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The immediate victims of a con would rather act as if the con never happened

statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu

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Re: The immediate victims of a con would rather act as if the con never happened

#111

Post by [deleted] »

fnorder wrote: post #71
akoboldfrying wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't trust anyone to be a police officer unless there's another police officer present certifying that they are in fact a police officer, and another police officer present certifying that that person is a police officer, and so on, up to a piece of paper listing hundreds of "root" police officers around the world that was prepared in an unspecified way by an unknown programmer involved in making whichever browser…

If you ask to see their badge and they show you a metal one it's probably a scammer, most real cops these days carry the plastic ones you can get at a Halloween store because budget cuts. IANAL etc etc

[deleted]

Re: The immediate victims of a con would rather act as if the con never happened

#112

Post by aqfamnzc »

pinkmuffinere wrote: post #110
MobileVet wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This scam is pretty active right now. My brother in law was called 2 days prior and they called my wife again 2 days later… Rough scam script: - - hello, is this XYZ? - this is Officer Z, do you agree to abide by Judge ABC’s orders? - we have been trying to reach you by mail about this case. It has to do with a minor. - the judge has issued a gag order, do not talk with anyone about this - look up the number from the…

I had this exact same scam a couple months ago! I never figured out how they spoof the courthouse’s number though — any idea how they do that?

I don't know the technical details, but as I understand it with today's infrastructure "caller's phone number" might as well be a free field where you can enter anything you like. There is no authentication or verification going on there

Re: The immediate victims of a con would rather act as if the con never happened

#113

Post by pimlottc »

godelski wrote: post #74
eurleif wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The police don't call you if they are trying to serve a warrant, they show up. But be aware that the converse isn't true: someone who shows up at your door claiming to be law enforcement with a warrant isn't necessarily legitimate. E.g.: https://madison.com/news/local/crime-courts/jack-mcquestion-...

I really wish there was a certificate authority run by the government. In the past we didn't have the capacity to do a lot of these things but now we can make many improvements, even if incomplete. Can we not have something like a CA but for, at minimum, officials? Or something like keybase for identity proofs? This seems quite invaluable. Couldn't this even be done within the phone, mail, and email systems? I don't…

> I really wish there was a certificate authority run by the government.

There are several US federal root CAs [0]. Among other things, they are used for signing the certificates on government employee PIV cards [1]

0: https://pki.treas.gov/crl_certs.htm

1: https://www.idmanagement.gov/university/piv/

Re: The immediate victims of a con would rather act as if the con never happened

#114

Post by arcastroe »

reaperman wrote: post #77
eurleif wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The police don't call you if they are trying to serve a warrant, they show up. But be aware that the converse isn't true: someone who shows up at your door claiming to be law enforcement with a warrant isn't necessarily legitimate. E.g.: https://madison.com/news/local/crime-courts/jack-mcquestion-...

I have absolutely gotten legitimate phone calls from a sheriff/marshal in the stats of texas to let me know I had two warrants out for my arrest (failure to pay wrong left turn ticket, failure to show up at court for said ticket). I called him back at the published phone number for his division. He let me know he wasn't going to be bothered driving 45 minutes across the metro area to find me and arrest me, and if I j…

You get arrested for simple traffic ticket? That doesn't sound right. Usually you would just be unable to renew your car registration the following year until you pay said ticket.

Re: The immediate victims of a con would rather act as if the con never happened

#115

Post by reaperman »

arcastroe wrote: post #114
reaperman wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have absolutely gotten legitimate phone calls from a sheriff/marshal in the stats of texas to let me know I had two warrants out for my arrest (failure to pay wrong left turn ticket, failure to show up at court for said ticket). I called him back at the published phone number for his division. He let me know he wasn't going to be bothered driving 45 minutes across the metro area to find me and arrest me, and if I j…

You get arrested for simple traffic ticket? That doesn't sound right. Usually you would just be unable to renew your car registration the following year until you pay said ticket.

I grew up in a different state, and was very surprised that nearly everything in Texas is an actual crime (misdemeanor). So yes, you get arrested for them here, because you committed a misdemeanor. Other differences that surprised me: It's legal to drive through a red light as long as you entered the intersection before the light turned red. Pedestrians don't automatically have the right of way. It's legal to change lanes in the middle of an intersection, even while turning.

I've had to re-learn a lot of legal things since moving here.

Re: The immediate victims of a con would rather act as if the con never happened

#116

Post by harimau777 »

iraqmtpizza wrote: post #63
deanCommie wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> he was asked by tankie friends to keep quiet about the USSR's crimes because they were the best chance for Communism. I have a lot of empathy for the tankies of that era. It was clear that people like Stalin were truly evil, but it was also clear from centuries of evidence that capitalism was exploitative and needed upheaval. On PAPER, Communism sounds great. I do think people genuinely believed there were simply g…

Everything sounds great until you ask, what if someone wants to opt out?

That applies to capitalism as well. For example, if you opt out of recognizing private property (in this case, by private property I mean things like land as opposed to personal property like someone's house or car) people with guns will come and destroy your personal property and/or throw you in jail.

Re: The immediate victims of a con would rather act as if the con never happened

#117

Post by cf1241290841 »

Aurornis wrote: post #106

These situations reveal the true preference toward status over accuracy: People would rather make an effort to preserve their status than to admit having made a mistake. There are domains where playing games like this will cause you to lose even more status. However, there are other domains where being loud and denying reality can actually preserve your status: If people are too tired, afraid, or avoidant to challeng…

>These situations reveal the true preference toward status over accuracy: People would rather make an effort to preserve their status than to admit having made a mistake.

This is especially bad if it happens internally, with peoples self image.

I used to recommend to people to just get to grip with how big of a moron they are but this lead to all sort of other problems. Framing it as managing expectations about ones competence for specific situations and moments and accounting for cognitive bias in the process seems to be much more palpable. With the inability of just taking the moron advice being a good example for what other difficulties you need to compensate for outside competence alone.

Re: The immediate victims of a con would rather act as if the con never happened

#119

Post by eviks »

MobileVet wrote: post #29

Shame and pride are such strong motivators. My wife was taken by a very elaborate and well-crafted scam in November. In retrospect, it all sounds ridiculous... but in the moment, with kids in tow, it was very convincing. It was so traumatizing that when it was over and she finally realized it was a scam, she was relieved! They had convinced her she was going to jail and that was terrifying. Losing the money was less…

Since it's so stepped, the main counter is to break the first step (so hanging up right away is indeed right), but then for the same reasons other pieces won't help (they'll come up with some excuse re. why they call instead of showing up or you won't contact anyone because of the "gag" order)

Re: The immediate victims of a con would rather act as if the con never happened

#120

Post by eviks »

DonsDiscountGas wrote: post #107
neilv wrote: post #4

> What really annoys me in these situations is how the institutions show loyalty to the people who did research misconduct. "Loyalty" means different things to different people, and not necessarily "doing what that party wants". So, if you don't call this "loyalty", it might be easier to imagine more of the possible/likely reasons for doing something that coincides with what that party wants, in an instance.

"Who should I believe, some random blogger or this person I've known for years?" Oftentimes the answer is "random blogger" but it's really not that surprising that people trust their friends more than strangers.

And if it's not a random blogger, but a team of professionals?
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