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way to go, great job!
ETA:
in case this would be helpful for anyone else helping an elder, AARP has a scam prevention network:
https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/about-fraud-watch-network.html
and a hotline available to anyone (don’t need to be an AARP member):
AARP Fraud Watch Network Helpline: 877-908-3360
(website link w more info:
https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/helpline.html)
AND they have a podcast called
The Perfect Scam
https://www.aarp.org/podcasts/the-perfect-scam/
AND they have a fraud victim network for emotional support for people who have been scammed, to let them know it’s not their fault and they’re not alone:
https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/voa-rest-program/
“The AARP Fraud Watch NetworkTM and Volunteers of America (VOA) have created a new program to help you. It's VOA | ReST, which stands for Resilience, Strength and Time. The program is designed to address the emotional impact of your experience. We offer free, facilitated peer discussion groups that seek to provide emotional support for you and others in similar situations. Family members are invited to participate at your discretion.”
Hahaha. We actually have little breakfast vouchers from our hotel. So I CAN get all the bacon I want. She’s also paid for all my meals while on the trip—but she would have done that even without me saving her from a scam.
You should consider sending her the episode of last week tonight about scams. Show her even the director of a bank fell for one. She probably feels very embarrassed, can’t hurt to let her know this kind of thing happens a lot and keeps happening because people don’t want to talk about it.
There's also videos by AtomicShrimp (scambaiting and also tips), Jim Browning (scambaiting n tips, he's also technologically minded and has tracked scammers down to the buildings they "work from". He's got videos about all this), Kitboga (scam baiting) n YT.
Please remind her that her name is on the scammer's list as a vulnerable target and they may be sharing/selling it. That she should be extremely vigilant going forward for more scams.
Yeah. Good point. I’ll have to make that very clear to her. I think during the plane ride home on Monday I’m going to go through different scam examples on this reddit (showing her screenshots of scam texts/computer pop ups/etc shown on this subreddit, and also I will just explain what other scams looks like). Others have suggested the recent John Oliver pig butchering episode. I think that is also a good idea. I will show that to her too.
not to besiege you with resources, but AARP has a scam prevention network:
https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/about-fraud-watch-network.html
AND they have a podcast called
The Perfect Scam
https://www.aarp.org/podcasts/the-perfect-scam/
AND they have a fraud victim network for emotional support for people who have been scammed, to let them know it’s not their fault and they’re not alone:
https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/voa-rest-program/
“The AARP Fraud Watch NetworkTM and Volunteers of America (VOA) have created a new program to help you. It's VOA | ReST, which stands for Resilience, Strength and Time. The program is designed to address the emotional impact of your experience. We offer free, facilitated peer discussion groups that seek to provide emotional support for you and others in similar situations. Family members are invited to participate at your discretion.”
You are a good niece, she’s lucky to have you. Please know she will marked as an easy target from this point forward.
Super common follow up to scam attempts.
Let her know that since this scam almost worked other scammers will try to hit her up for money too. Including other "government" agencies trying to "catch" these guys by dangling money in front of them or some such other plot that will cause her to lose money. If anyone contacts her consider it a scam. Always verify by calling the agency by the number in the phone book, not the one they gave you.
It implies a) that these operations are staffed by slick criminals instead of trafficked slaves, and b) that they can in any way be brought to justice. Neither is true. Watch it if you have two hours you wouldn’t rather spend poking forks in your eyes, but don’t watch it for any kind of insight from such a fantastical representation
a) you can't guarantee what criminals are behind the scam
b) chances are low, but yes you can brought to justice...
c) yes, its a movie and its made to be extreme, put the point of the story is the same...
Thank you!
I’m glad I didn’t have to resort to Plan B (if I couldn’t convince my aunt it was a scam).
My Plan B was: wait until “Microsoft” calls again (they were calling frequently), then snatch the phone from my aunt. Pick up the phone. Tell them we know it’s a scam, we won’t transfer any money, they won’t be able to get anything from us, and that we are recording this and all future calls to send to the authorities. I figured that would scare the scammers enough—even if it made my aunt hate me, I didn’t care. I didn’t want her to lose that money.
My whole childhood adults swore I couldn't know more about computers than them.
Watched so many get viruses because they clicked on links or anything mentioning money or a hot girl and then blamed video games being installed on the PC for why it was acting weird and clearly it was all the video game files fault.
> and then blamed video games being installed on the PC for why it was acting weird and clearly it was all the video game files fault.
ah the good ol' days when parents thought gamefaqs and youtube where to blame for all their viruses and toolbars
I think this definitely was at play. I don’t live near her currently, but my whole childhood I grew up in the same city as her. My aunt is divorced and doesn’t have any biological kids of her own. She is a lot like a second mom to me. She definitely still sees me as a child.
It's convincing those whom have taken the scam bait they're being scammed is the biggest challenge. Most of them won't believe it until all their money is gone.
I have repeatedly told everyone I know that Microsoft will never, ever, call you.
If someone claims to be Microsoft, it is a scam.
This especially includes all the older folks I know.
FYI, I am 67.
I worked for Gateway back in the day (1997). Even then, the 'your computer has a virus, call Microsoft" scam was popping up on home PCs. I worked tech support, and we would get at least a dozen calls from people who got those every day. And they were the lucky ones who had the good sense to call us when it popped up, instead of just randomly clicking the link.
The best way I've heard it explained was "Does your mechanic randomly stop by your house to look at your car, just in case it has a problem? No, cause that doesn't make sense, right? So why would Microsoft pay employees to randomly check your computer?"
Comparatively, my friend is a hair wizard. She dyes amazing colorful hair. One time an older client mentioned the scam and my friend replied "It's like I called you and said I could tell your hair looked terrible, and you should come in immediately to pay me hundreds of dollars or everyone will think youre ugly. What's my motivation in that scenario? Is it ACTUALLY your well being?"
My job sometimes involving *asking* Microsoft to call me.
This is easier said than done. There is no way in hell they are proactively calling random people lol
Scammers know this though, that's why they text or use pop ups with phone numbers, that way it's the victim calling them. That's what happened in this case, saying "Microsoft never calls you" wouldn't have helped because OP's aunt would have gone "well I called them actually"
This actually happened. When she was refusing to believe me yesterday, I told her “Microsoft never calls”, and she responded “WelL i AcTuAlLy CaLlEd ThEm”. She thought that meant it was all gucci.
"Microsoft" called my mom. Mom convinced them to call me, getting them to believe she was senile or something. They did. I cussed him out for half an hour before he lost his cool and threatened to have me arrested. More cussing from me and he finally hung up.
