at Your Business
(Businessweek) — Small business owners reported $8 billion in fraud losses in 2010, mainly related to hacked credit cards and bank accounts, according to a new study of about 900 small business owners and self-employed individuals by Javelin Strategy & Research, a research firm in Pleasanton, Calif. Of that $8 billion, some $5.43 billion was out-of-pocket expenses incurred due to fraud, including lost business, legal fees, and insurance payouts, says Philip Blank, a senior research analyst at Javelin and author of the study. Blank spoke recently to Smart Answers columnist Karen E. Klein. Edited excerpts of their conversation follow.
Karen E. Klein: Your study documents a 27 percent decrease in consumer fraud from 2009 to 2010 and an even bigger decrease in fraud, 45 percent, for small and midsize business owners. Why did the fraud rate drop last year?
Philip Blank: Just as a general rule: As the economy drops, the fraud rate increases, and as the economy increases, the fraud rate decreases. So part of the decline is due to increasing sales and GDP in late 2010. Part is unfortunately due to the fact that some small and midsize businesses closed during the economic downturn. But there’s also been improved education about credit-card fraud, and the larger small companies are instituting best practices in line with payment card industry compliance and tighter regulation. There was also a decline in existing card fraud, which small businesses are about 50 percent more likely to suffer than consumers.
Watch Out for Cons When Paying Debt
(Bankrate) — That angry voice on the phone insists you owe a debt you’ve never paid. But you don’t recognize the debt or the collector. Before you apologize or promise to pay, consider another scenario: It’s not your debt at all. It could be a con — a ruse by a clever scammer. Or it could be a case of “tagging,” in which a collector chases you for a debt that belongs to someone else. Both scenarios pose problems for consumers, advocates and regulators. ”It’s increasingly becoming more common,” says Nadine Samter, an attorney with the Federal Trade Commission. Much of it is unintentional: debt buyers who haven’t done their due diligence, she says. But some of it is phishing, she says. Con men “get an account number and just try and get money.”
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Is Your Phone Making You a Scam Target?
(Bankrate) — From iPhones to Android phones, the proliferation of smartphones has made consumers more vulnerable to scams aimed at getting banking and other personal information. So far, the attacks aren’t as widespread as they are on the Internet, but they are expected to increase as more consumers use their smartphones to conduct banking transactions. ”The bad guys out there want to target the platforms that give them the biggest bang for their buck,” says Andrew Hoog, chief investigative officer at viaForensics, the Chicago-based digital forensics and security firm. “The new juicy target is smartphones.” Many smartphone users use their phones for work as well as pleasure. That means scam artists have access to potential business information and personal data that can compromise someone’s identity.
Don’t Get Hustled While on the Job Hunt
(Daily Finance) — Some people kick you when you’re down, and with the effects of the recession lingering on through the jobless recovery, there are plenty of people down there to kick. Scams targeting the unemployed and cash-strapped are on the rise, and the con artists are getting more creative and sneaky. The Federal Trade Commission and its partners recently announced that they have brought more than 90 enforcement actions in a stepped-up campaign against scammers who falsely promise “guaranteed” jobs and opportunities to “be your own boss” to those who are struggling with unemployment and diminished incomes as a result of the recession. ”Working for a nonprofit credit counseling agency, we see too many people who are taken in by these scams because they are desperate and looking for a way out,” says Linnea Stephan, a certified financial planner with Lutheran Social Service of Minnesota. “That means that the rules on what to look for change, as the scammers will do whatever they can to look and sound legit,” she adds.
Don’t Get Hustled While on the Job Hunt
(Daily Finance) — Some people kick you when you’re down, and with the effects of the recession lingering on through the jobless recovery, there are plenty of people down there to kick. Scams targeting the unemployed and cash-strapped are on the rise, and the con artists are getting more creative and sneaky. The Federal Trade Commission and its partners recently announced that they have brought more than 90 enforcement actions in a stepped-up campaign against scammers who falsely promise “guaranteed” jobs and opportunities to “be your own boss” to those who are struggling with unemployment and diminished incomes as a result of the recession. ”Working for a nonprofit credit counseling agency, we see too many people who are taken in by these scams because they are desperate and looking for a way out,” says Linnea Stephan, a certified financial planner with Lutheran Social Service of Minnesota. “That means that the rules on what to look for change, as the scammers will do whatever they can to look and sound legit,” she adds.
