My Dad is...was...one of the sharpest people I know. The math he could do in his head amazed me for years. His knowledge about so many things, incredible. He just knew stuff. What he didn't know, he could figure out. Then he got older and his mental faculties declined.
I've been working in and around IT for close to 30 years now, so I've hammered into them being safe online, don't fall for scams, etc. I got a call from my Mom last year that my Dad was on the phone with someone because their Chromebook got a popup that said they had to renew their Microsoft license. Microsoft license...on a Chromebook. My Dad had just let someone remote to his computer and he had just logged into his bank account. I caught him just in time before he got fleeced. This was the second time he got compromised.
I wanted to be pissed at him for not listening to me, but I couldn't. My 80 year old Dad isn't my 30, 40, or 50 year old Dad anymore. Age has taken its toll on him. He's just not the sharp guy he was, and it's hard to see. Even harder is hearing him admit age is getting to him. Age catches up to all of us, and it's catching up to our parents right now. I frequently check on with them now, and toss out reminders, to try to make sure something like this won't happen again.
If y'all still have your parents, just realize, they are getting old. Getting old can do a number of things to folks. I'm watching what it's doing to my Dad and it sucks.
I'm not surprised when the police did a welfare check she told them everything was fine. This happens a ton because the elderly are very much embarrassed to admit something like this has happened to them. It's a pretty common thing when they get scammed. I know someone that let themselves continued to be taken, all told for about $100K, before asking for help from his daughter because he was embarrassed it was happening to him.
I sent the cops to my mom's house a month ago and she swore she was fine. Today, the same cop showed up and scolded her for not being honest a month earlier. I don't know what else we could have done.
You need to call her GP, inform them of this, and have them carry out more stringent tests for cognitive decline. Ideally get a referral to a paediatric neurologist.
And depending on outcome, you probably need to look into getting power of attorney over her financial affairs.
There are also senior welfare organisations who can counsel the best way to go about this. Because without protection she is at risk of getting scammed again.
TBH, if you're not already your mother's power of attorney and health care proxy or whatever they call them in your area, it's time for an emergency conservatorship/guardianship, with any and all evidence of this scam being brought before a judge so you can get into all her accounts and handle them for her. It's just time. If you're in the states, most states have a self help site with the forms necessary to fill out and take to court.
It's hard to wrap our minds around how people can get scammed like this. And it's not just the elderly! I actually just listened to a podcast about a series of "love" scams that used the same images of the woman who these catfished dudes were supposedly talking to. There was one guy in his EARLY 30s who ended up giving around $250,000 to this scam woman despite multiple, multiple, multiple red flags. He seemed like a normal guy and had his own business (which is why he had that money to give). Yet he let himself be scammed by this fake chick (who was really a group of men in West Africa) for four freaking years.
It's one thing when you are truly vulnerable/your faculties are failing. But how do so many other people get scammed like this? How???!!
I'm a regular in the scams subreddit, and let me tell you, everyone is vulnerable. Guys like the one in your story are probably lonely and looking for love. Romance scammers are excellent at getting to know their victims and preying on their tendencies. If they realize their victim is interested in business and finance, they'll mirror that and get them to "invest in their business." For someone with white-knight fantasies, they'll cook up trouble. They play the long game, going weeks or months before asking for money and building a relationship.
There are a ton of other scams out there. Young men have killed themselves over sextortion scams. A niche one targeting female therapists and social workers frightened several of them into giving up nudes as well as money (the scammer posed as a police officer pretending she'd failed to appear to testify. He laid on the fear really thick, emphasizing that she was facing the loss of her license and even prison time, but he was doing a favor of this complex procedure she had to follow while telling no one. Sometimes it included a video strip search.) People get scammed on buying and selling sites constantly.
Knowledge is your only defense and I always suggest everyone spend a little time learning what's out there.
This guy stuck with the scam lady for FOUR years without ever once seeing her in person or even having a video chat with her.
Four years.
Lonely or not, it's astounding. This guy seemed like a decent catch, too! He was a long-haired Italian guy with his own sustainable farming business.
It's wild.
It is, but it just goes to show how deeply they can get their hooks in. And you get emotionally invested and you get caught up in not wanting to admit the truth to yourself, and there you are.
I listened to that podcast, too. Love, Janessa. It was wild and so sad how many people got taken in and how many people use that same girl's image to scam people. Even the host of the podcast suspected the supposed real Janessa she talked to was a fake.
Weren't you frustrated by that Italian guy? Was he just hopelessly naive? Was he missing a screw? How did he give away $250k? It was so clear he was being catfished. Four years and he never even got a video chat. And all the messages from "her" were very, very weird!! The mind boggles.
It was bizarre. I was almost yelling at my phone, saying "She's not real, buddy! And you sound amazing! Go meet a real girl."
I ran across an older man at CVS a few years ago who was buying gift cards to get his grandson out of jail. No matter what the cashier and I said to him, he was convinced these $500 Visa gift cards were going to help. It was very sad.
I wanted to shake that guy! Do you think growing up on a small Mediterranean island just made him hopelessly naive?? And even after finding out he was duped out of $250k (!!!!!!!!!!!!!), he was way too nice and understanding. Aughhhhh. Dude. Get mad at least!!
>Young men have killed themselves over sextortion scams.
I worked on a few of these cases a couple of jobs ago. This was 10 years ago and very few people were aware of sextortion and even fewer were aware of the type that targets young guys, some of them as young as middle school. Fortunately none of the ones I worked on ended with a suicide but I absolutely understand how easy it is for it to go that way once they're far enough in the trap and have even been coerced into victimizing their younger siblings at these predators demands. It takes a lot to really bother me but I still think about some of those kids.
There have been a couple of mysterious suicides at my kids’ high school over the past few years where EVERYONE from their friends to their parents were taken completely by surprise. Kids with zero depression or known issues. I think it could have been this
I think they need to start warning the kids and educating them about scams
The comptroller of a local county in my area was sentenced to years in prison after embezzling several hundred thousand in taxpayer dollars which she had sent to some Nigerian scammer. It amazes me the people who get taken in by these pricks.
My grandpa used to be a bank manager so he dealt with this frequently.
Answers a phone call one day while the whole family is there. Lowers phone looks at me,
“hey Barry, how much did you say you need to get out of jail?”
I don’t need anything grandpa, I’m right here.
He raised the phone back up “ how about you go fuck yourself”
My uncle got a call once while working.
Was supposedly my lawyer requesting that he bail me out. Uncle said he sat there for a second and then replied.
“That’s strange we don’t show him as being in custody.”
My uncle was a cop.
What fucking bank was she with? My mother tried to send me 4k she owed me and they made her come in to the branch and answer all sorts of questions before they would release the funds.
She's 75. It was a digital transfer. Theres a record of me transferring the money in by the same means and it still got flagged. It was annoying, but I get it. You should be naming and shaming the bank that just let her pull 900k out of her accounts without so much as a blink.
That is such a good point. I can’t even take an Uber in California on a business trip because my bank doesn’t believe I’m really there. Where were they in that situation?
He said he was from Microsoft and that she had a bunch of hackers on her computer. He showed her he was legit by operating her computer. He somehow convinced her that she needed to safeguard her funds elsewhere. I'm still unraveling this whole shit show. He also said he was her friend. Tons of red flags and she didn't listen to them.
I’m sorry this happened to her and you and it’s honestly something I worry about constantly.
My mother is also a university professor and your mom’s* age and for reasons I cannot fathom, she will not take any internet precautions - she thinks she doesn’t ‘have an identity anyone would want to steal’ and when I explain that actually, her pension, savings, home equity, etc are in fact super attractive to scammers, she accuses me of trying to ‘scare’ her.
It’s okay though, I let my brother be the favorite so she’d move in with him when the time comes
* (I know it’s not a subject for levity, but haha I wrote ‘your mom’)
Eta: just saw your update, that’s horrible - there may be some recourse:
https://ovc.ojp.gov/program/stop-elder-fraud/providing-help-restoring-hope
You might check with her bank & any financial institutions and have them flag her account as a vulnerable senior and note to call you or your brother if she attempts any large withdrawals.
You might convince her by agreeing with her that her specific identity is not something someone wants to steal. But scammers will just try random telephonenumbers and emailadresses without knowing who is behind it. Its called fishing for a reason! They cast their net and see what comes up.
Just this week I got a SMS from a random number with the "mum I have a new number" line...
Damn man…I’m so sorry. Thanks for sharing because we never know what our parents might be falling for. I’m assuming it was a “cold call” out of the blue or was it one of those facebook scams where they start chatting through messenger?
I'm not sure how they first got their hooks in her. My husband set up her laptop with the latest security software, so it should it have been ok. It's so insane!
It’s quite easy to remote control someone PC with their permission, regardless of security software. Just direct them to a website, have them run a program, and enter a code.
My favorite way to string along scammers trying this was always to insist that I had totally just installed their remote control spyware and done everything they asked but nothing was happening (of course I was just surfing shitposts while doing nothing the guy said). I'd act more and more confused and tech-unsavvy the more aggravated the dude got, insisting I'd followed his instructions, until I hit a good timewasting milestone like 20 minutes or 1/2 an hour, then I'd make a stupid noise and hang up.
Yeah the trusting part is what got her, not the smarts. You just can’t trust anyone who comes to *you* unsolicited offering services, no matter how sincere sounding.
I’m really surprised the bank or whatever financial institution didn’t red flag this. They should’ve known better
Seriously. I saw a couple in front of me in IKEA a few years ago have to get out of line and go call their bank because they were from Alabama but they'd just tried to spend $300 in Atlanta, so the bank was blocking the transaction. I've gotten "Did you authorize this transaction?" texts from the bank when trying to take a $15 Uber trip while out of town. How do they not flag 80 or 90 withdrawals happening in rapid succession on an account that isn't normally that active?
My bank recently froze my debit card because my daughter and I were riding rent-a-scooters in the city and they were worried the small transactions were “account testing” before scammers tried for something big. Derailed our dinner plans (we only had enough cash for fast food 🤨), but I’m glad to know they are on top of things.
That's what I was thinking. How could her institution not catch this? I had someone try to empty my account, and they caught it instantly and contacted me. I can't tell you how grateful I was for that. It wasn't a ton of scratch (around 3K), but it definitely would've made me physically ill.
900K!?! Good God! I wonder if she's got a legit case against them for that kind of money. You gotta wonder why they didn't catch this. Something is definitely off here.
It was probably much smaller amounts that slowly escalate over a period of time rather than attempting to grab the whole balance in one swipe.
This makes the initial transactions less likely to trigger a response from the bank, and establishes a pattern of withdrawals that looks 'normal' to automated sentry software as the transactions increase in magnitude.
When the money dries up, the scammer ends the relationship, usually abruptly and brutally.
This is referred to as *pig butchering*.
Horrible. One of my best friends is an independent IT consultant. The first, second, third, and fourth thing she tells her clients is, “if anyone calls or emails you and says anything about your computer or your bank accounts, hang up the phone, don’t open the email, and CALL ME.”