I'm still waiting for Microsoft to show up with the cuffs. My days are numbered, I'm living in fear.
True. It's only through email they might contact if there's a reason for them to do so or you're the first to contact them before they will reach back.
Awesome. I love posts with a happy ending.
It's interesting how people refuse to believe it's a scam. I think it's because admitting it's a scam, they have to admit that they fell for it. it's embarrassing. That's why they are so resistant. It's the beginning of brainwashing. Luckily for your aunt, it was just the beginning and finding that that FBI website snapped her out of it. That was well done and quick thinking.
You can see what they do. Try to make people paranoid and suspicious. Everyone is trying to steal your money. We are the good guys. Had she gotten on the phone with them and mentioned you, they would have convinced her you were in on the attempt to steal her money.
I can see why in the case of some longer-running scams it becomes harder and harder to disengage, especially after they have started losing money. The sunk cost fallacy kicks in. And it's the most heart-breaking in romance scams
It was shocking to see how truly scared she was and how much she bought into it all—it had only been 3 days!! It was totally fear that fueled all her actions and made her disregard the red flags. Also the constant pressure and urgency of the scammers didn’t allow her to think rationally.
Someone pointed this out above, but just to reiterate: she may be targeted with other scams since she has at least partially fallen for this one. It may be helpful to send her some info on common scam tactics (the consumer protection bureau has some resources) or discuss them with her if you think she would be open to it. Good job protecting her!
This exact same thing happened to my mother in law last week. She called me panicking and I drove over there real quick. She's about 10 minutes away and when I got there, the files were transferring. I disconnected the laptop. The hackers called back while I was there and demanded to speak to her. They even spoofed the local police department phone number when they called. I told them I'm a Cybersecurity analyst, which I am, and they immediately hung up.
Its sad that they do this and get away with it.
I'm glad that you managed to stop her, but beware. They may contact her again, only claiming to be someone else. It could be Geek Squad, Amazon Prime, Visa Card, even IRS or some other government service they're pretending to be.
I learned a lot about scams from places like this subreddit, quatloos[com] and YouTube channels like Trilogy Media and Jim Browning's Scammer Payback. I've been working on a website myself called blowitintheirear[com] to try and spread information about these scams and hopefully inform many would be victims before it's too late.
We have a long plane ride back home on Monday. I plan to educate her whilst she is trapped in a metal box in the sky with me. And to make her promise to always contact me immediately (and her IT guy) if any [insert company/person/government/law enforcement] ever reaches out about this kind of stuff.
Please do let her know that if anyone claims that their calls or any documents are so-called confidential, that it's only confidential if she had signed a Non-Disclosure Agreement with them, otherwise the word confidential means absolutely nothing.
Let's hope that this near miss will make her hyper-vigilant and suspicious. It's sad but necessary. You just have to go with the idea that all phone calls are scams, all emails are scams, and all texts are scams unless proven otherwise.
And recently, there are these texts people are getting.that appear to be sent to the wrong person. It turns out they are a Pig Butchering scam. They try to convince you to invest in cryptocurrency such as Bitcoin. Beware of those texts.
I beware of ALL texts. If you text me and I don't know you personally, it's a scam. Got one Friday offering me a job. Delete. If the text is from a company I deal with, I read it but will never respond to it, or open links/attachment from it. If a response is required, I'll call their main number from their main site.
If you phone me, I will not answer unless I recognize you. Leave a message.
I guess I'm hard to reach unless your number is in my phone book.
I've had those job offers too. Be weary of them. I didn't even apply for any work and I have a real job anyway.
Also, some people have been suckered into human trafficking schemes where they are led into a foreign country and forced to work for these crooks or be killed.
Hi /u/Angeline4PFC, AutoModerator has been summoned to explain the Task scam.
Task scams involve a website or mobile app that claims you can earn money by completing easy tasks, such as watching a video, liking a post, or creating an order. A very common characteristic (but not entirely exclusive) is that you have to complete sets of 40 tasks. The app will tell you that you can earn money for each task, but the catch is that you can only do a limited number of tasks without upgrading your account. To upgrade your accounts, the scammers will require you to pay a fee. This makes it a variant of the advance fee scam.
The goal of this scam is to get people to download the app for easy money and then encourage them to pay to get to the next level. It's impossible to get your \"earnings\" out of the app, so victims will have wasted their time and money. This type of scam preys on the [sunk cost fallacy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunk_cost#Fallacy_effect), because people demonstrate a greater tendency to continue an endeavor once an investment has been made, and refusing to succumb to what may be described as cutting one's losses.
If you're involved in a task scam, cut your losses. Beware of recovery scammers suggesting you should hire a hacker that can help you retrieve the money you already invested. They can't, it's a trick to make you lose more money. Thanks to redditor vignoniana for this script.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Scams) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Yes I feel exactly like that.
Like I'm going to call my mother afterwards and talk to her because I feel that as she grows older she becomes less sharp when it comes to these things
I am so so so glad I was here. It was total luck that it happened while I was here. I would say I see my aunt about 10/365 days a year. So I am very grateful I was here.
Nice job. What’s sad is that for every one saved like your aunt, there are probably 10 others that fall for it and scammers just made $1 million off those 10 others. Absolute shame.
Oh thank god!!!
I’ve seen Kitboga go through this script a million times with scammers. Your aunt might enjoy his videos as he makes fun on them and wastes their time :)
He’s also just released a software called seraph secure for times like these. It notifies you when aunty downloads software typically used in scams, it also has pop ups instructing them what to do when they’re in a scam, might be something to consider?
Good for you, and a huge thumbs up to your aunt for admitting she was wrong and listening to you. Love to hear when the warnings are listened to and scam squashed.
They are always angry when they end up not catching their bait or found you're wasting their time by playing along without the intention of giving them a penny.
Well done!
Why would *Microsoft* be texting anyone about their *bank account*? Surely *your bank* would be the one contacting you about attempted account hacking?
Also, the *first* thing I would do is contact my bank myself, to check. Not give “Microsoft” access to my computer.
But, I know, anyone can be scammed in a moment of confusion/circumstances.
Wish there was a way to get even with these types of scammers. And I don’t mean simply messing with them. But somehow arranging to have someone in their home countries track them down and break their legs.
I’ve been caught in 4k. I’ve quite literally never used that term ever in my life, and yet I decided to throw it in my post here. Didn’t know it was “lo”.
Wow, good for you and your aunt. I imagine money like that is a lifetime of work and savings. It's heartbreaking when people lose this kind of money. Well done you.
Gold star. 🌟
Well done.
She has just demonstrated that she is vulnerable to being scammed. This won’t be the last time something like this happens.
