Scam, Scams, Scamming (Wisdom for the Masses)
Suspicion, caution, wariness, jaded, and guarded. These are the words for this generation and future generations that describe their life and future. There is and more than likely will be no openness, and free-spirited optimism. Nothing is real and everything is suspect. How did we get here?
The obvious answer is the internet and its many mind-boggling advancements throughout the decades. But now the wickedness is coming from the joined technologies of the internet and artificial intelligence.
Technology is a great thing. Our lives are much easier with it. We live better and more pleasurable lives than our predecessors did. Information is at our fingertips within a flash of a second, and there is nothing we cannot access. With that benefit and luxury, however, comes a negative. So far, I am not sure the positives outweigh the negatives in this new world.
It is deeply disturbing that people can no longer trust anything they see or read on the internet. In the beginning of this information superhighway, we could get information that was accurate and dependable. There was a level of trust you had with the answers to your queries and the information that you could access with online searches. Not anymore.
Like with everything else in life, humans have an uncanny way of degenerating everything they touch. Technology is no exception. In fact, is it even more appealing and readily available to people with bad intentions to use for bad, and not for good. It is a gangster’s paradise, a criminal's playing field, ripe for harvest. And harvesting they do.
I have written on the crime of impersonating celebrities and the EFT swindlers running rampant on the internet. I have, hopefully, made people aware that there is no-one looking out for you. There are no serious efforts or successes in stopping these kinds of crimes. Advancements in protecting people from tech crimes are so minimal that the world must navigate this jungle blindly and without a guide. I have stated before that if you create a technology and prepare to unleash it live, into the general population, the innovators and creators of the technological advancement should be required to study how it could be manipulated for ill-gotten gains. Creators of any technology should be required to implement public protections. We must regulate every new technology to ensure that criminals cannot exploit the systems that are being created. This should be the standard before creators release it for use.
Cybercrimes are rampant in every aspect of life now. Scams where celebrities pretend to be someone else to trick lonely women are just a small part of a bigger problem. Scammers luring desperate artists and writers into purchasing or publishing schemes is now gaining traction.
Over the last year or two, postal scams have also appeared. Recently, these crooks have used officially sounding tactics and correspondence to swindle us. I can’t even count the times I received texts, emails, and even phone calls from some government agency, telling me I have warrants out on me for traffic violations, expired this or that, in order to have me click a link that will undoubtedly take me to a site to make the required payment to clear the infraction up.. None of it is real.
Government offices do not text you. They don’t email you. They send you a letter in the mail. If the fraction is serious enough, they send it by registered mail. The IRS never calls or texts about underpayment of your taxes. They don’t ask you to go online to pay for or arrange for payment of a tax bill. It just doesn’t happen.
Shipping scams are also commonplace these days. FedEx does not ask you to click a link to verify your personal information. They do not email you to confirm an address for the delivery of an item being sent to you. The sender had your address, or it would not be coming to you to begin with. How did they even get your email or text number? Ask yourself these questions.
I don’t get scammers trying to lure me on social media much anymore. I always point the many celebrities that are dying to get to know me personally to my five-part feature on scammers. Then, poof! They magically disappear. I guess they got over their infatuation with me, because their profiles are gone when I go to check on them.
Some scammers come to me as regular people. Men, in my case, that “like” my profile or my work. Stating that they want to know more about the woman behind the work, they seem like normal people I come across every day. But they are not. They are all criminals with an agenda. The pictures on their profiles are fake, their stories are fake, and the interest in me as a person is fake. All of it.
Some scams are more elaborate than others. Some scammers take the time to generate a history online, or rather, an attempt at a convincing history. They will have posts on their profiles that make them look legitimate. They will have followers in the hundreds or thousands, which makes it seem they have been around a long time and have a real life you can trust. But it is all fake. What most don’t realize is that they are adept at manipulating when you see.
I have messaged with so many men and women who argue that the person they are talking to is genuine. If they are asking me to help them verify that, or coming to me about it at all, they already know the answer; they just refuse to accept it. Men who think this beautiful model is in love and desperate for them, their fifty-year-old beer-belly, beat-up truck in the driveway, and five figures income.
I have middle-aged and older women who strongly believe that the thirty-year-old actor and millionaire adores them so much that they cannot live without them. What they can’t live without is the women’s wallets. They are not real. They are thieves.
It makes me so angry that people fall for this. Every day it is getting worse. AI is the drug of choice for these scammers now. They can manufacture anything they want, from personalities and images to videos and voices. They can create it all with a keyboard and the internet.