It is INCREDIBLY common. I listened as my (very smart) boss a few years back gave someone on the phone access to his computer. I wasn’t even listening, but the hairs on the back of my neck stood up and I ran into his office, snatched the phone from his hand, and hard turned off his computer. He thought he was talking to his bank. He was not.
They prey on the elderly, and don’t give a damn. There is a special hell reserved for people like this.
I guess this is the advantage of living rurally and not having internet at the house (therefore no computer for banking). We never get scam calls, like, not ever. Maybe banking online makes people the target, and it’s not just cold calls to random people?
Well there have been all KINDS of data breaches that make people targets. If scammers have just a little information, they can often con the rest out of people.
It’s not necessarily online *banking* that makes people targets, but the more you buy online or use online services, the higher the chances of your data ending up in a hacker’s hands.
Heck, even going on whitepages or another phone number site will give scammers the people “connected” to you *along with their ages*, allowing them to make assumptions about who your kids and grandkids are. A scammer called my late dad (a man whose only foray into the web was getting to level 5000+ in Candy Crush) and said that he was “Xxxxx”, his grandson, and needed money for bail.
Sorry that happened to your mom. A similar thing happened to my mom. The scammers called her every single day and we’re able to get about $40K from her before I found out about it. I called the authorities and they were absolutely less than useless. These scammers prey on the elderly who may be in some form of mental decline and they are very persuasive. I’d love to have an opportunity to “chat” with them in a room for 20-30 minutes and let them know exactly what I think of them.
This shit is terrible. I have a friend from high school who took a job as a bank teller a little over a year ago after getting laid off from her corporate career. She said that she regularly sees people in their 70s and 80s getting scammed. She had no idea how much of it was going on. The same people coming in there withdrawing money several times a week to buy gift cards or send to who tf knows where via Western Union. Sometimes they even come into the bank to make the transactions while on the phone with the scammers. One guy has paid somebody over $400,000 in about a year.
The bank does have policies in place for reporting suspected incidents of fraud and scamming and she has occasionally been able to talk some of them out of making the withdrawals but sometimes they get angry and say "If you won't give me my money I'll go to another bank branch where they will." Apparently there's not much the police or FBI or Homeland Security can do if the person won't participate in the investigation, denies that anything is wrong, and just insists upon continuing to pay.
I remember back almost 10 years ago, I was sending large sums of money overseas and the lady at the Western Union noticed I came in the third time in 5 days and stopped me. It was like 8:15am and I was tired so I was kinda rude not realizing why she was questioning "Do you know this person? Who is this person? Did they send you here?". My response was "What? The fuck are you talking about? I'm sending money to my fiance because i'm moving there and she's getting our apartment and furnishings". Her next question really pissed me off "Have you met this person?" I just simply told her "Look, send the damned money and let me get out of here".
I'm hoping I didn't discourage her from stopping others. (Note: Yes, I knew the person, yes we got married and approaching 9 years now. Worlds worst scammer!)
I always joked about that. "Why get $15,000 from me once when you can get $30,000 and 2 cats over a lifetime of happy memories and eventually children"
I just read the details of the scam. My nephew got this exact phone call. As soon as they started reading off his bank account info, he hung up and locked everything down.
My 88yo dad gets a call or text almost every day. Luckily he calls me before responding, for now.
OP, I'm so sorry this happened. Be on the lookout for a recovery scam, where someone claims they can get the money back for a fee. It's a scam. No one can get the money back.
My mom is insane. "I got a popup that said I had a virus so I clicked.." MOM! How many times do I have to tell you?!
Thank goodness she calls me right after. I get plain envelopes and toss them. And what do cards come in? Plain envelopes 'for security' and they say DO NOT BEND CARD INSIDE. Secure as can be.
IT Guy bit ---
* Warn your parents around tax time, don't click on shit.
* Anything that says, "Danger", "Respond immediately" and/or has typos/misspellings.
(Unless you don't care, then ignore them)
* Get them a reliable email application, Outlook is available for mobile phones and desktops and it's got a lot of friendly user features. And a pretty good junk filter.
* Gmail is also good.
* If you know typical scams (Virus on your computer, you have a fax, "invoice from your cable provider") warn them. IRS scams will be rampant in several months.
My mother in law fell victim to scammers. I honestly believe she was bored and wanted someone to talk to. Her son lived with her and did nothing. She only lost a few thousand dollars before my niece, who lives closer, stepped in. When I hit that age I want my computer child proofed to prevent me form making any financial decisions. And banks should have noticed your mom’s account. $900k vanishing is something bangs typically catch
One of the banks called me a month ago, and I called my mom to find out wtf was going on. When she didn't respond, I called the local cops to do a welfare check and she told them everything was fine. She then told me everything was fine and I believed her. I should have told the bank not to release the funds, but she seemed fine and she was always a good money manager. Argh!
I am currently trying to guard against this with my dad. I'm concerned that he isn't good at filtering out what is an obvious scam vs things that are legit, so we've been having a lot of "okay so here's what you can safely ignore" conversations.
Basically, we are at the "ask me first before you buy anything that isn't groceries." Ugh.
My mother had her bank account cleared out by a scammer about 10 years ago. She applied for a job online and they hired her and told her they would provide her with a laptop so she could work from home. They told her to provide her bank information so they could deposit the funds into her account, then she could go buy the laptop. She did, and they cleaned her out. She never told us anything because she wanted to surprise us about this great new job she had gotten. By then it was too late. Sigh. Now she’s 76 and having to work a part time job to supplement her SS so she can get by.
I took away my dad's landline and got him a cellphone years ago. That took away about 9/10 scammer calls. I also programmed his phone to send to VM anyone not on his contact list (family, friends, doctors, insurance, etc.).
That took care of the rest. When we meet up (which is a few times a week), he plays the VMs and I delete all the bullshit ones. I think it also helps that dad is naturally cantankerous, so that helps quite a bit.
I'm so sorry this happened to your mother. I take care of my parents and they live with me BUT I noticed my parents would get weird offers via call to their cell phones. Luckily they tell me about whatever the person said and I always explain to them there are scammers out there and share victims stories so they are aware. Also for not answering the door when I'm not home. There are scammers coming to homes as electricians etc.
I think educating our elderly family members is the best way and to tell them that if anyone that asks for money they should call a designated family member to check/seek advice so the scam ends there.
I get really upset seeing and hearing elderly people that worked hard their entire life get scammed out if their money. It's disgusting and we need much harsher punishment/imprisonment for this!
>$900k
What?!?!?! Also can I have her number.
I went through my dad's expenses and found a bunch of cc payments he was making to scammers. He also never has used his ATM card and just writes checks to cash for himself that there's no accounting for. He was also paying for an insurance plan that he didn't need. He has a timeshare that I've been trying to get him out of, but he won't make the calls. He also didn't switch to medicare part B when my mom died and accrued $90K worth of prostate cancer treatments that weren't covered. It amazes me how Silent G and Boomers are so bad with money and still have everything taken care of for them.
OMG, my Mom did that same shit with Medicare Part B. She didn’t switch and racked up insane bills that nearly bankrupted her. Why? She was too stubborn to make the call.
I had a guy who was working on my property who I referred to my mom. He went over to work on her place and brought New Guy. New Guy called mom a few days later and convinced her my guy was overcharging her and to start using him exclusively. It's almost a year later and she FINALLY stopped giving him "projects" to do. She was paying his rent, taking him to buy batteries for his car, buying his gas, cigarettes, etc. She even spent $200 for his young daughter's birthday gift. She gave me a fking spin mop for mine. She's very lonely and I get that but it's so hard to sit by and watch your mom get fleeced by some creep who does not have any romantic interest at her at all. My friend and I looked him up and found he had DV charges against him. I sent her the mugshots and she said it was just a misunderstanding (!!!). During this time period, she threw out a lot of my dead father's belongings, including his VA records. I was absolutely gutted because my son is in the military and would have liked to have had his grandfather's records.
Took me a while but I have let her back into my life. It will never bet the same. We used to be extremely close but she said some really horrible things about my dad when she was infatuated with this man. All this sucks but I am so afraid I will become like her and I am TERRIFIED!!!
>She gave me a fking spin mop for mine.
It would have been less insulting to get nothing!
I'm sorry, this is serious and I hate that you had to go through this whole deprogramming of your mom.
Same here. My father was the smartest man I knew. He got caught up in a scam. They wanted him to send a money order so that he could collect the prize money he just won.
He got so far as the customer service desk at the grocery store. The clerk said "I know this is none of my business, but this sounds like a scam" He stepped back and snapped out of whatever trance they put him under.
All he could say to his defence was "they were so convincing" He was so ashamed. I felt so bad for him.
I wished I knew who that clerk was. I would have liked to thank her, given her a gift, or something .She saved us from such pain and heartache! An angel for sure.
Kitboga(?) and some others have YT vids were they play the scammers back. It’s small but it’s great to watch him play them back. The videos I’ve seen aren’t tutorials, but they give an idea of how those a holes operate.
I’m sorry this happened, it’s awful. I’m sure she’s ashamed.
I've watched all those guys, and they are great. I wish they would do more with the romance scammers. They are getting a lot of support, which is wonderful, but it makes it harder to get their help unless you spend over $500.00 a month on their pateron.
My parents have got scammed once and hacked twice in the past year. The first time they were contrite. Now they are belligerent. They won't tell my sister or me anything because they are afraid we'll think poorly of them. We tried to help them the first time but then they all of a sudden get protective of their CC and bank accounts. They don't listen anyway but they are yelling (literally) at the wrong people. They have protection through their credit union and get refunded what was hacked but they don't actually report it to Visa or MC or whatever their card is. So their number is still out there. Which is probably how it happened again.
As for the scamming... well thankfully she wised up before she actually got into the bank. The guy called her back and she didn't answer. But that was a close one.
Now, I honestly mind my business. If they are going to be so belligerent then whatever, not my problem anymore.
That’s just horrible. There has to be something that can be done to get it back. That amount of money is FBI level of reporting. I’d encourage you to call your closest branch and find what department you need and be connected.
I am so sorry to hear this. But what the fuck kind of financial institution just lets this much money move out of the account without raising massive red flags, or even alerting authorities to potential fraud and money laundering? Hell, just about any transaction over $10K has to get reported to the government, doesn’t it? There is a special place in Hell for people like these scammers.
This may turn out a bit like back when US jobs were sent oversees. There was a lot of hand-wringing and faux concern from politicians, but ultimately “nothing could be done”, you see.
In the next few decades there’ll be some hand-wringing from politicians but mysteriously “nothing can be done”, no enforceable regulation, etc.
>But what the fuck kind of financial institution just lets this much money move out of the account without raising massive red flags, or even alerting authorities to potential fraud and money laundering?
I think a lot depends on how and to where they sent the funds but this feels like something OP should report to a federal authority to look into. Even if it goes nowhere, I hope it forces the bank to keep a better watch on behalf of their clients.
Be aware that she is now on every scammer’s list as a hot property and she will get all kinds of new scams heading her way.
Some of those scams will be recovery scams from people that will promise to help her recover the money for $X. These are also scams and they will take ever increasing amounts of money and not recover a dime.