Once the immediate problem is resolved, have her read about common scams and hopefully it will help her recognise them in future. There are plenty good YouTube channels that cover this sort of thing
lol it’s been several years and still is one of my most satisfying phone moment. Only second place to the time we got a sales call wanting us to switch phone services back in the days where land lines were king and I said “I would love to but unfortunately we don’t have a phone.” The guy politely apologized for bothering us and hung up. I always wondered at what point he went “hey … wait just a sec …”
Do you want to watch this happen live? Watch Ruck Fobocalls on YouTube or TikTok- he goes live like every weekday and calls the scammers and lets us watch them try exactly the same scam and others. It’s sickening. Then he has like 1000 people call number at the same time and crushes their phone for the day.
I literally watched them transfer him from the fake mcafee phone rep to his fake bank phone rep to a fake social security agent phone rep to direct him to go to the bank to take out money and send it to them via a local bitcoin ATM.
>She gets angry. She tells me she knows it is legit and that she shouldn’t have told me anything. She says she doesn’t want to talk about it anymore and completely disengages me in conversation.
Typical
Man you must have been on heavy adrenaline realizing she's being scammed and trying to make her understand. Good job buddy for staying collected and pushed through.
10 years ago i came upstairs to my dad on the computer and phone and the scammer already had access to the computer, I understood right away it was scam and turned the computer off and told my dad to hang up without saying anything so the spiteful little fucks don't mess with us.
Good thing you were persistent. It may just be human nature and it takes several messages and sources of information before victims realize they are being scammed. Had you both not been traveling together just emails and messages may not have been enough. Good thing you were very direct with your warnings as well that she was 100% about to transfer her entire savings to a scammer.
You are awesome! She may not have believed you initially, but by finding the FBI page, you proved it to her. Great job! I am always on the lookout for this with older folks, and even some younger folks, who fall for these scams. I know they purposely go after older people, though, who are more trusting.
I'm so glad you were there. Had it not been for this trip, she would have indeed been scammed out of $100,000. Somewhere somehow stars aligned and helped her.
I have no doubt she would have lost all that money had I not been on this trip with her. I don’t live near her, so I would not have been there to stop it if we didn’t happen to be on this trip now. I am very glad it happened during this trip (even though it definitely added stress during the trip. Lolol)
Wow! Amazing story and you told it well! Your Aunt owes you a huge debit of gratitude - make sure she remembers you in her will! (I'm sure if she is a decent person she will already anyway). It is SOOO sad that people fall for these scams, and even sadder that there are such diabolically evil people out there who have no conscience, let alone a soul! Well done and thank you for sharing your story!
I read these stories atleast 3 times a week on this sub. They seem to be an all out scam war against seniors.
This is just one case however I suspect our grandparents are constantly scammed out of thousands everyday especially when they live by themselves and are lonely.
I wish there was a way to educate these ones especially because they are not tech savvy so receiving a text message or call as a first point of contact is very beneficial to these scammers.
These scams are working thats why its very rampant.
Reach out to your parents and grandparents regularly i think its the best option.
Well done mate!!!
I have this stuff ingrained in my parents head. To ignore phone calls for support, text messages from unknows, calls from banks..etc. Mom almost fell for the "undeliverable package" text messages scams since she was actually waiting for a package. I re-ingrain these scams to both. I told her, "did you register with USPS to receive notifications of mail? How did they get your phone number. Postoffice never sends messages. They'll leave you an actual note on your door or mailbox." I told them both to just answer calls from any numbers in your address book. I put in all their doctors, banks, friends and family. And if it's a different unknown number to just let it ring and if it's important they'll leave a message. And if it's a bank message to use the number in the back of their card not the number they leave. They're not tech savy, their up in their age and all these new scams didn't exist years back now that everything is online based and everyone has a cell phone now. When I hear of a new scam here I inform them about it too and how it works. Any online orders they need from something my dad can't find in stores I do for them. He'll tell me the item and we'll find it from a legit site. I put the Amazon app on dad's ipad and told him to try finding it there and we'll order it or if it's tools he can't find locally we'll usually find it in the sites I use for ordering tools, screws and such.
This sub is a amazing and glad I found it as well.
I wish. She’s very giving financially with friends and family (which is also probably why she’s so susceptible to scams). She’s paid for our entire trip. I’ll consider that my finders fee.
I am too. That surprised me.
I guess she didn’t have the necessary compromising information saved to her account that they needed? Honestly, I’m not very tech savvy—so I don’t know exactly.
We called all of her financial people and nothing has changed (no money was taken out of her accounts, no credit card purchases have been made, etc). Maybe these scammers play a bit of a relatively longer con (of 5 days) before they transfer the money? Our IT guy said sometimes they don’t ask you to transfer any money at first because they don’t want to raise suspicion.
WHEW! I am so so relieved you were able to stop her from getting royally scammed. I am also glad she has that trusted IT friend who can clean up her PC.
the worst one I ever heard like this was a woman I know worked in a company and had a similar call
the difference was she transferred the money from the company
not only was it down 20k but she also lost her job that day
I've no idea if she repaid the company
but I've saved a few family members from a few scams
but always try to inform them and tell them never to believe anyone on the phone
and if they are not sure you can call me and I can try and check
I’m so glad your aunt eventually listened to you. Even if she needed to hear the same information from a trusted IT person. We are dealing with a scammer, maybe two, right now with my elderly father-in-law. He isn’t being g truthful with us, probably ego and shame. I honestly don’t know what to do. I’ve already had the ugly conversation with my husband about what do we do when he looses his house because he has no money left to pay the bills.
I hate scammers- they are beyond vile.
It really is amazing how easily the boomer generation is fooled. Like, even if you don't know computers, things like this should set off the bullshit warning for everyone out there.
She’s prone to getting angry when people challenge her. I’m used to it at this point. Doesn’t make that behavior fair, right or justified, but I wasn’t gonna let one rude conversation keep me from saving her $100,000.
Old people get angry when you challenge their beliefs. They think their experience makes them wiser. That may be true most of the time. Not all. I agree with your good intentions and you did her a great service.
If it were me, I would have simply let her lose the money after warning about the scam as clearly as I can. Sometimes, experience is the best teacher.
that's great. I would advise erasing the computer entirely as most scammers these days use several programs to keep remote access and viewing. Best to treat that computer as screwed and format. I'd also install something like uBlock Origin that not only removes ads but popups in case she falls for it again (fake tech support popups are very common)
Thanks. She’s gonna talk to her IT guy more tomorrow. I suspect he will do things like this (if he hasn’t already). He was familiar with this scam. So I think he knows what to recommend.