Official government correspondence is even simpler for them to create. All that is needed is a very official-sounding form letter, a fake header, and an email address or text number. They send it to you, and thousands of people panic at the letter about their imminent arrest or warrant issuance. They click the link provided and fill out the information. Guess what? You are giving them the keys to your person, consensually. Your address, date of birth, social security number, and bank account number, and that is there end of you as you know it. They can steal your identity and clean out your bank account within minutes. And they do.
Let me reiterate that government offices, the IRS, the courthouse, the driver’s license bureau, the local tax office, the post office, and the like, do not send you letters via email. They don’t text you. They will never ask you for personal information to be filled out by clicking a link or calling a phone number to give them personal information, so don’t do it.
Here is what you can and should do.
If you get a text or email in any form from a government agency, on an official and urgent matter, any matter in fact, click on the information button on the sender. This is imperative.
Any phone number that is not local is from a fraud. The other day I got a text from a number that begins with the country code 63. The code is for the Philippines. None of our governments text from another country. Period. They do not text.
Recently, I received an email from Apple that asked me to click on a link to respond to a query for information on my Mac. It had something to do with updating information for the updates. My cynicism prompted me to click the sender's email address for information about its origin, and I found a strange address that included the word "apple." This was still not convincing to me, so I called Apple Support. It was not from them. I gave them the sender's address, and they confirmed that. Then they asked me to forward the email to them and the coding language from the email. Apple gave me step-by-step instructions on how to do that. They will, if you ever have to send them anything.
The reason for and the importance of this example are simple.
One, you have to be cynical about everything. Texts, emails, online activity, everything. Take nothing at face value. If you get a text, look at the sender’s number. Block all foreign codes. Do not respond.
The country codes with the highest scamming activity are as follows:
Nigeria, +234
India +91
South Africa +27
Ghana +233
China +86
Pakistan +92
Romania +40
Phillipines +63
Russia +7
Ukraine +380
Indonesia +62
Kenya +254
Venezuela +58
Argentina +54
Colombia +57
Dominican Republic +1 (809, 829, 849-area codes)
Uganda +256
Egypt +20
United States +1 (216 Cleveland, 469 Dallas, 712 Iowa, New York 332, 347 and 646, many Texas codes)
If you noticed that the United States and the Dominican Republic share country codes, you are correct and astute. They are both part of the North American Numbering Plan. I have listed the area codes for those particular to these countries. Yes the United States has scammers too.
As desperate and criminally minded people see the ease with which they can make money off the backs of honest people, cybercrimes and scamming crimes have increased and will more than likely increase exponentially, since so little is being done to protect us.
Two, if an email comes from an email, that is not in your contacts, do not trust it. Call the agency directly. Go online, Google the phone number of the agency contacting you, and call them directly. Don’t get frustrated with the long hold times; just wait. Get your answer. Ask them if they sent it. They will look you up and verify or disprove the email. What I am saying will also be told to you by them. Contacting individuals by email or text is not how the government does its work.
The bottom line here is that everything should be vetted by everyone. Trust nothing as genuine. Verify and verify again.
Scammers can spoof, conceal, and mask phone numbers. They can even create local numbers that look like they are in your own country. They can come from any state. Don’t just assume the ones I have listed here are complete. They are not. I had one text from someone who looked like they were from Texas, and yet they were a scammer. A manager of a celebrity texted me whose number was showing as being from Dubai. All are scams by scammers.
The takeaway is this: you can no longer accept anything as legitimate. Assume it is all fake and you are on the right track. This is sad but true. Make sure your children, elders, friends, and family know to do this too. Older adults are easy prey for criminals. They grew up in generations that trusted and did not have these concerns. They are easily frightened into submission by very adept scammers. Teach them to verify every contact before engaging. Better yet, ask them to show you the contact. Then help them find the truth.
If you are not sure in any situation, err on the side of assuming it is fake. It is. Consider the internet entertainment, not a source of truth. It has lost its ability to consider itself a benevolent force of information and truth. It is more of a malignancy.
AI is a force that will be one of the most malignant poisons to society. Yes, it will have aspects that will enhance the world. But the lack of governance and due diligence, over financial gain, will not protect you or safeguard you. Celebrities, social media platforms, nor artificial intelligence will do anything to help. Look at the name Artificial Intelligence. Fake intelligence. Key word. Fake. That is what you need to keep at the forefront of your mind. You are on your own. Be wise.
#fraud #selfprotection #wisdom #scams #scam #scamming #AI #cybercrime #Cyber #cybercrimes #life #lifelesson #people #Beware #CAUTION #Crime #victim #culture #popculture #society #socialmedia #social #fact #facts #truth #true #fake #lies #PSA