Yeah it’s really unfortunate.
As their children, it’s hard to keep track of what scams and bad financial decisions they may be exposed to. My mom’s financial guy is asking her to change her long-term care insurance right now from a *great* policy to one that will cost her a lot less. And I get that. But she doesn’t understand what the changes are and cannot even tell me *what* they are. And — to be blunt — she’s already showing signs of early Alzheimer’s so we will be using that policy at some point in the next decade I am sure.
So are they trying to take advantage of her to sell some sub-par policy and collect a commission? Or are they looking at the amount she’s paying and just thinking it’s excessive? And I cannot figure how much to intervene or even whether to do so. It’s her money. But at the same time … ugh.
OMG. I am so sorry for you and your mom. If you haven’t already, report this to the FBI IC3 unit.
Reading these other stories, too… Goddamn it is seriously time to set up child permissions on their computers. There is a serious need for elder computer monitoring. If only they’d swallow their pride and admit they need the oversight.
We reported to them, but it's of little use. They are just collecting numbers, and it will have to get even bigger before they use resources to investigate. It will be years before anything trickles down to help us, if ever.
Because -- not all elderly people do, so if you just barrel into their homes and say they need to be treated like children, they aren't going to like it. Gen X ain't exactly young. Oldest Xers are pushing 60. How do you think they will feel if, in 10 years, someone tries to tell them, for no reason, that they are no longer mentally competent?
My dude, if I spent almost a million actual dollars on something that didn’t directly benefit me, then *damn right I’m no longer mentally competent*. Blows my mind people are too proud to the tune of nearly seven figures.
THIS PARTICULAR PERSON was incompetent. Do you think this happens to everyone? You're getting pretty fucking old. Are you ready to give up your independence soon?
It’s a bit like with car keys and driving. At some point you’ve got to start watching your elderly relative closely and when you see signs of problems, intervene before things get out of hand.
Personally, I WANT my kids to take away my car keys and computers and smartphones at the first sign of problems. If I get new ones I want those to mysteriously disappear too. I’ve told them to only listen to what young me says on this matter and ignore old me. Also, don’t confront elderly me or tell elderly me my marbles are gone. Instead, just quietly get rid of all my dangerous stuff (cars, computers). Because if they try to talk to me about it I’ll just be mad at them because that is how demented people are.
So sorry that happened to her. And that kind of cash. Unfortunatley, it happens everyday, to lots of people. They are good at working on fear, anxiety, greed, any emotion that ties a person up. Tgere is a sub..r/scams that help identify scams. And if anyone messages you they can help, they are scammers too. Check out you tube also, lots of ppl there tyring to stop or slow the bs down. Scam baiters, kitboga. I send my family links all the time.
I don’t remember his name, but there’s one guy who talks to phone scammers in a little old woman voice while simultaneously wiping everything from the scammers’ networks, turns their cameras on and describes their office, sends them glitter bombs, it’s amazing.
OMG! We have the same exact thing going on with our mom!! It is astonishing how little help is out there in this situation. My mom was fiscal and health insurance officer officer for our state senate for 31 years and the cheapest person ever.
They started grooming her 2 years ago, and we found out by accident when her bank called my sister, the night before my sister was scheduled for breast reconstruction (who has poa) when she wrote a check for 10,000 dollars!!
We found out it was worse than that. Since then, she has sent thousands more in gift cards and even took out a loan, and worse, GAVE HER ACCOUNT NUMBERS SND PASSWORDS OVER TO THEM!
She will not believe these people are scammers. She thinks they are peace keepers in Syria. She had never cared about this kind of crap before!
She just handed over THOUSANDS of dollars to complete strangers. After 65 years of catering to her, lavishing her with thoughtful gifts and flowers, decorating her house at my expense, she gives me a few bucks on my birthday and nothing at Christmas!
We finally got her phone and computer away from her. She is so broke she can't afford to buy any more.
My sister is working with her bank and trying to find all her accounts. The credit companies have been notified, but only one responded so far. They don't understand the urgency of this!!
Meanwhile, they are blowing up her phone with threats!!! This is aggravation we don't need and work we don't want! We told her she could be on the street soon, and her response is, "Well, I hope I die before that!"" I'm 😤😡🤬😡😭
Edit:
My mother still drives, maintains her house, and goes to group discussions every week along with poker and luncheons and paints. She is 89, has all her knees, hips, etc. Takes NO medicine. Who is going to believe us that she lost it?!?
I'm so sorry you're going through this. We discovered after she passed away that my MiL had given thousands and thousands of dollars to someone who'd formed a romantic attachment via one of those retiree dating sites. It turned out to be someone overseas and she'd sent iphones, clothing, toiletries to an address in CA and giftcard codes every week for a year. She was in serious debt when she passed away and we thought it was for other reasons - no, she'd been funneling all her income to this monster online. She was an incredibly intelligent woman, just lonely after her partner died. My husband was furious at what happened and so sad that she didn't share anything. It's just heartbreaking. Check on your seniors. This stuff is way more common than it seems.
We recently discovered that my MIL law was spending several thousand a month on a holistic quack who told her she didn’t need blood pressure or thyroid medicine if she took her amazing supplements, and of course only hers worked. SIL went through all her cabinets and found 67 different supplements, which all cost $60-80 a bottle, in addition to the monthly “appointment” fees, which, to my knowledge, were phone calls telling MIL what not to eat that month. It’s fucking ridiculous how deep that bitch had her, and it had apparently been going on for years. It especially pissed me off because this woman preyed on the fact that my MIL lost her daughter to cancer, and it fucking broke her. She is so determined to not lose another family member that she’s an easy target for these assholes, and it just burns my fucking britches.
My elderly Mom fell for a scam for a "home warranty" that appeared to be calls and letters from her actual bank/mortgage lender, using their logo on mail, etc. She called me in a panic saying her bank was "demanding her to provide proof of a home warranty". She had always had home insurance, which is a normal requirement. I begged her not to share any info until I got a chance to review the documents. But she'd already done so out of fear.
Sure enough, it was one of those "warranties" that will replace major items like a furnace, AC, if they break down, and she'd already given them her bank info, they'd withdrawn the first $100/mo payment. They were in no way connected to her bank/mortgage company. We had to open new accounts, the scam was reported to her actual bank and there were warnings in the news about it. But, I fear that many others have already signed up for the auto withdrawals, figuring it was legit, something they have to have or jeopardize their mortgage.
My mother actually signed up for the "car warranty". She got a letter in the mail that she thought was from her car manufacturer. She had already made the first payment, they wanted her to drive her car a lot more than she normally was to be sure it was in good working order. At first she resisted canceling it, because it would pay for "absolutely anything" that went wrong with her car, which only had 30,000 miles on it. When I added up how much the warranty would cost her in 2 years, it was more than $3000. I asked her when she had ever had a car repair cost her $3000, and she said "never" in a small voice. Luckily, she was able to cancel it and get her 1st payment back, but listening to the person on the other end of the line trying to scare her, telling her that her car would break down and no one would help her and she would have no way to get groceries was infuriating.
The "do not call" lists used to help... And yes, the scammers use very intimidating calls/letters that would appear genuine, they even had me worried at first, took calling the real number to her mortgage bank and regular bank to confirm it actually wasn't from either. I wish these scammers would face jail time, severe penalties and be blasted on the news, even if they actually originate from other countries.
We just recently helped an aunt who was scammed out of 5k which is a drop in the bucket compared to what you are enduring with your mom. Unfortunately a lot of silent gen and early boomers are susceptible to this. My aunt said we were too cynical and believed the worse in people when we were trying to convince her. And when she realized the money was gone, she blamed everyone but herself. She's 73. No dementia. It was one of those government scams. We got rid of her landline, And we made sure her remaining money was safe. And we set up a blocker on her mobile phone. I'm so sorry you and your mom are dealing with this.
Scammers getting smarter and smarter.
I keep receiving notifications from UPS and USPS about this or that. They look official and often come after I use on of those companies to send a package.
My husband insists they are a scam, but if I were a couple decades older, I probably would trust these. They are getting damn good.
I got one from my college alumni office that looked so legit that I almost fell for it. But then I googled the phone # as I noticed it wasn’t the right area code for that office’s landline and saw it was a scam #.
AI is only gonna make this worse. I’m tempted to give up digital banking.
JFC. one thing about my mom being from the silent gen, she never trusted anyone enough to let them scam her. i’m so sorry, that is a fuck ton of money.
My mom was also silent gen. Trusted NO ONE and literally thought anyone who was friendly to her “must want something”.
Also she did not have a computer or a cell phone. Which is huge.
She also would never answer her phone. Must have driven scammers crazy, an elderly person with a nest egg completely out of reach like that.
And god help anyone who “pestered” her aka approached in person or called more than once. She gave some poor minister in her town hell once for that lol
ha! my mom was friendly with EVERYONE. she always took the path of least resistance. but she never believed anything at face value. she was a mathematician when women didnt do that kind of stuff. so she believed only what she personally had evidence to believe. the only time she got taken advantage of was once in a supermarket in the evening she was distracted while someone else stole her wallet. and apparently they felt so bad they mailed her back her wallet with everything but the cash in there! she never left her purse in the cart again. she was very pragmatic: “they must have needed the money more than i did.” other than that, she was scam proof.
I had this happen recently. Someone claiming to work on an Oil Rig in Oslo, Norway... Had a daughter who really needed a mother, he found me on FB and thought I was perfect, etc, etc. Was telling me he loved me.
I played along a bit for fun, he actually talked on the phone with me.
Then I told him to get lost. There are no oil rigs near Oslo and he was going by the typical script. He knew I was married as well. He said we would be the perfect family. Supposedly his daughter was in boarding school in Canada, and her mother had passed from cancer.
People on an oil rig don't have time for that crap. His daughter then asked me for a gift card so she could download FB. I just had to laugh and block her too.
Maybe there is some info in here that can help:
- https://ovc.ojp.gov/program/stop-elder-fraud/providing-help-restoring-hope
- https://seniorservicesofamerica.com/blog/elderly-scams-what-you-need-to-know/
- https://www.storypoint.com/resources/health-wellness/what-to-do-elderly-parent-is-being-scammed/
- https://theultimatecaregivingexpert.com/senior-parent-scams/
I've always been lucky in that when something happens my mom contacts me first to find out what my advice is. Plus she doesn't answer the phone unless it's someone she knows.
What really annoys me is how rampant this is. I'm on the scams subreddit a lot, and so many people are losing hundred of thousands of dollars.
When you think about the bigger picture, how many billions of dollars are being stolen out of the country and given to Nigeria and India? How are we going to handle this in a few years when we have however many thousands of seniors that are suddenly insolvent (that's on top of the poor folks we already have)? And the governments out there aren't doing much of anything to stop it.
This happened to my dad. The Jamaican lottery scammers got some of his money. Fortunately someone we knew locally became concerned when he was doing some money transfers that were out of the ordinary for him -- flagged it up to my brother and asked him to look into it. It could have been much worse because we put a stop to it, but still. He got very depressed in the aftermath, and we asked him to please consult us before making any more financial decisions, though he passed away a couple of years later.