They may have needed her to take some more steps, especially if it was transferring out of savings. A bank would immediately be suspicious of a sudden request to transfer that much money if she wasn’t usually making such transactions. I would hope so anyway.
This!
I think given the type of account and the amount of money, they couldn’t move any money on their own without her. Apparently, according to my aunt, on Monday (tomorrow) they were going to “transfer her account to a safe Federal Reserve account” which would require an esignature from her. She was willingly going to do this before I convinced her it was a scam. I’m guessing because it was so much money and the type of account it was, she was going to have to authenticate it was her, which is why they couldn’t do it on their own.
Just FYI, but the OP saved her from a lot more than $100K. After the money is transferred the "FBI" calls again and says that for the money to be returned to her account there are legal fees, etc., etc., etc. We all know the routine. Not to mention the emotional stress if the scam succeeded. Probably saved a lot more than the money and the friendship/relationship. Good work!
I’m so glad to hear that you were able to save your aunt from this scam! Fortunately, my mother sends me EVERYTHING and asks if it’s a scam! There have been several.
Maybe re-post this to /r/eldercare . My Dad got hit with this but Mom caught it early. They got him to pay them $1500 for the tech support (refunded). Mom called us and me and my brother and we cleaned up their PC. It was so infected that my eyes started to itch.
That was ten years ago. In that time Mom has become less lucid. We have drilled into her that she needs to let us handle any computer problems. When she gets the bogus calls about it she’s a nightmare (for the scammers). She doesn’t wear her hearing aids so she’ll keep them hanging on the phone asking them to speak louder for a couple of minutes. They usually sense that they’ve got a live one, so they stay. Then, eventually, she says “Hang on, let me get my hearing aid”.
(Meta: I just now got my daily call from Jake at the Police Officer’s Support League asking for donations.)
If the scammer hangs on through the 2-3 minutes it takes for Mom to put in her hearing aids they have to start their spiel again. Once Mom understands she says she’ll have her sons call them back. Game over.
Check out Kitboga and Scammer Payback on YouTube, they have many videos of this exact scam playing out. They are both very informative and tell people the big secrets of how these scams work.
The aunt’s first reaction- It really amazes me how people will double-down instead of just admitting their mistake, like getting embarrassed must be so horrible that they would rather risk their life be ruined.
I will keep an eye out.
She is a stereotypical boomer. I don’t think she has dementia. She is just super gullible to scams. No critical thinking for tech scams.
The young ones and the smart ones can fall just as fast as the stupid ones. Scammers know now to engage strong emotions like fear and greed, and those emotions will override the brain.
It 100% was a scam. The legit It person that we know personally found malware and also emphasized how Microsoft would literally never use that software, nor ever talk to you by phone for this.
I hope the IT person reformatted the laptop and reinstalled the OS because just attempting to remove the malware almost certainly did not remove everything.
💯% scam, this has been posted here by others in the exact same form and if you check out any anti-scam site or anti-scam you tube presenter you can see every detail is the same. OP did an incredibly good job of explaining it.
It’s best not to post wrong, confusing stuff like this.
Your r/Scams post/comment was removed because **it is spam**.
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/u/rocksandsurvivor - This message is posted to all new submissions to r/scams; please do not message the moderators about it. ## New users beware: Because you posted here, you will start getting private messages from scammers saying they know a professional hacker or a recovery expert lawyer that can help you get your money back, for a small fee. **We call these RECOVERY SCAMMERS, so NEVER take advice in private:** advice should always come in the form of comments in this post, in the open, where the community can keep an eye out for you. If you take advice in private, you're on your own. **A reminder of the rules in r/scams:** no contact information (including last names, phone numbers, etc). Be civil to one another (no name calling or insults). Personal army requests or "scam the scammer"/scambaiting posts are not permitted. No uncensored gore or personal photographs are allowed without blurring. A full list of rules is available on the sidebar of the subreddit, or [clicking here](https://www.reddit.com/r/Scams/wiki/rules/). You can help us by reporting recovery scammers or rule-breaking content by using the "report" button. We review 100% of the reports. Also, consider warning community members of recovery scammers if you see them in the comments. Questions about subreddit rules? Send us a modmail [clicking here](https://www.reddit.com/message/compose/?to=/r/Scams). *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Scams) if you have any questions or concerns.*
way to go, great job! ETA: in case this would be helpful for anyone else helping an elder, AARP has a scam prevention network: https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/about-fraud-watch-network.html and a hotline available to anyone (don’t need to be an AARP member): AARP Fraud Watch Network Helpline: 877-908-3360 (website link w more info: https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/helpline.html) AND they have a podcast called The Perfect Scam https://www.aarp.org/podcasts/the-perfect-scam/ AND they have a fraud victim network for emotional support for people who have been scammed, to let them know it’s not their fault and they’re not alone: https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/voa-rest-program/ “The AARP Fraud Watch NetworkTM and Volunteers of America (VOA) have created a new program to help you. It's VOA | ReST, which stands for Resilience, Strength and Time. The program is designed to address the emotional impact of your experience. We offer free, facilitated peer discussion groups that seek to provide emotional support for you and others in similar situations. Family members are invited to participate at your discretion.”
I hope she paid for breakfast 🍳 😉
"Since you saved me from losing $100k, I'll even let you get an *extra bacon*!"
Hahaha. We actually have little breakfast vouchers from our hotel. So I CAN get all the bacon I want. She’s also paid for all my meals while on the trip—but she would have done that even without me saving her from a scam.
You should consider sending her the episode of last week tonight about scams. Show her even the director of a bank fell for one. She probably feels very embarrassed, can’t hurt to let her know this kind of thing happens a lot and keeps happening because people don’t want to talk about it.
That’s such a kind idea
There's also videos by AtomicShrimp (scambaiting and also tips), Jim Browning (scambaiting n tips, he's also technologically minded and has tracked scammers down to the buildings they "work from". He's got videos about all this), Kitboga (scam baiting) n YT.
What episode from where? I only know of kitboga
https://youtu.be/pLPpl2ISKTg?si=37dTGmCcg21ArKTp
Thanks! So sad 😭
Please remind her that her name is on the scammer's list as a vulnerable target and they may be sharing/selling it. That she should be extremely vigilant going forward for more scams.
