Love these. I keep talking to them for days. Really pissed a few of them off.
Given the dark turn that the article takes at the end and what happens to underperformers it almost seems cruel to waste their time, in retrospect.
What's the deal with all those weird wrong-number texts?
121–130 of 326 posts
Re: What's the deal with all those weird wrong-number texts?
#122This always reminds me of some dudes in France who decided to counter attack the scammers. They basically steer the conversation off-script to something more tempting to the scammers, and then make them do stupid things. Like "I am sorry there is nothing I can do for you, but while you're here, we're looking for some partnership to develop a new NGO in Benin". And then it turns out the NGO is called the "Sauerkraut b…
I did this with some 419 scammers, and led them on a merry chase. I documented it in a private web forum, which entertained my friends for weeks. I had created this persona which was just too good to be true: A bank manager who was getting ready to run off with his mistress, and trying to secure a future for themselves with a quick payout. This fake persona was a total maniac. At the end, the scammers were super piss…
>I did this with some 419 scammers, and led them on a merry chase. I documented it in a private web forum, which entertained my friends for weeks.
It's a bit dated now, but 419eater[0] is a public forum that did the same. If you enjoyed your own, I expect you'll like this too.
I did the same a few times myself, but got bored after a while. I never did get anyone to send a photo of themselves with underwear on their head (as others on 419eater did), but it was amusing for a while.
Re: What's the deal with all those weird wrong-number texts?
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
Phone numbers have the same problem as email, though: because "everyone" is responsible, no one is responsible. The deluge of spam texts and calls to my public phone number is genuinely unpleasant and frustrating to deal with as, like, a person living in the world . I practically don't use email anymore for those reasons, and a phone number hangs around only because right now I can't not have one for legal-type reaso…
The way to solve this is by educating the people in your network about better security practices, not by giving away control over your communications just because of "convenience".
"Just get everyone to be perfect, including random companies who require a phone number for validation, and if a single failure ever happens you're going to be spammed forever in a way that is directly interruptive and intrusive instead of one in a list of messages in a queue."
I don't know how to say this any more nicely than this: this is a permanently losing solution with no redeeming qualities to such a degree that it makes me wonder at how in-good-faith the suggestion actually is with regards to solving the stated problem.
Re: What's the deal with all those weird wrong-number texts?
#124Terrified to consider what happens when these scammers get hold of large language models here in a year or so. Rather than fading into the background as this article posits, I expect people to have models finetuned on convincing them to make purchases/send money. Probably trained by being pitted against other models which have been trained on the mark's social media feeds. Train the scambot to perfectly push your but…
"Train the scambot to perfectly push your buttons by having it practice against your own style of thought as embodied by your social corpus." Fortunately, that's not really what these language models can do. They can easily be trained to mimic you. They can be trained to mimic what normal people reply to you with. But there's no way to train the transformer-based high-probability-next-word AIs to be superhumanly good…
>You'll know when AI does get to that point, because suddenly the internet will be an amazingly interesting place with all sorts of amazingly good arguments you can't hardly resist. I imagine few of us experience that sort of internet. (If you do, uh, watch out.)
Relevant XKCD[0].
Re: What's the deal with all those weird wrong-number texts?
#125Wow, how interesting. I started getting these a few months ago, right after starting a new job in a somewhat high-profile area. I have been getting 1-2 per month but found them quite unusual because none of them ever progressed to an actual scam - just a few messages back and forth about the fabricated "wrong number" situation and then each thread would stop, seemingly earnestly. Since there was no obvious scam, I've…
Likely an exploit or simply a means to confirm the number is active. Getting those in the uk as well.
Re: What's the deal with all those weird wrong-number texts?
#126For a while I grew quite fond of wasting phone scammers time. I’d pick up, talk suuuuuuper slowly— like Emo Phillips speed at one syllable every one or two seconds— interrupt with irrelevant questions or anecdotes, and overall just see how long I could keep them on the phone without giving them any information. The best strategy I found was telling them that, yes indeed I did remember owing the IRS or whoever money and I could pay them however and insisting that first they needed to take down my new email address… I’d just start spelling random words incredibly slowly, say I messed up and start over, ask if they needed my checking account number to keep them engaged and then start spelling my email address again. They prey on intellectually disabled folks so pantomiming a stereotypical version of that wastes a ton of time while keeping their interest. Got boring after a while but I got pretty good at it.
Re: What's the deal with all those weird wrong-number texts?
#127This always reminds me of some dudes in France who decided to counter attack the scammers. They basically steer the conversation off-script to something more tempting to the scammers, and then make them do stupid things. Like "I am sorry there is nothing I can do for you, but while you're here, we're looking for some partnership to develop a new NGO in Benin". And then it turns out the NGO is called the "Sauerkraut b…
I did this with some 419 scammers, and led them on a merry chase. I documented it in a private web forum, which entertained my friends for weeks. I had created this persona which was just too good to be true: A bank manager who was getting ready to run off with his mistress, and trying to secure a future for themselves with a quick payout. This fake persona was a total maniac. At the end, the scammers were super piss…
Some years ago I was selling an expensive aquarium on Craigslist, a scammer ‘paid’ me with a fake PayPal payment before asking to come pick it up.
So I convinced him that I was the manager of a Red Lobster restaurant and it was an old lobster tank that we were selling. I told him to show up during business hours and tell the manager he’s there to pick up the lobster tank.
The next day I got some ‘on my way’ texts and then soon after a bunch of swearing at me.
Good times.
Re: What's the deal with all those weird wrong-number texts?
#128Simple: it's time to stop using phone numbers. I use Apple's Messages. If someone spams me, I report them. They're blocked and have to go through the extra work of setting up a new account to try again. Compare this with, say, Google. Gmail lets spammers / scammers have limitless accounts and they don't do shit when an account is reported for spam. You can block and report Gmail spammers all day long and you'll get n…
saying stop using phone numbers and then going directly into "hey, use this one proprietary vendor's closed source walled garden messaging app" is NOT a solution. people should be looking at things like Signal or custom implementations of Matrix/Element/Synapse or similar if they want real control of their two way chat communications.
I'm sorry that you can't see how I could be making an example. I didn't say anything like, "do this instead". I said, "I've done this".
Re: What's the deal with all those weird wrong-number texts?
#129This is from the same scam:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/crime/cali...
Re: What's the deal with all those weird wrong-number texts?
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
I respectfully disagree. The postal service is held to a standard of service by a USO - Universal Service Obligation. [0] This means it is an org mandated to accept your request for service at a reasonable price regardless of your location of residence. There is an important distinction between that, and being mandated to receive mail service. That is not a stipulation of being alive in USA. [0] - https://www.uspsoig…
Just imagine, every drifter, nomad and homeless person were required to set up a mailbox. It's just silly.
>Just imagine, every drifter, nomad and homeless person were required to set up a mailbox. It's just silly.
They don't have to. Just have mail sent to:
Joe/Jane Drifter
General Delivery
TownNearWhereYouSquat,