One of the most shocking things about your parents aging is the poor decisions they start to make, it is so unlike the parents you knew growing up.
What do childless seniors do? I'm 52 and probably have a good 20 years left. It worries me that I don't have anyone looking out for me when I get old. I'd like to think I'm of a generation that's more internet savvy, but as others have said, cognitive decline is real.
I did my best to make my dad scammer proof. First thing was to set his computer so that his user only had basic rights no install or anything like that. Set up an admin account for myself where I was the only person who could install anything. I also put up a remote login software so I can jump on at any time as needed. Because of his disability as he aged online banking was a must for him. Still I set up all the accounts with unique and difficult passwords. Every second factor came to my phone directly. I finally convinced him that it was worth waiting for my help to pay any bills or do any online transactions. I managed to keep him safe this way. It's a little extreme but it prevented him from getting swindled.
My mom was almost scammed when she got a message supposedly from me asking for money because "I" had lost my phone.
Fortunately, we live in a bilingual region where one of the languages is the dominant, and that's the one the scammers used, but I always speak in the other language with my family, so she grew suspicious and contacted me first.
And some say my minority language is useless 😏
My co-worker is dealing with a similar situation with her mother, who is a retired doctor. It is *terrifying* how quickly the mental acuity can go. Now she's on all her mother's accounts and was trying to pay bills online the other day with her mom on the phone (they live in different states) and it was wild, listening to them talk. "Mom, it says her the bill is X amount. Is that right?" her mother: "There's a good possibility." her: "What do you mean? Look at the amount on your bill. Does it say X?" her mom: "It sounds right. It could be." her: "WHAT DOES IT SAYS YOU OWE ON THE BILL? DON'T YOU HAVE IT IN FRONT OF YOU?"
I've never been happy my mom's dead, but this is as close as I'll come.
During my time in the Army, working as tactical AT&T, I know for a fact that the phone companies can shut these people down.
You want to put a halt to this shit, you cut off all telecommunications from India, Russia and most of Africa those countries will police this shit right up.
Peer pressure is a mother fucker.
The governments aren't willing to curtail this shit.
Fuck with their economy and I guarantee the spam calls, and other BS will stop.
Hell, just do it to one country and the others will take notice.
I honestly can't believe, but sort of can, that there is this many stupid people in GenX. This is some real "Tell me you've never been out of the United States without telling me you've never been out of the United States" shit.
Lived in Germany for 3 years, lived in S Korea for 13 months, deployed to Saudi Arabia for 3 months prior to Iraq invasion, then there for an additional 6 months, deployed to the Balkans for 6 months, short deployments to Honduras, Haiti, Sinai Peninsula.
Vacationed with family to France, England, and Israel.
I have been outside of the U.S.
I spent 20+ years in the US Army, I don't particularly care if another country suffers an inconvenience.
Isn't that the heart of the whole Gen-X thing? We take care of ourselves.
There is an entire country (the U.S.) who has been incapacitated when it comes to their phones. No one answers their phone due to the insane number of scam calls coming in from those countries.
The governments of those countries aren't interested in doing anything about it. Cut off legitimate business and then you will see action.
Think it can't be done? look no further than N. Korea or Cuba it can and will work.
Oh no! I’m so sorry. That fucking hurts. People can do such terrible things. Thank you for this warning. My mom has always been so savvy, but I can see she’s losing confidence in her own judgment…
I work in risk at a bank. The problem is fraudsters are businesses. They know there target market and their weaknesses. They also are very good at coaching their victims to the point that they lie when they come into the branch and tell the bank personnel they know the person they are sending money to, blah blah blah…. It is sad really. Sometimes they can be coaxed out of it. But too often even after telling them we think they are being scammed they proceed to take the money out and give it away. No one thinks it could happen to them.
That’s so tragic. I watched Telemarketers on Max and elderly people are their bread and butter. It’s a sign of cognitive decline. Also, that show impressed upon me how readily people will give you money if you just ask them to.
This is currently happening with an in-law’s parent. My father has also been scammed/stolen from because he’s too trusting. I’ve become super guarded and suspicious now and that makes me sad. Sad state of the world.
My dad gives his number to scammers thinking they want to have him be their investment partner. I try to logic with him how would that work but pride gets in the way and he’s mad that I’m interfering. We now answer the phone they are relentless. Being told to fuck off and we know they are scammers just makes my dad angry. He’s not mad that we caught it but not allowing him to complete his business dealings. This is weekly as well thankfully he was too old to get a cell phone so he doesn’t use one and we can monitor his phone calls.
My Dad is in his 80s and I never taught him how to do any online banking whatsoever. I take him to his bank and he pays for everything with checks & money orders. This has helped to scam proof him. The few autopays I have set up for him come out of a shared acct so I can monitor them. His phone is set to block all calls except for trusted contacts. Anyone legit will leave a voicemail.
It’s not perfect. He’s still susceptible to snail mail schemes.
I watched some “scamming the scammer” videos on YouTube to see how it works. They have a lot of procedures to account for people who are skeptical and for banks who won’t allow the transfers. They actually stay on the phone with them while they go in person and visit their banks, and tell them not to tell the people at the bank what it’s for, or that they are sending money to a family member—whatever it takes.
Sometimes their scam is that their target was charged money erroneously and the scammer is trying to “transfer it back” (plus some for the inconvenience) and they have fake websites set up to look like the target is getting the money when they are actually sending the money. Or they have to send money to prove it’s their account, and when they have control of their PC, they change the amount. Or they simply watch them log in with their password and use it later. Sometimes they’ll have them go buy gift cards at a store (while staying on the phone with them to “help” with any pushback from the retailer) so it doesn’t flag at their bank.
They have entire call centers just for scamming people this way, it’s a “real” 9-5 type job there (the ones I’ve seen were in India), where they apply, are interviewed, everything. All to scam people out of their hard-earned money. It’s gross.
The scam baiting people are good at it, and advanced at playing along, but most of the time it’s just to waste the scammer’s time/keep them from scamming real victims for a while and nothing substantial is ever done to stop it. When they catch on to the fact that they’re being scammed and break character, they have no shame at all.
[Kitboga](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCm22FAXZMw1BaWeFszZxUKw)is a good one to watch on youtube.
i seriously want to go all vigilante on these scammers. they can often be traced to a foreign country. something needs to be done about the criminals that are allowed to keep doing this.
r/Scams is your new subreddit. No joke, go there, get edumacated.
That aside, it's unlikely she will ever stop. Right now recovery scammers are lining up for a piece of the pie, and so are fake cops. She will have fake FBI trying to get her to download 'crime stopper' apps from dodgy websites. She will have multiple US DA's personally taking an interest in her case and for some reason needing Wal Mart gift cards in bulk. RIP her land line number, it is now Three Mile Island multiplied by Chernobyl, to the power of Fukushima. She has proven herself such a mark this will never end. This is her life now.
Source: a five year run with an in-law we've given up on since he canceled a family dinner, on a major holiday, because he had an 'important business phone call'. This is after doing all the things, giving him AARP info on lotto scams. Getting documentation from Publisher's Clearing House saying they have no idea who he is. After two uniformed police officers showed up at his door and told him that no, he does not have the RCMP commissioner's personal cell number. (This is Canada which makes the FBI thing extra fucked up, I mean, a foreign police force?) Between the police and local health authority, and meticulous record keeping, he's now under a public guardian since he's been convinced his entire family can't be trusted.
Good luck and remember this isn't your fault.
i have said this loads of times, but they should put either a perogi or jim browning video on the tv before the evening news.
many boomers would happily watch a 5 or 10 minute video whilst waiting for the news to start, and they are the target for many of these scammers.
in these cases the only defence is education in advance, and the boomers just dont have it.
All these elderly lonely people being scammed can't meet each other instead of these overseas predators? I just caught my mom with tons and tons of used up gift cards. When I confronted her, she tried to act like she didn't know what I was talking about and then wanted to know how much she'd spent when she had already run a receipt and had the total there with them. Because of course she was going to be paid back. Lol. Ugh!!!
I(48M) think about how it's 2023 and how quickly the last 20 years flew by, and edging on 50 how another 20 flying by has me at 70 WTAF if I knew I was gonna live this long, I'd have drank more water.
Hey, sorry for your loss. Shit does happen. Most of us, our parents died, and never seen any inheritances.
Just be great full she isn't dead and has a house
For now on you look after all her money now
OMG. I cannot imagine what you’re feeling right now.
My aunt got scammed out of several hundred dollars from that Microsoft activation scam. This was when she was in her late 50s.
We talk a lot about elderly victims of a cam and they are bit their are also younger people. A totally alert and on top of finances elderly person can be a victim as much as an older person who isn't as alert or an alert middle aged adult.
I worry sometimes when I overhear my dementia-ailing mum on her landline conversing curtly on the phone to someone. I guess I'm somewhat relieved that she's 'short' with whoever's on the other end and that she isn't really in a position now to readily be wrangled into being scammed...but if undesirables were to front at her door if none of us were around, it may very well prove a different story
I am sorry for how your mother was scammed can you get any of the money back at all? Is there a way you can set up a trust or something to protect her savings? I know scammers can be persuasive but given her age please have her get checked for age related memory issues, dementia, etc.
My husband is 19 years older. At least by now he’ll run things past me or hand me his laptop pre scam.
The latest was a guy coming to the door, offering to repair our front walkway. It was a total scam. I figured it out because he asked for much too much money to fix it, and much too little to replace it.
My Dad is...was...one of the sharpest people I know. The math he could do in his head amazed me for years. His knowledge about so many things, incredible. He just knew stuff. What he didn't know, he could figure out. Then he got older and his mental faculties declined. I've been working in and around IT for close to 30 years now, so I've hammered into them being safe online, don't fall for scams, etc. I got a call from my Mom last year that my Dad was on the phone with someone because their Chromebook got a popup that said they had to renew their Microsoft license. Microsoft license...on a Chromebook. My Dad had just let someone remote to his computer and he had just logged into his bank account. I caught him just in time before he got fleeced. This was the second time he got compromised. I wanted to be pissed at him for not listening to me, but I couldn't. My 80 year old Dad isn't my 30, 40, or 50 year old Dad anymore. Age has taken its toll on him. He's just not the sharp guy he was, and it's hard to see. Even harder is hearing him admit age is getting to him. Age catches up to all of us, and it's catching up to our parents right now. I frequently check on with them now, and toss out reminders, to try to make sure something like this won't happen again. If y'all still have your parents, just realize, they are getting old. Getting old can do a number of things to folks. I'm watching what it's doing to my Dad and it sucks. I'm not surprised when the police did a welfare check she told them everything was fine. This happens a ton because the elderly are very much embarrassed to admit something like this has happened to them. It's a pretty common thing when they get scammed. I know someone that let themselves continued to be taken, all told for about $100K, before asking for help from his daughter because he was embarrassed it was happening to him.
I sent the cops to my mom's house a month ago and she swore she was fine. Today, the same cop showed up and scolded her for not being honest a month earlier. I don't know what else we could have done.