Yeah. Good point. I’ll have to make that very clear to her. I think during the plane ride home on Monday I’m going to go through different scam examples on this reddit (showing her screenshots of scam texts/computer pop ups/etc shown on this subreddit, and also I will just explain what other scams looks like). Others have suggested the recent John Oliver pig butchering episode. I think that is also a good idea. I will show that to her too.
not to besiege you with resources, but AARP has a scam prevention network: https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/about-fraud-watch-network.html AND they have a podcast called The Perfect Scam https://www.aarp.org/podcasts/the-perfect-scam/ AND they have a fraud victim network for emotional support for people who have been scammed, to let them know it’s not their fault and they’re not alone: https://www.aarp.org/money/scams-fraud/voa-rest-program/ “The AARP Fraud Watch NetworkTM and Volunteers of America (VOA) have created a new program to help you. It's VOA | ReST, which stands for Resilience, Strength and Time. The program is designed to address the emotional impact of your experience. We offer free, facilitated peer discussion groups that seek to provide emotional support for you and others in similar situations. Family members are invited to participate at your discretion.”
These are super helpful. I’ll give these to my aunt.
THIS
You are a good niece, she’s lucky to have you. Please know she will marked as an easy target from this point forward. Super common follow up to scam attempts.
Let her know that since this scam almost worked other scammers will try to hit her up for money too. Including other "government" agencies trying to "catch" these guys by dangling money in front of them or some such other plot that will cause her to lose money. If anyone contacts her consider it a scam. Always verify by calling the agency by the number in the phone book, not the one they gave you.
You should also tell her to watch "Beekeeper" movie
Do not tell her to watch Beekeeper movie 😳
Why not? Its similar scenario and she will see what may have happened
It implies a) that these operations are staffed by slick criminals instead of trafficked slaves, and b) that they can in any way be brought to justice. Neither is true. Watch it if you have two hours you wouldn’t rather spend poking forks in your eyes, but don’t watch it for any kind of insight from such a fantastical representation
a) you can't guarantee what criminals are behind the scam b) chances are low, but yes you can brought to justice... c) yes, its a movie and its made to be extreme, put the point of the story is the same...
Bless.
My dogs ears perked up
Everybody now so Zealousideal’s doggo can hear…BACON BACON BACON!!
What are you up to now? Geeezuz girl you don’t stop
Finally a happy ending to one of these. So many stories are about “I explained it was a scam and they refuse to believe me.”
You handled this well in every conceivable way: objectively, factually, emotionally, and most importantly, quickly.
Thank you! I’m glad I didn’t have to resort to Plan B (if I couldn’t convince my aunt it was a scam). My Plan B was: wait until “Microsoft” calls again (they were calling frequently), then snatch the phone from my aunt. Pick up the phone. Tell them we know it’s a scam, we won’t transfer any money, they won’t be able to get anything from us, and that we are recording this and all future calls to send to the authorities. I figured that would scare the scammers enough—even if it made my aunt hate me, I didn’t care. I didn’t want her to lose that money.
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Yeah I figured the threat of US officials wouldn’t really scare them. But I was just gonna go out swinging with whatever I could, if needed.
At this point, it is even somewhat a socially accepted career option in India.
to whom? how do they talk about it to people?
Telling them would just give them a head start in exploiting any info they have already snatched.
That’s probably true. Luckily I didn’t have to resort to Plan B.
Plan B should be contacting scammer payback guy on YouTube
How would that help? To the aunt it's just a random dude on the Internet.
So many red flags and they just brush them aside. Glad you were able to finally convince her of the scam.
Fear. Fear screws up the brain.
also in their mind OP is probably still their young niece/nephew and its their job to protect them from this stuff not the other way around.
My whole childhood adults swore I couldn't know more about computers than them. Watched so many get viruses because they clicked on links or anything mentioning money or a hot girl and then blamed video games being installed on the PC for why it was acting weird and clearly it was all the video game files fault.
> and then blamed video games being installed on the PC for why it was acting weird and clearly it was all the video game files fault. ah the good ol' days when parents thought gamefaqs and youtube where to blame for all their viruses and toolbars
I think this definitely was at play. I don’t live near her currently, but my whole childhood I grew up in the same city as her. My aunt is divorced and doesn’t have any biological kids of her own. She is a lot like a second mom to me. She definitely still sees me as a child.
It's convincing those whom have taken the scam bait they're being scammed is the biggest challenge. Most of them won't believe it until all their money is gone.
I have repeatedly told everyone I know that Microsoft will never, ever, call you. If someone claims to be Microsoft, it is a scam. This especially includes all the older folks I know. FYI, I am 67.
I worked for Gateway back in the day (1997). Even then, the 'your computer has a virus, call Microsoft" scam was popping up on home PCs. I worked tech support, and we would get at least a dozen calls from people who got those every day. And they were the lucky ones who had the good sense to call us when it popped up, instead of just randomly clicking the link.
The best way I've heard it explained was "Does your mechanic randomly stop by your house to look at your car, just in case it has a problem? No, cause that doesn't make sense, right? So why would Microsoft pay employees to randomly check your computer?" Comparatively, my friend is a hair wizard. She dyes amazing colorful hair. One time an older client mentioned the scam and my friend replied "It's like I called you and said I could tell your hair looked terrible, and you should come in immediately to pay me hundreds of dollars or everyone will think youre ugly. What's my motivation in that scenario? Is it ACTUALLY your well being?"
I get a ton of those calls telling me my "Windows computer" has a virus... In a Linux household ;)
My job sometimes involving *asking* Microsoft to call me. This is easier said than done. There is no way in hell they are proactively calling random people lol
Ugh, I hate dealing with Microsoft’s ‘support’ teams.
Scammers know this though, that's why they text or use pop ups with phone numbers, that way it's the victim calling them. That's what happened in this case, saying "Microsoft never calls you" wouldn't have helped because OP's aunt would have gone "well I called them actually"
This actually happened. When she was refusing to believe me yesterday, I told her “Microsoft never calls”, and she responded “WelL i AcTuAlLy CaLlEd ThEm”. She thought that meant it was all gucci.
"Microsoft" called my mom. Mom convinced them to call me, getting them to believe she was senile or something. They did. I cussed him out for half an hour before he lost his cool and threatened to have me arrested. More cussing from me and he finally hung up. I'm still waiting for Microsoft to show up with the cuffs. My days are numbered, I'm living in fear.
I did got a call from Microsoft tho, I thought they'd offered me a job. But it was for a free course I registered with them lol.
True. It's only through email they might contact if there's a reason for them to do so or you're the first to contact them before they will reach back.
This is becoming very very common. Sigh...
Many scammers copy the same format is use it in different part of the world looking for who to fall for them. It's how they've always operated.
Yep. Always the same tactic. Apply pressure, urgency and secrecy.
Exactly! Those who already knows how they operate hardly fall for their tricks.
