The little black book of scams (2016) • Hacker News Board

Re: The little black book of scams (2016)

#21

Post by anonymouzz » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 1:44 PM UTC

I recently fell victim to a nasty scam I've never heard about before. Wonder if anyone had similar experiences.

Happened in Serbia on a highway. We had an RV on German plates and slept on a gas station there, next to the truckers. Morning comes and the clutch pedal is dead - no resistance when I press it (this is a manual transmission car). Obviously not driveable, and we're not car gurus to debug it. We call the insurance but it's not responding (perhaps because it's Sunday). I find a tow car nearby and ask the guy for help, to which he suggests to tow the car 10km to his garage to investigate. I agree.

There they use the debug interface of the car to figure out that we need some part replaced (language is a bit of a barrier now) and quote us 700 EUR + VAT. I agree because we need to drive, and because I cannot contact insurance.

After the job is done I ask them for the old part (the replaced one), and they just say it's "software", after which I realize that I was just massively overcharged/defrauded.

Later when we discuss the situation with my girlfriend she tells me she's seen that tow car waiting seemingly for us for several hours, which suggests that the clutch damage was perhaps inflicted by the very people that fixed our car. I became scared of the whole situation and decided to not report it to the Serbian police and just leave the country asap (I mean if people cut cables in cars on the highway to get 700 EUR I have very low trust in the local law enforcement).

Re: The little black book of scams (2016)

#22

Post by dt_rsp » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 1:48 PM UTC

I was hoping it included the fiddle scam from American Gods.

Re: The little black book of scams (2016)

#23

Post by tapland » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 2:09 PM UTC

anonymouzz wrote: post #21

I recently fell victim to a nasty scam I've never heard about before. Wonder if anyone had similar experiences. Happened in Serbia on a highway. We had an RV on German plates and slept on a gas station there, next to the truckers. Morning comes and the clutch pedal is dead - no resistance when I press it (this is a manual transmission car). Obviously not driveable, and we're not car gurus to debug it. We call the ins…

> If people do crimes, why trust law enforcement?

That really helps noone. Report in a nearby larger city. If they don't care they just drop it.

Re: The little black book of scams (2016)

#24

Post by pavel_lishin » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 2:34 PM UTC

erikb wrote: post #5

geraldbauer wrote: post #2

FYI: I've put together an Awesome Initial Coin Offerings (ICO) Truths page. Subtitled The Art of the Steal - The Scammers' Big Lies at https://github.com/openblockchains/awesome-ico-truths . Buyer beware! Cheers. Prost.

Great that you put actual examples together. I like that. But I'm not sure if you can really improve the world through that. A lot of these problems are quite obvious and if people iwll still put their money into ICOs I'm not sure anything could help that. That, I feel, is the hardest part of learning more about scams and how to protect yourself. You inevitably see a lot of people who simply can't avoid it, almost go…

> A lot of these problems are quite obvious

Not to everyone.

Re: The little black book of scams (2016)

#25

Post by pontifier » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 2:51 PM UTC

geraldbauer wrote: post #2

FYI: I've put together an Awesome Initial Coin Offerings (ICO) Truths page. Subtitled The Art of the Steal - The Scammers' Big Lies at https://github.com/openblockchains/awesome-ico-truths . Buyer beware! Cheers. Prost.

Even when lightning strikes, and the coin you were supposed to get goes up x50,000 good luck trying to get them if you weren't watching the people behind it like a hawk.

Case in point NEM, who kept the coins from hundreds of initial stakeholders.

Re: The little black book of scams (2016)

#26

Post by aaron695 » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 2:52 PM UTC

erikb wrote: post #3

You sit with an old friend in bar, already quite drunk. You haven't seen this guys for years but now that you had such a nice evening you really feel like old brothers. Now he tells you about this great house he has and that he considers to move to another town. He might let you take it before he puts it on the market and to a friendship price that he could certainly not achieve on the market. Will you, at this point…

This is not really relevant at all.

Scammers are people you don't know.

They can't really be your friend, cause you know, they scam people so either you know they are dodgy or they are really desperate since you've never seen them scam before.

A friend who scamming you is like a suicide bomber, there's little you can do and it never happens off the news. So chill out.

It's like winning the lotto compared to real things you do have to be careful of, like you're friend being scammed and passing it on. Or them not knowing what they are talking about for market value. OR them not realising their own debt. Or business disagreements that no one could see coming.

It's a whole different story to OP.

Re: The little black book of scams (2016)

#27

Post by HourglassFR » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 2:54 PM UTC

As my brother often says:

In life, you can be greedy, you can be stupid. But you cannot afford beeing greedy and stupid at the same time.

Re: The little black book of scams (2016)

#28

Post by anonserb124 » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 3:07 PM UTC

anonymouzz wrote: post #21

I recently fell victim to a nasty scam I've never heard about before. Wonder if anyone had similar experiences. Happened in Serbia on a highway. We had an RV on German plates and slept on a gas station there, next to the truckers. Morning comes and the clutch pedal is dead - no resistance when I press it (this is a manual transmission car). Obviously not driveable, and we're not car gurus to debug it. We call the ins…

As a Serbian expat I would very much avoid putting too much trust in Serbian locals.

Sure, there are obviously some nice people but overall it's a very poor, corrupt, and cut-throat country. Serbian doctors have been caught stealing children from hospitals for god's sake.

Re: The little black book of scams (2016)

#29

Post by mrhappyunhappy » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 3:27 PM UTC

anonymouzz wrote: post #21

I recently fell victim to a nasty scam I've never heard about before. Wonder if anyone had similar experiences. Happened in Serbia on a highway. We had an RV on German plates and slept on a gas station there, next to the truckers. Morning comes and the clutch pedal is dead - no resistance when I press it (this is a manual transmission car). Obviously not driveable, and we're not car gurus to debug it. We call the ins…

Count your lucky stars it wasn’t worse than it was. A terrible scam indeed “tow it to my shop” should have set off a flag but I can totally understand your desire to just get going again. Sorry to hear about your terrible experience, it could have happened to anyone really, myself included. Try not to lose sleep over it and be extra careful from now on.

Re: The little black book of scams (2016)

#30

Post by JohnWilcox » Mon, Dec 03, 2018, 3:33 PM UTC

anonserb124 wrote: post #28

anonymouzz wrote: post #21

I recently fell victim to a nasty scam I've never heard about before. Wonder if anyone had similar experiences. Happened in Serbia on a highway. We had an RV on German plates and slept on a gas station there, next to the truckers. Morning comes and the clutch pedal is dead - no resistance when I press it (this is a manual transmission car). Obviously not driveable, and we're not car gurus to debug it. We call the ins…

As a Serbian expat I would very much avoid putting too much trust in Serbian locals. Sure, there are obviously some nice people but overall it's a very poor, corrupt, and cut-throat country. Serbian doctors have been caught stealing children from hospitals for god's sake.

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