You need to call her GP, inform them of this, and have them carry out more stringent tests for cognitive decline. Ideally get a referral to a paediatric neurologist. And depending on outcome, you probably need to look into getting power of attorney over her financial affairs. There are also senior welfare organisations who can counsel the best way to go about this. Because without protection she is at risk of getting scammed again.
Next step, Have her move to the same town you live. Its best for everyone.
TBH, if you're not already your mother's power of attorney and health care proxy or whatever they call them in your area, it's time for an emergency conservatorship/guardianship, with any and all evidence of this scam being brought before a judge so you can get into all her accounts and handle them for her. It's just time. If you're in the states, most states have a self help site with the forms necessary to fill out and take to court.
It's hard to wrap our minds around how people can get scammed like this. And it's not just the elderly! I actually just listened to a podcast about a series of "love" scams that used the same images of the woman who these catfished dudes were supposedly talking to. There was one guy in his EARLY 30s who ended up giving around $250,000 to this scam woman despite multiple, multiple, multiple red flags. He seemed like a normal guy and had his own business (which is why he had that money to give). Yet he let himself be scammed by this fake chick (who was really a group of men in West Africa) for four freaking years. It's one thing when you are truly vulnerable/your faculties are failing. But how do so many other people get scammed like this? How???!!
I'm a regular in the scams subreddit, and let me tell you, everyone is vulnerable. Guys like the one in your story are probably lonely and looking for love. Romance scammers are excellent at getting to know their victims and preying on their tendencies. If they realize their victim is interested in business and finance, they'll mirror that and get them to "invest in their business." For someone with white-knight fantasies, they'll cook up trouble. They play the long game, going weeks or months before asking for money and building a relationship. There are a ton of other scams out there. Young men have killed themselves over sextortion scams. A niche one targeting female therapists and social workers frightened several of them into giving up nudes as well as money (the scammer posed as a police officer pretending she'd failed to appear to testify. He laid on the fear really thick, emphasizing that she was facing the loss of her license and even prison time, but he was doing a favor of this complex procedure she had to follow while telling no one. Sometimes it included a video strip search.) People get scammed on buying and selling sites constantly. Knowledge is your only defense and I always suggest everyone spend a little time learning what's out there.
I hate to admit my mom was lonely- she really liked all the attention.
This guy stuck with the scam lady for FOUR years without ever once seeing her in person or even having a video chat with her. Four years. Lonely or not, it's astounding. This guy seemed like a decent catch, too! He was a long-haired Italian guy with his own sustainable farming business. It's wild.
It is, but it just goes to show how deeply they can get their hooks in. And you get emotionally invested and you get caught up in not wanting to admit the truth to yourself, and there you are.
I listened to that podcast, too. Love, Janessa. It was wild and so sad how many people got taken in and how many people use that same girl's image to scam people. Even the host of the podcast suspected the supposed real Janessa she talked to was a fake.
Weren't you frustrated by that Italian guy? Was he just hopelessly naive? Was he missing a screw? How did he give away $250k? It was so clear he was being catfished. Four years and he never even got a video chat. And all the messages from "her" were very, very weird!! The mind boggles.
It was bizarre. I was almost yelling at my phone, saying "She's not real, buddy! And you sound amazing! Go meet a real girl." I ran across an older man at CVS a few years ago who was buying gift cards to get his grandson out of jail. No matter what the cashier and I said to him, he was convinced these $500 Visa gift cards were going to help. It was very sad.
I wanted to shake that guy! Do you think growing up on a small Mediterranean island just made him hopelessly naive?? And even after finding out he was duped out of $250k (!!!!!!!!!!!!!), he was way too nice and understanding. Aughhhhh. Dude. Get mad at least!!
The internet & social media is a total cesspool of bad faith manipulators
>Young men have killed themselves over sextortion scams. I worked on a few of these cases a couple of jobs ago. This was 10 years ago and very few people were aware of sextortion and even fewer were aware of the type that targets young guys, some of them as young as middle school. Fortunately none of the ones I worked on ended with a suicide but I absolutely understand how easy it is for it to go that way once they're far enough in the trap and have even been coerced into victimizing their younger siblings at these predators demands. It takes a lot to really bother me but I still think about some of those kids.
There have been a couple of mysterious suicides at my kids’ high school over the past few years where EVERYONE from their friends to their parents were taken completely by surprise. Kids with zero depression or known issues. I think it could have been this I think they need to start warning the kids and educating them about scams
Many years ago my kid "accidentally" dropped his laptop down a flight of stairs when he was 14. I'm positive he was targeted.
Smart kid. Better a destroyed laptop than a destroyed life.
What would make you think that?
I know 3 people who have been seriously scammed-all normal, intelligent, only 2 were older (not elderly). it can happen!
The comptroller of a local county in my area was sentenced to years in prison after embezzling several hundred thousand in taxpayer dollars which she had sent to some Nigerian scammer. It amazes me the people who get taken in by these pricks.
It's like the people who are taken in by cults. Mind-boggling.
My gf is a bank manager the amount of stories she has about stopping people getting scammed is ridiculous.
Lonely people who are very insecure & awkward with the opposite sex.
And then they clearly lie to themselves even when it's insanely obvious they are being scammed. It's insane!!!!
My grandpa used to be a bank manager so he dealt with this frequently. Answers a phone call one day while the whole family is there. Lowers phone looks at me, “hey Barry, how much did you say you need to get out of jail?” I don’t need anything grandpa, I’m right here. He raised the phone back up “ how about you go fuck yourself” My uncle got a call once while working. Was supposedly my lawyer requesting that he bail me out. Uncle said he sat there for a second and then replied. “That’s strange we don’t show him as being in custody.” My uncle was a cop.
What fucking bank was she with? My mother tried to send me 4k she owed me and they made her come in to the branch and answer all sorts of questions before they would release the funds. She's 75. It was a digital transfer. Theres a record of me transferring the money in by the same means and it still got flagged. It was annoying, but I get it. You should be naming and shaming the bank that just let her pull 900k out of her accounts without so much as a blink.
That is such a good point. I can’t even take an Uber in California on a business trip because my bank doesn’t believe I’m really there. Where were they in that situation?
I’m sorry to hear this. That is a crap ton of money. What was the scam?
He said he was from Microsoft and that she had a bunch of hackers on her computer. He showed her he was legit by operating her computer. He somehow convinced her that she needed to safeguard her funds elsewhere. I'm still unraveling this whole shit show. He also said he was her friend. Tons of red flags and she didn't listen to them.
I’m sorry this happened to her and you and it’s honestly something I worry about constantly. My mother is also a university professor and your mom’s* age and for reasons I cannot fathom, she will not take any internet precautions - she thinks she doesn’t ‘have an identity anyone would want to steal’ and when I explain that actually, her pension, savings, home equity, etc are in fact super attractive to scammers, she accuses me of trying to ‘scare’ her. It’s okay though, I let my brother be the favorite so she’d move in with him when the time comes * (I know it’s not a subject for levity, but haha I wrote ‘your mom’) Eta: just saw your update, that’s horrible - there may be some recourse: https://ovc.ojp.gov/program/stop-elder-fraud/providing-help-restoring-hope
You might check with her bank & any financial institutions and have them flag her account as a vulnerable senior and note to call you or your brother if she attempts any large withdrawals.
When my friends mom was scammed, the bank did nothing.
You might convince her by agreeing with her that her specific identity is not something someone wants to steal. But scammers will just try random telephonenumbers and emailadresses without knowing who is behind it. Its called fishing for a reason! They cast their net and see what comes up. Just this week I got a SMS from a random number with the "mum I have a new number" line...
Thank you for this.
Your mom. *Beavis* *and* *butthead* *laugh*
Damn man…I’m so sorry. Thanks for sharing because we never know what our parents might be falling for. I’m assuming it was a “cold call” out of the blue or was it one of those facebook scams where they start chatting through messenger?
I'm not sure how they first got their hooks in her. My husband set up her laptop with the latest security software, so it should it have been ok. It's so insane!
It’s quite easy to remote control someone PC with their permission, regardless of security software. Just direct them to a website, have them run a program, and enter a code.
My favorite way to string along scammers trying this was always to insist that I had totally just installed their remote control spyware and done everything they asked but nothing was happening (of course I was just surfing shitposts while doing nothing the guy said). I'd act more and more confused and tech-unsavvy the more aggravated the dude got, insisting I'd followed his instructions, until I hit a good timewasting milestone like 20 minutes or 1/2 an hour, then I'd make a stupid noise and hang up.
As a tech support person, it’s all too real to have a legitimate session take forever to make work, so that stringing along is highly effective.
I'm sure that's exactly what happened. She's very trusting.
Yeah the trusting part is what got her, not the smarts. You just can’t trust anyone who comes to *you* unsolicited offering services, no matter how sincere sounding. I’m really surprised the bank or whatever financial institution didn’t red flag this. They should’ve known better
Seriously. I saw a couple in front of me in IKEA a few years ago have to get out of line and go call their bank because they were from Alabama but they'd just tried to spend $300 in Atlanta, so the bank was blocking the transaction. I've gotten "Did you authorize this transaction?" texts from the bank when trying to take a $15 Uber trip while out of town. How do they not flag 80 or 90 withdrawals happening in rapid succession on an account that isn't normally that active?
My bank recently froze my debit card because my daughter and I were riding rent-a-scooters in the city and they were worried the small transactions were “account testing” before scammers tried for something big. Derailed our dinner plans (we only had enough cash for fast food 🤨), but I’m glad to know they are on top of things.
That's what I was thinking. How could her institution not catch this? I had someone try to empty my account, and they caught it instantly and contacted me. I can't tell you how grateful I was for that. It wasn't a ton of scratch (around 3K), but it definitely would've made me physically ill.
Yeah is apparently 900k. They’d usually be very vigilant against withdrawals that big. I’d definitely talk to them about this whole thing.
900K!?! Good God! I wonder if she's got a legit case against them for that kind of money. You gotta wonder why they didn't catch this. Something is definitely off here.
It was probably much smaller amounts that slowly escalate over a period of time rather than attempting to grab the whole balance in one swipe. This makes the initial transactions less likely to trigger a response from the bank, and establishes a pattern of withdrawals that looks 'normal' to automated sentry software as the transactions increase in magnitude. When the money dries up, the scammer ends the relationship, usually abruptly and brutally. This is referred to as *pig butchering*.
Horrible. One of my best friends is an independent IT consultant. The first, second, third, and fourth thing she tells her clients is, “if anyone calls or emails you and says anything about your computer or your bank accounts, hang up the phone, don’t open the email, and CALL ME.” It is INCREDIBLY common. I listened as my (very smart) boss a few years back gave someone on the phone access to his computer. I wasn’t even listening, but the hairs on the back of my neck stood up and I ran into his office, snatched the phone from his hand, and hard turned off his computer. He thought he was talking to his bank. He was not. They prey on the elderly, and don’t give a damn. There is a special hell reserved for people like this.
It’s not just the elderly, I knew a person in their 40’s fall for this. They just trust people too much.
I guess this is the advantage of living rurally and not having internet at the house (therefore no computer for banking). We never get scam calls, like, not ever. Maybe banking online makes people the target, and it’s not just cold calls to random people?