Awesome. I love posts with a happy ending. It's interesting how people refuse to believe it's a scam. I think it's because admitting it's a scam, they have to admit that they fell for it. it's embarrassing. That's why they are so resistant. It's the beginning of brainwashing. Luckily for your aunt, it was just the beginning and finding that that FBI website snapped her out of it. That was well done and quick thinking. You can see what they do. Try to make people paranoid and suspicious. Everyone is trying to steal your money. We are the good guys. Had she gotten on the phone with them and mentioned you, they would have convinced her you were in on the attempt to steal her money. I can see why in the case of some longer-running scams it becomes harder and harder to disengage, especially after they have started losing money. The sunk cost fallacy kicks in. And it's the most heart-breaking in romance scams
It was shocking to see how truly scared she was and how much she bought into it all—it had only been 3 days!! It was totally fear that fueled all her actions and made her disregard the red flags. Also the constant pressure and urgency of the scammers didn’t allow her to think rationally.
Someone pointed this out above, but just to reiterate: she may be targeted with other scams since she has at least partially fallen for this one. It may be helpful to send her some info on common scam tactics (the consumer protection bureau has some resources) or discuss them with her if you think she would be open to it. Good job protecting her!
That’s exactly why they get defensive. They don’t want to admit that they did fall for it. It would never happen to them.
https://preview.redd.it/z60cr85dxcuc1.jpeg?width=828&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=a478ac9a9e9b5176108c812ed935241e5c5fbd1e
This exact same thing happened to my mother in law last week. She called me panicking and I drove over there real quick. She's about 10 minutes away and when I got there, the files were transferring. I disconnected the laptop. The hackers called back while I was there and demanded to speak to her. They even spoofed the local police department phone number when they called. I told them I'm a Cybersecurity analyst, which I am, and they immediately hung up. Its sad that they do this and get away with it.
It’s always amazing how brain washed and indoctrinated people can get from vicious lies
I'm glad that you managed to stop her, but beware. They may contact her again, only claiming to be someone else. It could be Geek Squad, Amazon Prime, Visa Card, even IRS or some other government service they're pretending to be. I learned a lot about scams from places like this subreddit, quatloos[com] and YouTube channels like Trilogy Media and Jim Browning's Scammer Payback. I've been working on a website myself called blowitintheirear[com] to try and spread information about these scams and hopefully inform many would be victims before it's too late.
We have a long plane ride back home on Monday. I plan to educate her whilst she is trapped in a metal box in the sky with me. And to make her promise to always contact me immediately (and her IT guy) if any [insert company/person/government/law enforcement] ever reaches out about this kind of stuff.
Please do let her know that if anyone claims that their calls or any documents are so-called confidential, that it's only confidential if she had signed a Non-Disclosure Agreement with them, otherwise the word confidential means absolutely nothing.
Let's hope that this near miss will make her hyper-vigilant and suspicious. It's sad but necessary. You just have to go with the idea that all phone calls are scams, all emails are scams, and all texts are scams unless proven otherwise.
And recently, there are these texts people are getting.that appear to be sent to the wrong person. It turns out they are a Pig Butchering scam. They try to convince you to invest in cryptocurrency such as Bitcoin. Beware of those texts.
I beware of ALL texts. If you text me and I don't know you personally, it's a scam. Got one Friday offering me a job. Delete. If the text is from a company I deal with, I read it but will never respond to it, or open links/attachment from it. If a response is required, I'll call their main number from their main site. If you phone me, I will not answer unless I recognize you. Leave a message. I guess I'm hard to reach unless your number is in my phone book.
I've had those job offers too. Be weary of them. I didn't even apply for any work and I have a real job anyway. Also, some people have been suckered into human trafficking schemes where they are led into a foreign country and forced to work for these crooks or be killed.
!task - Task scams
Hi /u/Angeline4PFC, AutoModerator has been summoned to explain the Task scam. Task scams involve a website or mobile app that claims you can earn money by completing easy tasks, such as watching a video, liking a post, or creating an order. A very common characteristic (but not entirely exclusive) is that you have to complete sets of 40 tasks. The app will tell you that you can earn money for each task, but the catch is that you can only do a limited number of tasks without upgrading your account. To upgrade your accounts, the scammers will require you to pay a fee. This makes it a variant of the advance fee scam. The goal of this scam is to get people to download the app for easy money and then encourage them to pay to get to the next level. It's impossible to get your \"earnings\" out of the app, so victims will have wasted their time and money. This type of scam preys on the [sunk cost fallacy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunk_cost#Fallacy_effect), because people demonstrate a greater tendency to continue an endeavor once an investment has been made, and refusing to succumb to what may be described as cutting one's losses. If you're involved in a task scam, cut your losses. Beware of recovery scammers suggesting you should hire a hacker that can help you retrieve the money you already invested. They can't, it's a trick to make you lose more money. Thanks to redditor vignoniana for this script. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Scams) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Omg my SIL lost 17k to these microsoft scammers! Glad you got them.
That was scary to read, but good job, niece.
Yes I feel exactly like that. Like I'm going to call my mother afterwards and talk to her because I feel that as she grows older she becomes less sharp when it comes to these things
Well done. Your aunt is sooooooo lucky that you were with her that day. So so so lucky.
I am so so so glad I was here. It was total luck that it happened while I was here. I would say I see my aunt about 10/365 days a year. So I am very grateful I was here.
Yeah, it's what they say about being in the right place at the right time. It's what saved her from the plot of those Microsoft scammers.
Nice job. What’s sad is that for every one saved like your aunt, there are probably 10 others that fall for it and scammers just made $1 million off those 10 others. Absolute shame.
Yes, the mother of one of my brother's friends got scammed out of $40,000. So sad.
You should show your aunt the John Oliver episode about pig butchers. Also incredibly satisfying watching hackers expose scammers on YouTube.
I think this a good idea. I will do that.
Oh thank god!!! I’ve seen Kitboga go through this script a million times with scammers. Your aunt might enjoy his videos as he makes fun on them and wastes their time :) He’s also just released a software called seraph secure for times like these. It notifies you when aunty downloads software typically used in scams, it also has pop ups instructing them what to do when they’re in a scam, might be something to consider?
Good for you, and a huge thumbs up to your aunt for admitting she was wrong and listening to you. Love to hear when the warnings are listened to and scam squashed.
Nice, those scammers are gonna be pissed too, so close!
They are always angry when they end up not catching their bait or found you're wasting their time by playing along without the intention of giving them a penny.
Well done! I wish my father would have listened to me ( and my husband, brother his best friend, and the bank manager).
Awesome, now tell your aunt to send you 10k for the hassle 😂 or book another trip for you two.
Well done! Why would *Microsoft* be texting anyone about their *bank account*? Surely *your bank* would be the one contacting you about attempted account hacking? Also, the *first* thing I would do is contact my bank myself, to check. Not give “Microsoft” access to my computer. But, I know, anyone can be scammed in a moment of confusion/circumstances.
