After existing on planet earth for
some time, it’s safe to say that almost every adult has encountered a scammer
in their life (I know I have!). People who you meet on the streets and they
start selling you fake or expired products, people who receive your payment and
run away without delivering services or goods you paid them for, etc. The
reality is that we are all too aware of scammers in the physical world. After
existing on planet earth for some time, it’s safe to say that almost every
adult has encountered a scammer in their life (I know I have!). People who you
meet on the streets and they start selling you fake or expired products, people
who receive your payment and run away without delivering services or goods you
paid them for, etc. The reality is that we are all too aware of scammers in the
physical world.
Our reality now is that we live in a
world of the internet! As such, we have to open ourselves to the idea that
internet scammers exist on the World Wide Web. These days, especially now with
the Covid-19 pandemic, most of us spend a lot of time online either working,
playing games, social networking, online dating, social media, and even plain
communication with family and friends. As easy as it is to do all of the
aforementioned, so it is for us to become victims of internet scammers.
One of the popular ways this has
happened is through accepting Facebook friend requests. The scammer does their
research on your profile once they have established you as the target, they may
guess that you won’t accept their request for obvious reasons so they randomly
choose one of your other Facebook friends and become their friends. Once that
happens then they can request your friendship and like me in the past, one will
accept the request since they have a mutual friend.
Almost immediately after accepting the
request, the scammers try to build momentum by chatting you up. The innocent
chats gradually start evolving into flirtations, endearing terms just to hold
your attention while they do their background check on you. You know like in
the spy movies when the bad guys or good guys want to get the other person’s
location, they call then and begin chatting them up long enough for them to
trace their location? Sorry been watching lots of movies
Anyways, during that time they ask you
what you do for work or/and other personal information but in an ever so smooth
way that you won’t be suspicious! Then they say that they want to send you
expensive gifts from overseas just because. Usually, at this point, you are not a
complete victim yet, until you send over your personal shipping details
expecting gifts. What ends up happening is that since you’ve taken interest in
their free gifts, they try to scam you by asking you to pay for some taxes,
duty fees, etc that come with international shipping. They tell you that the
gifts got stuck at a certain country border and only you can pay for them, but
they will reimburse you as soon as the gift arrives. And, alas! this is how people
have been manipulated into sending substantial sums of money to strangers not
knowing that they are being scammed. Some people even go to the airports to
pick up their packages only to realize then that it was all too good to be true
and that in that story there is no HEA (Happily ever after).
How do you sniff out internet
scammers? If something sounds too good and too easy, think very carefully
before committing to it in any way. Even if the offer has a limited timeline,
STOP, consult with someone you trust, research, and research! More
often than not, one or two Google searches will lead you to an answer or
someone else asking about the same thing. In one case that I know of, the
scammer claimed to be from the UK, but their English writing was not adding up.
Because these scammers are usually targeting multiple people, the chances of them
missing a step are usually high, but they count on you not noticing the tiny
details!
I hope that was helpful, stay safe and
avoid internet scammers!
Comments
Post a Comment