Well there have been all KINDS of data breaches that make people targets. If scammers have just a little information, they can often con the rest out of people. It’s not necessarily online *banking* that makes people targets, but the more you buy online or use online services, the higher the chances of your data ending up in a hacker’s hands. Heck, even going on whitepages or another phone number site will give scammers the people “connected” to you *along with their ages*, allowing them to make assumptions about who your kids and grandkids are. A scammer called my late dad (a man whose only foray into the web was getting to level 5000+ in Candy Crush) and said that he was “Xxxxx”, his grandson, and needed money for bail.
That’s a very common scam approach.
Sorry that happened to your mom. A similar thing happened to my mom. The scammers called her every single day and we’re able to get about $40K from her before I found out about it. I called the authorities and they were absolutely less than useless. These scammers prey on the elderly who may be in some form of mental decline and they are very persuasive. I’d love to have an opportunity to “chat” with them in a room for 20-30 minutes and let them know exactly what I think of them.
You and me both. But first, I'd like to slit their Achilles tendons and break their kneecaps.
This shit is terrible. I have a friend from high school who took a job as a bank teller a little over a year ago after getting laid off from her corporate career. She said that she regularly sees people in their 70s and 80s getting scammed. She had no idea how much of it was going on. The same people coming in there withdrawing money several times a week to buy gift cards or send to who tf knows where via Western Union. Sometimes they even come into the bank to make the transactions while on the phone with the scammers. One guy has paid somebody over $400,000 in about a year. The bank does have policies in place for reporting suspected incidents of fraud and scamming and she has occasionally been able to talk some of them out of making the withdrawals but sometimes they get angry and say "If you won't give me my money I'll go to another bank branch where they will." Apparently there's not much the police or FBI or Homeland Security can do if the person won't participate in the investigation, denies that anything is wrong, and just insists upon continuing to pay.
I remember back almost 10 years ago, I was sending large sums of money overseas and the lady at the Western Union noticed I came in the third time in 5 days and stopped me. It was like 8:15am and I was tired so I was kinda rude not realizing why she was questioning "Do you know this person? Who is this person? Did they send you here?". My response was "What? The fuck are you talking about? I'm sending money to my fiance because i'm moving there and she's getting our apartment and furnishings". Her next question really pissed me off "Have you met this person?" I just simply told her "Look, send the damned money and let me get out of here". I'm hoping I didn't discourage her from stopping others. (Note: Yes, I knew the person, yes we got married and approaching 9 years now. Worlds worst scammer!)
Maybe she's in for the really, really long con! (kidding)
I always joked about that. "Why get $15,000 from me once when you can get $30,000 and 2 cats over a lifetime of happy memories and eventually children"
I just read the details of the scam. My nephew got this exact phone call. As soon as they started reading off his bank account info, he hung up and locked everything down. My 88yo dad gets a call or text almost every day. Luckily he calls me before responding, for now.
OP, I'm so sorry this happened. Be on the lookout for a recovery scam, where someone claims they can get the money back for a fee. It's a scam. No one can get the money back.
My mom is insane. "I got a popup that said I had a virus so I clicked.." MOM! How many times do I have to tell you?! Thank goodness she calls me right after. I get plain envelopes and toss them. And what do cards come in? Plain envelopes 'for security' and they say DO NOT BEND CARD INSIDE. Secure as can be. IT Guy bit --- * Warn your parents around tax time, don't click on shit. * Anything that says, "Danger", "Respond immediately" and/or has typos/misspellings. (Unless you don't care, then ignore them) * Get them a reliable email application, Outlook is available for mobile phones and desktops and it's got a lot of friendly user features. And a pretty good junk filter. * Gmail is also good. * If you know typical scams (Virus on your computer, you have a fax, "invoice from your cable provider") warn them. IRS scams will be rampant in several months.
My mother in law fell victim to scammers. I honestly believe she was bored and wanted someone to talk to. Her son lived with her and did nothing. She only lost a few thousand dollars before my niece, who lives closer, stepped in. When I hit that age I want my computer child proofed to prevent me form making any financial decisions. And banks should have noticed your mom’s account. $900k vanishing is something bangs typically catch
One of the banks called me a month ago, and I called my mom to find out wtf was going on. When she didn't respond, I called the local cops to do a welfare check and she told them everything was fine. She then told me everything was fine and I believed her. I should have told the bank not to release the funds, but she seemed fine and she was always a good money manager. Argh!
Your mom flushed $1m down the drain. It is insane.
Man, that's terrible
I am currently trying to guard against this with my dad. I'm concerned that he isn't good at filtering out what is an obvious scam vs things that are legit, so we've been having a lot of "okay so here's what you can safely ignore" conversations. Basically, we are at the "ask me first before you buy anything that isn't groceries." Ugh.
My mother had her bank account cleared out by a scammer about 10 years ago. She applied for a job online and they hired her and told her they would provide her with a laptop so she could work from home. They told her to provide her bank information so they could deposit the funds into her account, then she could go buy the laptop. She did, and they cleaned her out. She never told us anything because she wanted to surprise us about this great new job she had gotten. By then it was too late. Sigh. Now she’s 76 and having to work a part time job to supplement her SS so she can get by.
I took away my dad's landline and got him a cellphone years ago. That took away about 9/10 scammer calls. I also programmed his phone to send to VM anyone not on his contact list (family, friends, doctors, insurance, etc.). That took care of the rest. When we meet up (which is a few times a week), he plays the VMs and I delete all the bullshit ones. I think it also helps that dad is naturally cantankerous, so that helps quite a bit.
This is the way. This, and not having a computer.
This is pretty common in aging folks. Sad. 😫
I'm so sorry this happened to your mother. I take care of my parents and they live with me BUT I noticed my parents would get weird offers via call to their cell phones. Luckily they tell me about whatever the person said and I always explain to them there are scammers out there and share victims stories so they are aware. Also for not answering the door when I'm not home. There are scammers coming to homes as electricians etc. I think educating our elderly family members is the best way and to tell them that if anyone that asks for money they should call a designated family member to check/seek advice so the scam ends there. I get really upset seeing and hearing elderly people that worked hard their entire life get scammed out if their money. It's disgusting and we need much harsher punishment/imprisonment for this!
>$900k What?!?!?! Also can I have her number. I went through my dad's expenses and found a bunch of cc payments he was making to scammers. He also never has used his ATM card and just writes checks to cash for himself that there's no accounting for. He was also paying for an insurance plan that he didn't need. He has a timeshare that I've been trying to get him out of, but he won't make the calls. He also didn't switch to medicare part B when my mom died and accrued $90K worth of prostate cancer treatments that weren't covered. It amazes me how Silent G and Boomers are so bad with money and still have everything taken care of for them.
OMG, my Mom did that same shit with Medicare Part B. She didn’t switch and racked up insane bills that nearly bankrupted her. Why? She was too stubborn to make the call.
I had a guy who was working on my property who I referred to my mom. He went over to work on her place and brought New Guy. New Guy called mom a few days later and convinced her my guy was overcharging her and to start using him exclusively. It's almost a year later and she FINALLY stopped giving him "projects" to do. She was paying his rent, taking him to buy batteries for his car, buying his gas, cigarettes, etc. She even spent $200 for his young daughter's birthday gift. She gave me a fking spin mop for mine. She's very lonely and I get that but it's so hard to sit by and watch your mom get fleeced by some creep who does not have any romantic interest at her at all. My friend and I looked him up and found he had DV charges against him. I sent her the mugshots and she said it was just a misunderstanding (!!!). During this time period, she threw out a lot of my dead father's belongings, including his VA records. I was absolutely gutted because my son is in the military and would have liked to have had his grandfather's records. Took me a while but I have let her back into my life. It will never bet the same. We used to be extremely close but she said some really horrible things about my dad when she was infatuated with this man. All this sucks but I am so afraid I will become like her and I am TERRIFIED!!!
>She gave me a fking spin mop for mine. I'm sorry but I snorted with laughter at this.
hahahaha
>She gave me a fking spin mop for mine. It would have been less insulting to get nothing! I'm sorry, this is serious and I hate that you had to go through this whole deprogramming of your mom.
Thanks. She actually asked me what I wanted this year and I picked out a $20 Halloween decoration from Amazon :)
Did I read 900k correctly? Almost 1 million? OUCH! I keep an eye on my parent and inlaws for this EXACT reason.
I got light-headed for a second when I saw that number.
Same here. My father was the smartest man I knew. He got caught up in a scam. They wanted him to send a money order so that he could collect the prize money he just won. He got so far as the customer service desk at the grocery store. The clerk said "I know this is none of my business, but this sounds like a scam" He stepped back and snapped out of whatever trance they put him under. All he could say to his defence was "they were so convincing" He was so ashamed. I felt so bad for him. I wished I knew who that clerk was. I would have liked to thank her, given her a gift, or something .She saved us from such pain and heartache! An angel for sure.
Kitboga(?) and some others have YT vids were they play the scammers back. It’s small but it’s great to watch him play them back. The videos I’ve seen aren’t tutorials, but they give an idea of how those a holes operate. I’m sorry this happened, it’s awful. I’m sure she’s ashamed.
I've watched all those guys, and they are great. I wish they would do more with the romance scammers. They are getting a lot of support, which is wonderful, but it makes it harder to get their help unless you spend over $500.00 a month on their pateron.
My parents have got scammed once and hacked twice in the past year. The first time they were contrite. Now they are belligerent. They won't tell my sister or me anything because they are afraid we'll think poorly of them. We tried to help them the first time but then they all of a sudden get protective of their CC and bank accounts. They don't listen anyway but they are yelling (literally) at the wrong people. They have protection through their credit union and get refunded what was hacked but they don't actually report it to Visa or MC or whatever their card is. So their number is still out there. Which is probably how it happened again. As for the scamming... well thankfully she wised up before she actually got into the bank. The guy called her back and she didn't answer. But that was a close one. Now, I honestly mind my business. If they are going to be so belligerent then whatever, not my problem anymore.
That’s just horrible. There has to be something that can be done to get it back. That amount of money is FBI level of reporting. I’d encourage you to call your closest branch and find what department you need and be connected.
I am so sorry to hear this. But what the fuck kind of financial institution just lets this much money move out of the account without raising massive red flags, or even alerting authorities to potential fraud and money laundering? Hell, just about any transaction over $10K has to get reported to the government, doesn’t it? There is a special place in Hell for people like these scammers.
This may turn out a bit like back when US jobs were sent oversees. There was a lot of hand-wringing and faux concern from politicians, but ultimately “nothing could be done”, you see. In the next few decades there’ll be some hand-wringing from politicians but mysteriously “nothing can be done”, no enforceable regulation, etc.
I hope you are right.
>But what the fuck kind of financial institution just lets this much money move out of the account without raising massive red flags, or even alerting authorities to potential fraud and money laundering? I think a lot depends on how and to where they sent the funds but this feels like something OP should report to a federal authority to look into. Even if it goes nowhere, I hope it forces the bank to keep a better watch on behalf of their clients.