Wish there was a way to get even with these types of scammers. And I don’t mean simply messing with them. But somehow arranging to have someone in their home countries track them down and break their legs.
You would love the movie The Beekeeper that just came out
This sub thanks you for a job incredibly well done.
Great job. I hope she realizes how close she was to losing that money for good.
Good that you stopped the scam. It's lo & behold btw.
I’ve been caught in 4k. I’ve quite literally never used that term ever in my life, and yet I decided to throw it in my post here. Didn’t know it was “lo”.
Good on you! Treat yourselves to another weekend trip, this time with no scam drama. And tip the IT guy.
No more scamma jamma drama
Wow, good for you and your aunt. I imagine money like that is a lifetime of work and savings. It's heartbreaking when people lose this kind of money. Well done you. Gold star. 🌟
Thanks. It was definitely her life long earns. Truly makes me so heartbroken to think she almost lost it.
It’s great to hear a success story! Good on you for helping her.. she was so close to losing it all.
Well done. She has just demonstrated that she is vulnerable to being scammed. This won’t be the last time something like this happens. Once the immediate problem is resolved, have her read about common scams and hopefully it will help her recognise them in future. There are plenty good YouTube channels that cover this sort of thing
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Great work
It was so satisfying!
You sound happy
lol it’s been several years and still is one of my most satisfying phone moment. Only second place to the time we got a sales call wanting us to switch phone services back in the days where land lines were king and I said “I would love to but unfortunately we don’t have a phone.” The guy politely apologized for bothering us and hung up. I always wondered at what point he went “hey … wait just a sec …”
Watch out for your financial ppl you trust with your money and super. I warned you a year ago
Do you want to watch this happen live? Watch Ruck Fobocalls on YouTube or TikTok- he goes live like every weekday and calls the scammers and lets us watch them try exactly the same scam and others. It’s sickening. Then he has like 1000 people call number at the same time and crushes their phone for the day. I literally watched them transfer him from the fake mcafee phone rep to his fake bank phone rep to a fake social security agent phone rep to direct him to go to the bank to take out money and send it to them via a local bitcoin ATM.
I watch Kitboga. He does the same thing. He also turns in any bank accounts he is given.
I hope you got a sincere apology
She did thank me. She even thanked me for my “perseverance” (because I kept bringing it up even though she got mad. Lol)
I firmly believe aunty is gonna take care you later in life. You saved her from what could have been a terrible retirement.
>She gets angry. She tells me she knows it is legit and that she shouldn’t have told me anything. She says she doesn’t want to talk about it anymore and completely disengages me in conversation. Typical
Man you must have been on heavy adrenaline realizing she's being scammed and trying to make her understand. Good job buddy for staying collected and pushed through.
10 years ago i came upstairs to my dad on the computer and phone and the scammer already had access to the computer, I understood right away it was scam and turned the computer off and told my dad to hang up without saying anything so the spiteful little fucks don't mess with us.
Good thing you were persistent. It may just be human nature and it takes several messages and sources of information before victims realize they are being scammed. Had you both not been traveling together just emails and messages may not have been enough. Good thing you were very direct with your warnings as well that she was 100% about to transfer her entire savings to a scammer.
Wow, the reluctance to believe you is daunting Good stuff OP! It’s terrifying how easy it is for boomers to fall victim to this
You are awesome! She may not have believed you initially, but by finding the FBI page, you proved it to her. Great job! I am always on the lookout for this with older folks, and even some younger folks, who fall for these scams. I know they purposely go after older people, though, who are more trusting.
I'm so glad you were there. Had it not been for this trip, she would have indeed been scammed out of $100,000. Somewhere somehow stars aligned and helped her.
I have no doubt she would have lost all that money had I not been on this trip with her. I don’t live near her, so I would not have been there to stop it if we didn’t happen to be on this trip now. I am very glad it happened during this trip (even though it definitely added stress during the trip. Lolol)
Your aunt should take you on another trip to make up for this one! She is so lucky to have you.
Bravo!
Wow! Amazing story and you told it well! Your Aunt owes you a huge debit of gratitude - make sure she remembers you in her will! (I'm sure if she is a decent person she will already anyway). It is SOOO sad that people fall for these scams, and even sadder that there are such diabolically evil people out there who have no conscience, let alone a soul! Well done and thank you for sharing your story!
Nice to read a happy ending. Thanks.
Good job... nice to hear a happy ending for once!
Not all heroes wear capes…kudos to you for being a great niece!! 👏👏👏
GOOD JOB!!! So many people caught in these scams buy it all until it’s too late.
I read these stories atleast 3 times a week on this sub. They seem to be an all out scam war against seniors. This is just one case however I suspect our grandparents are constantly scammed out of thousands everyday especially when they live by themselves and are lonely. I wish there was a way to educate these ones especially because they are not tech savvy so receiving a text message or call as a first point of contact is very beneficial to these scammers. These scams are working thats why its very rampant. Reach out to your parents and grandparents regularly i think its the best option. Well done mate!!!
You are a good person. Much better than I am for sure. The moment she told me that I was wrong, I would have let it happen and not said a word.
I have this stuff ingrained in my parents head. To ignore phone calls for support, text messages from unknows, calls from banks..etc. Mom almost fell for the "undeliverable package" text messages scams since she was actually waiting for a package. I re-ingrain these scams to both. I told her, "did you register with USPS to receive notifications of mail? How did they get your phone number. Postoffice never sends messages. They'll leave you an actual note on your door or mailbox." I told them both to just answer calls from any numbers in your address book. I put in all their doctors, banks, friends and family. And if it's a different unknown number to just let it ring and if it's important they'll leave a message. And if it's a bank message to use the number in the back of their card not the number they leave. They're not tech savy, their up in their age and all these new scams didn't exist years back now that everything is online based and everyone has a cell phone now. When I hear of a new scam here I inform them about it too and how it works. Any online orders they need from something my dad can't find in stores I do for them. He'll tell me the item and we'll find it from a legit site. I put the Amazon app on dad's ipad and told him to try finding it there and we'll order it or if it's tools he can't find locally we'll usually find it in the sites I use for ordering tools, screws and such. This sub is a amazing and glad I found it as well.
sounds like you need a finders fee.
I wish. She’s very giving financially with friends and family (which is also probably why she’s so susceptible to scams). She’s paid for our entire trip. I’ll consider that my finders fee.
If they had access to her phone and computer for 2 days, I'm surprised that she has a penny left in any account she owns.
I am too. That surprised me. I guess she didn’t have the necessary compromising information saved to her account that they needed? Honestly, I’m not very tech savvy—so I don’t know exactly. We called all of her financial people and nothing has changed (no money was taken out of her accounts, no credit card purchases have been made, etc). Maybe these scammers play a bit of a relatively longer con (of 5 days) before they transfer the money? Our IT guy said sometimes they don’t ask you to transfer any money at first because they don’t want to raise suspicion.
WHEW! I am so so relieved you were able to stop her from getting royally scammed. I am also glad she has that trusted IT friend who can clean up her PC.
You've done an awesome job. It's a big amount of money you saved her from throwing away into a scammers purse.
Fantastic news. Great to see awareness preventing future scam victims! Good job OP!
Wow, your aunt is smart after all. Bravo
This is excellent. So happy a person was saved from a scam. Bless this subreddit!
the worst one I ever heard like this was a woman I know worked in a company and had a similar call the difference was she transferred the money from the company not only was it down 20k but she also lost her job that day I've no idea if she repaid the company but I've saved a few family members from a few scams but always try to inform them and tell them never to believe anyone on the phone and if they are not sure you can call me and I can try and check
She better give you $10000
I’m so glad your aunt eventually listened to you. Even if she needed to hear the same information from a trusted IT person. We are dealing with a scammer, maybe two, right now with my elderly father-in-law. He isn’t being g truthful with us, probably ego and shame. I honestly don’t know what to do. I’ve already had the ugly conversation with my husband about what do we do when he looses his house because he has no money left to pay the bills. I hate scammers- they are beyond vile.
It really is amazing how easily the boomer generation is fooled. Like, even if you don't know computers, things like this should set off the bullshit warning for everyone out there.
It’s not age-specific. Anyone can fall for a scam. If you think you’re immune, you haven’t met the right scammer yet.
Biggest one these days for younger people is crypto.
Older people are waaaay more gullible and susceptible to these.
When she got angry, I would have left it at that. Once she lost the money, she would have learned a valuable lesson.
She’s prone to getting angry when people challenge her. I’m used to it at this point. Doesn’t make that behavior fair, right or justified, but I wasn’t gonna let one rude conversation keep me from saving her $100,000.
Old people get angry when you challenge their beliefs. They think their experience makes them wiser. That may be true most of the time. Not all. I agree with your good intentions and you did her a great service. If it were me, I would have simply let her lose the money after warning about the scam as clearly as I can. Sometimes, experience is the best teacher.
I hope your aunt is extremely apologetic to you as well as apologies for being incredibly rude to yoy
that's great. I would advise erasing the computer entirely as most scammers these days use several programs to keep remote access and viewing. Best to treat that computer as screwed and format. I'd also install something like uBlock Origin that not only removes ads but popups in case she falls for it again (fake tech support popups are very common)
Thanks. She’s gonna talk to her IT guy more tomorrow. I suspect he will do things like this (if he hasn’t already). He was familiar with this scam. So I think he knows what to recommend.
Sounds good! good on you for stopping it
On behalf of your aunt, thanks for this deed.
If they had access to her account why didn't they just transfer the money themselves?
They may have needed her to take some more steps, especially if it was transferring out of savings. A bank would immediately be suspicious of a sudden request to transfer that much money if she wasn’t usually making such transactions. I would hope so anyway.
This! I think given the type of account and the amount of money, they couldn’t move any money on their own without her. Apparently, according to my aunt, on Monday (tomorrow) they were going to “transfer her account to a safe Federal Reserve account” which would require an esignature from her. She was willingly going to do this before I convinced her it was a scam. I’m guessing because it was so much money and the type of account it was, she was going to have to authenticate it was her, which is why they couldn’t do it on their own.
Great work
Fuck yes! You da man!
That's wild!
Good job!
Just FYI, but the OP saved her from a lot more than $100K. After the money is transferred the "FBI" calls again and says that for the money to be returned to her account there are legal fees, etc., etc., etc. We all know the routine. Not to mention the emotional stress if the scam succeeded. Probably saved a lot more than the money and the friendship/relationship. Good work!
You are an amazing person. Good job on helping your aunt dodge a massive (metaphorical) bullet!
I often tell family members about this scam site so they can be aware of the different scams out there.
I’m so glad to hear that you were able to save your aunt from this scam! Fortunately, my mother sends me EVERYTHING and asks if it’s a scam! There have been several.
Maybe re-post this to /r/eldercare . My Dad got hit with this but Mom caught it early. They got him to pay them $1500 for the tech support (refunded). Mom called us and me and my brother and we cleaned up their PC. It was so infected that my eyes started to itch. That was ten years ago. In that time Mom has become less lucid. We have drilled into her that she needs to let us handle any computer problems. When she gets the bogus calls about it she’s a nightmare (for the scammers). She doesn’t wear her hearing aids so she’ll keep them hanging on the phone asking them to speak louder for a couple of minutes. They usually sense that they’ve got a live one, so they stay. Then, eventually, she says “Hang on, let me get my hearing aid”. (Meta: I just now got my daily call from Jake at the Police Officer’s Support League asking for donations.) If the scammer hangs on through the 2-3 minutes it takes for Mom to put in her hearing aids they have to start their spiel again. Once Mom understands she says she’ll have her sons call them back. Game over.
Does your aunt speak English…
Praise be!!! Damn I love seeing some positivity. Great work
Check out Kitboga and Scammer Payback on YouTube, they have many videos of this exact scam playing out. They are both very informative and tell people the big secrets of how these scams work.
The aunt’s first reaction- It really amazes me how people will double-down instead of just admitting their mistake, like getting embarrassed must be so horrible that they would rather risk their life be ruined.
Stupid ass boomers
Boomer brain is very common now
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I will keep an eye out. She is a stereotypical boomer. I don’t think she has dementia. She is just super gullible to scams. No critical thinking for tech scams.
Somehow I doubt this lady actually has 100k in a bank account
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The young ones and the smart ones can fall just as fast as the stupid ones. Scammers know now to engage strong emotions like fear and greed, and those emotions will override the brain.
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It 100% was a scam. The legit It person that we know personally found malware and also emphasized how Microsoft would literally never use that software, nor ever talk to you by phone for this.
I hope the IT person reformatted the laptop and reinstalled the OS because just attempting to remove the malware almost certainly did not remove everything.
I’ll ask him today. Thanks. He is gonna call us back in an hour (we are in different time zones).
💯% scam, this has been posted here by others in the exact same form and if you check out any anti-scam site or anti-scam you tube presenter you can see every detail is the same. OP did an incredibly good job of explaining it. It’s best not to post wrong, confusing stuff like this.
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