Be aware that she is now on every scammer’s list as a hot property and she will get all kinds of new scams heading her way. Some of those scams will be recovery scams from people that will promise to help her recover the money for $X. These are also scams and they will take ever increasing amounts of money and not recover a dime.
I was just watching a video about this yesterday. A lady lost $10,000 to a romance scammer then another $5,000 to a recovery scam. Unbelievable.
Yeah it’s really unfortunate. As their children, it’s hard to keep track of what scams and bad financial decisions they may be exposed to. My mom’s financial guy is asking her to change her long-term care insurance right now from a *great* policy to one that will cost her a lot less. And I get that. But she doesn’t understand what the changes are and cannot even tell me *what* they are. And — to be blunt — she’s already showing signs of early Alzheimer’s so we will be using that policy at some point in the next decade I am sure. So are they trying to take advantage of her to sell some sub-par policy and collect a commission? Or are they looking at the amount she’s paying and just thinking it’s excessive? And I cannot figure how much to intervene or even whether to do so. It’s her money. But at the same time … ugh.
OMG. I am so sorry for you and your mom. If you haven’t already, report this to the FBI IC3 unit. Reading these other stories, too… Goddamn it is seriously time to set up child permissions on their computers. There is a serious need for elder computer monitoring. If only they’d swallow their pride and admit they need the oversight.
We reported to them, but it's of little use. They are just collecting numbers, and it will have to get even bigger before they use resources to investigate. It will be years before anything trickles down to help us, if ever.
Because -- not all elderly people do, so if you just barrel into their homes and say they need to be treated like children, they aren't going to like it. Gen X ain't exactly young. Oldest Xers are pushing 60. How do you think they will feel if, in 10 years, someone tries to tell them, for no reason, that they are no longer mentally competent?
My dude, if I spent almost a million actual dollars on something that didn’t directly benefit me, then *damn right I’m no longer mentally competent*. Blows my mind people are too proud to the tune of nearly seven figures.
THIS PARTICULAR PERSON was incompetent. Do you think this happens to everyone? You're getting pretty fucking old. Are you ready to give up your independence soon?
It’s a bit like with car keys and driving. At some point you’ve got to start watching your elderly relative closely and when you see signs of problems, intervene before things get out of hand. Personally, I WANT my kids to take away my car keys and computers and smartphones at the first sign of problems. If I get new ones I want those to mysteriously disappear too. I’ve told them to only listen to what young me says on this matter and ignore old me. Also, don’t confront elderly me or tell elderly me my marbles are gone. Instead, just quietly get rid of all my dangerous stuff (cars, computers). Because if they try to talk to me about it I’ll just be mad at them because that is how demented people are.
You do realize that not everyone gets dementia, right? Not even most.
Yes, when you're seeing signs of problems, obviously . But not simply when you turn a certain age.
So sorry that happened to her. And that kind of cash. Unfortunatley, it happens everyday, to lots of people. They are good at working on fear, anxiety, greed, any emotion that ties a person up. Tgere is a sub..r/scams that help identify scams. And if anyone messages you they can help, they are scammers too. Check out you tube also, lots of ppl there tyring to stop or slow the bs down. Scam baiters, kitboga. I send my family links all the time.
I don’t remember his name, but there’s one guy who talks to phone scammers in a little old woman voice while simultaneously wiping everything from the scammers’ networks, turns their cameras on and describes their office, sends them glitter bombs, it’s amazing.
Perogie
Great channel.
Yup.
Kitboga, watch him on Youtube or Twitch
OMG! We have the same exact thing going on with our mom!! It is astonishing how little help is out there in this situation. My mom was fiscal and health insurance officer officer for our state senate for 31 years and the cheapest person ever. They started grooming her 2 years ago, and we found out by accident when her bank called my sister, the night before my sister was scheduled for breast reconstruction (who has poa) when she wrote a check for 10,000 dollars!! We found out it was worse than that. Since then, she has sent thousands more in gift cards and even took out a loan, and worse, GAVE HER ACCOUNT NUMBERS SND PASSWORDS OVER TO THEM! She will not believe these people are scammers. She thinks they are peace keepers in Syria. She had never cared about this kind of crap before! She just handed over THOUSANDS of dollars to complete strangers. After 65 years of catering to her, lavishing her with thoughtful gifts and flowers, decorating her house at my expense, she gives me a few bucks on my birthday and nothing at Christmas! We finally got her phone and computer away from her. She is so broke she can't afford to buy any more. My sister is working with her bank and trying to find all her accounts. The credit companies have been notified, but only one responded so far. They don't understand the urgency of this!! Meanwhile, they are blowing up her phone with threats!!! This is aggravation we don't need and work we don't want! We told her she could be on the street soon, and her response is, "Well, I hope I die before that!"" I'm 😤😡🤬😡😭 Edit: My mother still drives, maintains her house, and goes to group discussions every week along with poker and luncheons and paints. She is 89, has all her knees, hips, etc. Takes NO medicine. Who is going to believe us that she lost it?!?
I'm so sorry you're going through this. We discovered after she passed away that my MiL had given thousands and thousands of dollars to someone who'd formed a romantic attachment via one of those retiree dating sites. It turned out to be someone overseas and she'd sent iphones, clothing, toiletries to an address in CA and giftcard codes every week for a year. She was in serious debt when she passed away and we thought it was for other reasons - no, she'd been funneling all her income to this monster online. She was an incredibly intelligent woman, just lonely after her partner died. My husband was furious at what happened and so sad that she didn't share anything. It's just heartbreaking. Check on your seniors. This stuff is way more common than it seems.
We recently discovered that my MIL law was spending several thousand a month on a holistic quack who told her she didn’t need blood pressure or thyroid medicine if she took her amazing supplements, and of course only hers worked. SIL went through all her cabinets and found 67 different supplements, which all cost $60-80 a bottle, in addition to the monthly “appointment” fees, which, to my knowledge, were phone calls telling MIL what not to eat that month. It’s fucking ridiculous how deep that bitch had her, and it had apparently been going on for years. It especially pissed me off because this woman preyed on the fact that my MIL lost her daughter to cancer, and it fucking broke her. She is so determined to not lose another family member that she’s an easy target for these assholes, and it just burns my fucking britches.
My elderly Mom fell for a scam for a "home warranty" that appeared to be calls and letters from her actual bank/mortgage lender, using their logo on mail, etc. She called me in a panic saying her bank was "demanding her to provide proof of a home warranty". She had always had home insurance, which is a normal requirement. I begged her not to share any info until I got a chance to review the documents. But she'd already done so out of fear. Sure enough, it was one of those "warranties" that will replace major items like a furnace, AC, if they break down, and she'd already given them her bank info, they'd withdrawn the first $100/mo payment. They were in no way connected to her bank/mortgage company. We had to open new accounts, the scam was reported to her actual bank and there were warnings in the news about it. But, I fear that many others have already signed up for the auto withdrawals, figuring it was legit, something they have to have or jeopardize their mortgage.
My mother actually signed up for the "car warranty". She got a letter in the mail that she thought was from her car manufacturer. She had already made the first payment, they wanted her to drive her car a lot more than she normally was to be sure it was in good working order. At first she resisted canceling it, because it would pay for "absolutely anything" that went wrong with her car, which only had 30,000 miles on it. When I added up how much the warranty would cost her in 2 years, it was more than $3000. I asked her when she had ever had a car repair cost her $3000, and she said "never" in a small voice. Luckily, she was able to cancel it and get her 1st payment back, but listening to the person on the other end of the line trying to scare her, telling her that her car would break down and no one would help her and she would have no way to get groceries was infuriating.
The "do not call" lists used to help... And yes, the scammers use very intimidating calls/letters that would appear genuine, they even had me worried at first, took calling the real number to her mortgage bank and regular bank to confirm it actually wasn't from either. I wish these scammers would face jail time, severe penalties and be blasted on the news, even if they actually originate from other countries.
She's been on the do not call list for years but they are still calling. I agree that the penalties need to be much stiffer
We just recently helped an aunt who was scammed out of 5k which is a drop in the bucket compared to what you are enduring with your mom. Unfortunately a lot of silent gen and early boomers are susceptible to this. My aunt said we were too cynical and believed the worse in people when we were trying to convince her. And when she realized the money was gone, she blamed everyone but herself. She's 73. No dementia. It was one of those government scams. We got rid of her landline, And we made sure her remaining money was safe. And we set up a blocker on her mobile phone. I'm so sorry you and your mom are dealing with this.
Scammers getting smarter and smarter. I keep receiving notifications from UPS and USPS about this or that. They look official and often come after I use on of those companies to send a package. My husband insists they are a scam, but if I were a couple decades older, I probably would trust these. They are getting damn good.
I got one from my college alumni office that looked so legit that I almost fell for it. But then I googled the phone # as I noticed it wasn’t the right area code for that office’s landline and saw it was a scam #. AI is only gonna make this worse. I’m tempted to give up digital banking.
JFC. one thing about my mom being from the silent gen, she never trusted anyone enough to let them scam her. i’m so sorry, that is a fuck ton of money.
My mom was also silent gen. Trusted NO ONE and literally thought anyone who was friendly to her “must want something”. Also she did not have a computer or a cell phone. Which is huge. She also would never answer her phone. Must have driven scammers crazy, an elderly person with a nest egg completely out of reach like that. And god help anyone who “pestered” her aka approached in person or called more than once. She gave some poor minister in her town hell once for that lol
ha! my mom was friendly with EVERYONE. she always took the path of least resistance. but she never believed anything at face value. she was a mathematician when women didnt do that kind of stuff. so she believed only what she personally had evidence to believe. the only time she got taken advantage of was once in a supermarket in the evening she was distracted while someone else stole her wallet. and apparently they felt so bad they mailed her back her wallet with everything but the cash in there! she never left her purse in the cart again. she was very pragmatic: “they must have needed the money more than i did.” other than that, she was scam proof.
I had this happen recently. Someone claiming to work on an Oil Rig in Oslo, Norway... Had a daughter who really needed a mother, he found me on FB and thought I was perfect, etc, etc. Was telling me he loved me. I played along a bit for fun, he actually talked on the phone with me. Then I told him to get lost. There are no oil rigs near Oslo and he was going by the typical script. He knew I was married as well. He said we would be the perfect family. Supposedly his daughter was in boarding school in Canada, and her mother had passed from cancer. People on an oil rig don't have time for that crap. His daughter then asked me for a gift card so she could download FB. I just had to laugh and block her too.
Maybe there is some info in here that can help: - https://ovc.ojp.gov/program/stop-elder-fraud/providing-help-restoring-hope - https://seniorservicesofamerica.com/blog/elderly-scams-what-you-need-to-know/ - https://www.storypoint.com/resources/health-wellness/what-to-do-elderly-parent-is-being-scammed/ - https://theultimatecaregivingexpert.com/senior-parent-scams/
I've always been lucky in that when something happens my mom contacts me first to find out what my advice is. Plus she doesn't answer the phone unless it's someone she knows.
I'm so sorry this happened to her.
What really annoys me is how rampant this is. I'm on the scams subreddit a lot, and so many people are losing hundred of thousands of dollars. When you think about the bigger picture, how many billions of dollars are being stolen out of the country and given to Nigeria and India? How are we going to handle this in a few years when we have however many thousands of seniors that are suddenly insolvent (that's on top of the poor folks we already have)? And the governments out there aren't doing much of anything to stop it.
This happened to my dad. The Jamaican lottery scammers got some of his money. Fortunately someone we knew locally became concerned when he was doing some money transfers that were out of the ordinary for him -- flagged it up to my brother and asked him to look into it. It could have been much worse because we put a stop to it, but still. He got very depressed in the aftermath, and we asked him to please consult us before making any more financial decisions, though he passed away a couple of years later. One of the most shocking things about your parents aging is the poor decisions they start to make, it is so unlike the parents you knew growing up.
What do childless seniors do? I'm 52 and probably have a good 20 years left. It worries me that I don't have anyone looking out for me when I get old. I'd like to think I'm of a generation that's more internet savvy, but as others have said, cognitive decline is real.
Hire an attorney and put your assets in a trust.
I should look into that. Thanks.
I did my best to make my dad scammer proof. First thing was to set his computer so that his user only had basic rights no install or anything like that. Set up an admin account for myself where I was the only person who could install anything. I also put up a remote login software so I can jump on at any time as needed. Because of his disability as he aged online banking was a must for him. Still I set up all the accounts with unique and difficult passwords. Every second factor came to my phone directly. I finally convinced him that it was worth waiting for my help to pay any bills or do any online transactions. I managed to keep him safe this way. It's a little extreme but it prevented him from getting swindled.
My mom was almost scammed when she got a message supposedly from me asking for money because "I" had lost my phone. Fortunately, we live in a bilingual region where one of the languages is the dominant, and that's the one the scammers used, but I always speak in the other language with my family, so she grew suspicious and contacted me first. And some say my minority language is useless 😏
My co-worker is dealing with a similar situation with her mother, who is a retired doctor. It is *terrifying* how quickly the mental acuity can go. Now she's on all her mother's accounts and was trying to pay bills online the other day with her mom on the phone (they live in different states) and it was wild, listening to them talk. "Mom, it says her the bill is X amount. Is that right?" her mother: "There's a good possibility." her: "What do you mean? Look at the amount on your bill. Does it say X?" her mom: "It sounds right. It could be." her: "WHAT DOES IT SAYS YOU OWE ON THE BILL? DON'T YOU HAVE IT IN FRONT OF YOU?" I've never been happy my mom's dead, but this is as close as I'll come.
During my time in the Army, working as tactical AT&T, I know for a fact that the phone companies can shut these people down. You want to put a halt to this shit, you cut off all telecommunications from India, Russia and most of Africa those countries will police this shit right up.
The fuck? Cut off telecommunications from roughly 2.5billion people? Are you fucking stupid? And someone upvoted this stupid comment?
Peer pressure is a mother fucker. The governments aren't willing to curtail this shit. Fuck with their economy and I guarantee the spam calls, and other BS will stop. Hell, just do it to one country and the others will take notice.
I honestly can't believe, but sort of can, that there is this many stupid people in GenX. This is some real "Tell me you've never been out of the United States without telling me you've never been out of the United States" shit.
Lived in Germany for 3 years, lived in S Korea for 13 months, deployed to Saudi Arabia for 3 months prior to Iraq invasion, then there for an additional 6 months, deployed to the Balkans for 6 months, short deployments to Honduras, Haiti, Sinai Peninsula. Vacationed with family to France, England, and Israel. I have been outside of the U.S. I spent 20+ years in the US Army, I don't particularly care if another country suffers an inconvenience. Isn't that the heart of the whole Gen-X thing? We take care of ourselves. There is an entire country (the U.S.) who has been incapacitated when it comes to their phones. No one answers their phone due to the insane number of scam calls coming in from those countries. The governments of those countries aren't interested in doing anything about it. Cut off legitimate business and then you will see action. Think it can't be done? look no further than N. Korea or Cuba it can and will work.
Oh no! I’m so sorry. That fucking hurts. People can do such terrible things. Thank you for this warning. My mom has always been so savvy, but I can see she’s losing confidence in her own judgment…
This is just frightening. I worry about my parents getting scammed all the time.
I work in risk at a bank. The problem is fraudsters are businesses. They know there target market and their weaknesses. They also are very good at coaching their victims to the point that they lie when they come into the branch and tell the bank personnel they know the person they are sending money to, blah blah blah…. It is sad really. Sometimes they can be coaxed out of it. But too often even after telling them we think they are being scammed they proceed to take the money out and give it away. No one thinks it could happen to them.
That’s so tragic. I watched Telemarketers on Max and elderly people are their bread and butter. It’s a sign of cognitive decline. Also, that show impressed upon me how readily people will give you money if you just ask them to.
This is currently happening with an in-law’s parent. My father has also been scammed/stolen from because he’s too trusting. I’ve become super guarded and suspicious now and that makes me sad. Sad state of the world.
My dad gives his number to scammers thinking they want to have him be their investment partner. I try to logic with him how would that work but pride gets in the way and he’s mad that I’m interfering. We now answer the phone they are relentless. Being told to fuck off and we know they are scammers just makes my dad angry. He’s not mad that we caught it but not allowing him to complete his business dealings. This is weekly as well thankfully he was too old to get a cell phone so he doesn’t use one and we can monitor his phone calls.
Everyone should watch scammer payback on YouTube and show it your olds. It really shows how cunning the scammers can be.
This almost happened to my parents and I think they are still in danger. So sorry.
My Dad is in his 80s and I never taught him how to do any online banking whatsoever. I take him to his bank and he pays for everything with checks & money orders. This has helped to scam proof him. The few autopays I have set up for him come out of a shared acct so I can monitor them. His phone is set to block all calls except for trusted contacts. Anyone legit will leave a voicemail. It’s not perfect. He’s still susceptible to snail mail schemes.
I watched some “scamming the scammer” videos on YouTube to see how it works. They have a lot of procedures to account for people who are skeptical and for banks who won’t allow the transfers. They actually stay on the phone with them while they go in person and visit their banks, and tell them not to tell the people at the bank what it’s for, or that they are sending money to a family member—whatever it takes. Sometimes their scam is that their target was charged money erroneously and the scammer is trying to “transfer it back” (plus some for the inconvenience) and they have fake websites set up to look like the target is getting the money when they are actually sending the money. Or they have to send money to prove it’s their account, and when they have control of their PC, they change the amount. Or they simply watch them log in with their password and use it later. Sometimes they’ll have them go buy gift cards at a store (while staying on the phone with them to “help” with any pushback from the retailer) so it doesn’t flag at their bank. They have entire call centers just for scamming people this way, it’s a “real” 9-5 type job there (the ones I’ve seen were in India), where they apply, are interviewed, everything. All to scam people out of their hard-earned money. It’s gross. The scam baiting people are good at it, and advanced at playing along, but most of the time it’s just to waste the scammer’s time/keep them from scamming real victims for a while and nothing substantial is ever done to stop it. When they catch on to the fact that they’re being scammed and break character, they have no shame at all. [Kitboga](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCm22FAXZMw1BaWeFszZxUKw)is a good one to watch on youtube.
So sorry. My mom nearly gave away high 5 figures to a scammer, and she's still really sharp and together. It's like she goes into some sort of trance.
This makes me so sad. I’m sorry they did this to your Mom.
i seriously want to go all vigilante on these scammers. they can often be traced to a foreign country. something needs to be done about the criminals that are allowed to keep doing this.
r/Scams is your new subreddit. No joke, go there, get edumacated. That aside, it's unlikely she will ever stop. Right now recovery scammers are lining up for a piece of the pie, and so are fake cops. She will have fake FBI trying to get her to download 'crime stopper' apps from dodgy websites. She will have multiple US DA's personally taking an interest in her case and for some reason needing Wal Mart gift cards in bulk. RIP her land line number, it is now Three Mile Island multiplied by Chernobyl, to the power of Fukushima. She has proven herself such a mark this will never end. This is her life now. Source: a five year run with an in-law we've given up on since he canceled a family dinner, on a major holiday, because he had an 'important business phone call'. This is after doing all the things, giving him AARP info on lotto scams. Getting documentation from Publisher's Clearing House saying they have no idea who he is. After two uniformed police officers showed up at his door and told him that no, he does not have the RCMP commissioner's personal cell number. (This is Canada which makes the FBI thing extra fucked up, I mean, a foreign police force?) Between the police and local health authority, and meticulous record keeping, he's now under a public guardian since he's been convinced his entire family can't be trusted. Good luck and remember this isn't your fault.
i have said this loads of times, but they should put either a perogi or jim browning video on the tv before the evening news. many boomers would happily watch a 5 or 10 minute video whilst waiting for the news to start, and they are the target for many of these scammers. in these cases the only defence is education in advance, and the boomers just dont have it.
All these elderly lonely people being scammed can't meet each other instead of these overseas predators? I just caught my mom with tons and tons of used up gift cards. When I confronted her, she tried to act like she didn't know what I was talking about and then wanted to know how much she'd spent when she had already run a receipt and had the total there with them. Because of course she was going to be paid back. Lol. Ugh!!!
I get at least 6 scam calls a day on my work phone.
Its always the "smart" ones who fall for these scams. Actually says a lot
I(48M) think about how it's 2023 and how quickly the last 20 years flew by, and edging on 50 how another 20 flying by has me at 70 WTAF if I knew I was gonna live this long, I'd have drank more water.
Hey, sorry for your loss. Shit does happen. Most of us, our parents died, and never seen any inheritances. Just be great full she isn't dead and has a house For now on you look after all her money now
I’m sorry your mother is so bad off in her mental faculties. Can I ask how it started, and what it has progressed into?
What's your mom have to say about it all now?
OMG. I cannot imagine what you’re feeling right now. My aunt got scammed out of several hundred dollars from that Microsoft activation scam. This was when she was in her late 50s.
We talk a lot about elderly victims of a cam and they are bit their are also younger people. A totally alert and on top of finances elderly person can be a victim as much as an older person who isn't as alert or an alert middle aged adult.
People will do crazy shit when it comes to love.
I worry sometimes when I overhear my dementia-ailing mum on her landline conversing curtly on the phone to someone. I guess I'm somewhat relieved that she's 'short' with whoever's on the other end and that she isn't really in a position now to readily be wrangled into being scammed...but if undesirables were to front at her door if none of us were around, it may very well prove a different story
I am sorry for how your mother was scammed can you get any of the money back at all? Is there a way you can set up a trust or something to protect her savings? I know scammers can be persuasive but given her age please have her get checked for age related memory issues, dementia, etc.
watch out for tonya konigsmark.
Jesus. My mom just got her FB account “hacked” and lost all access to it. You win
Holy cannoli thats a lot of money! I hope your mother can get some of it back.
My husband is 19 years older. At least by now he’ll run things past me or hand me his laptop pre scam. The latest was a guy coming to the door, offering to repair our front walkway. It was a total scam. I figured it out because he asked for much too much money to fix it, and much too little to replace it.