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I'm a scam prevention expert and I got scammed

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Re: I'm a scam prevention expert and I got scammed

#211

Post by caf »

tempestn wrote: post #151
klik99 wrote: post #21

There's one easy rule that could have avoided all of this - never give out any info on incoming calls. If I get a call or text about fraudulent transactions, I'll keep them on hold while I log into the bank website. If I get a call about a late payment, I'll thank them for the info and ask them to stay on while I pay online. If I get an inbound call with a more complex request, I'll ask them for their employee info a…

This is good advice, despite it being a pain sometimes! I once got a voicemail from the fraud department at my bank, with a number to call back. I googled the number and all that came up were stories about being scammed. So I was 95% sure it was a scam, but called my bank directly just in case. The person who answered assured me they hadn't contacted me, and it was indeed a scam. I later got a follow-up voicemail fro…

This has a similarity to the original story here, in that the original sounded like: "They behaved a lot like a scammer would, but I also totally expect my real bank to behave like a scammer would".

Re: I'm a scam prevention expert and I got scammed

#212

Post by pmoriarty »

klik99 wrote: post #21

There's one easy rule that could have avoided all of this - never give out any info on incoming calls. If I get a call or text about fraudulent transactions, I'll keep them on hold while I log into the bank website. If I get a call about a late payment, I'll thank them for the info and ask them to stay on while I pay online. If I get an inbound call with a more complex request, I'll ask them for their employee info a…

"There's one easy rule that could have avoided all of this - never give out any info on incoming calls."

Also: Just call your official bank/card phone number yourself. This number should be on the back of your debit/credit card.

Re: I'm a scam prevention expert and I got scammed

#213

Post by intrasight »

Banks will never call you. It's that simple. And if they do, hang up and call them back.

I've had this attempted scam tried on me twice in last 4 months. You know it's a scam for sure when they try to prevent you from hanging up.

Also, always disconnect. Don't just listen for a "dial tone" after they hang up.

Re: I'm a scam prevention expert and I got scammed

#214

Post by caf »

camtarn wrote: post #68
cjg wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Calling on the official number is a good rule. But my neighbour followed that and was still scammed for tens of thousands. The critical extra step that they missed was to check that the line was disconnected before calling out. They were using a landline. The scammers called them, but didn't hang up. Then, when my neighbour called out to their bank, they pretended to be answering that call - going through security, e…

For the people who are confused: this is a fairly common thing on landlines in some countries, where the telephone exchange doesn't drop the connection until both ends have hung up, or in some cases when the caller hangs up but not the callee. So it's possible to put your own phone down, but when you pick it up again your phone is still connected to the scammer's telephone. If they play a convincing dial tone, then c…

Back when I was in high school and landlines were still a thing, we used to prank our friends this way sometimes.

Re: I'm a scam prevention expert and I got scammed

#215

Post by throwaway2474 »

I wonder who these well-spoken, educated scammers are and how they’re recruited.

Pet theory: voice recordings will be the next fingerprints/DNA, at some point it will be trivial to identify the person based on old recordings. At which point we can retroactively convict these people years or decades later, when they thought they were out of the woods.

Re: I'm a scam prevention expert and I got scammed

#216

Post by scottmcdot »

> he was talking about mobile app payment systems, like Apple Pay and Google Pay. Which, yes, I'm very familiar with, but I don't use and have no interest in using.

I think if you're going to be a Scam Prevention Expert, you should at least familiarise yourself with the user experiences of these services so that you can detect when they're potentially being used in a scam.

Re: I'm a scam prevention expert and I got scammed

#218

Post by InitialLastName »

bsder wrote: post #167
carabiner wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Amazon today is a street side flea market. You really don't know what you'll get. I've started ordering more stuff from traditional retailers. Their online operations these days are really good, and at most a few dollars more than Amazon. Clothes from macys.com, home goods from homedepot.com and target.com, and so on. You're not flooded with choices with these stores that are mostly garbage, instead you get only 1-3…

> Amazon today is a street side flea market. You really don't know what you'll get. There are two time when I will use Amazon nowadays: 1) If there is an official store there Anker is a good example of this. It seems like Amazon doesn't commingle inventory if there is an official store. 2) If I want something faster than Alibaba/Aliexpress Quite often I can find the exact Chinesium equivalent on Amazon and I get the…

> It seems like Amazon doesn't commingle inventory if there is an official store.

Is there any confirmation of this? I've seen assertions both ways.

Re: I'm a scam prevention expert and I got scammed

#219

Post by brk »

taylorfinley wrote: post #94
Nextgrid wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I was blown away that Amazon would transfer me to a scammer. I contacted Amazon again and let them know what had happened. Hopefully they will figure out how their guy got this scammers phone number and teach him how to find a 3rd party phone number... 1) Amazon is complicit in shady behavior on their platform, whether it's inventory commingling, sketchy sellers repurposing existing, well-reviewed listings for a to…

It’s pretty shocking but most IP cameras can be accessed with nothing more than their serial number. Here’s a somewhat recent DefCon talk about it: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_gKEF76oMM I use Reolink cameras, in the admin interface there’s an option called UID. Turning that off (theoretically) disables the backdoor. I have my cameras and NVR (which is actually just a python script on an old laptop that uses ffmpe…

Well, most IP cameras cannot be accessed this way when you look at the global pool of IP cameras. However many on them on Amazon, particularly from OEM companies like Reolink that are more of a custom relabeller vs. a real camera manufacturer have all kinds of backdoor access methods.

Best practice is to put your IP cameras on a separate isolated network, connected to a dual-NIC recorder/PC running trusted software (eg: not some random DVR/NVR on Amazon) for recording and viewing. This is not a perfect solution, but it at least takes you far away from the path-of-least-resistance pool of devices with weak cybersecurity that are prone to various exploits.

Re: I'm a scam prevention expert and I got scammed

#220

Post by pmoriarty »

rolobio wrote: post #146
Galaxeblaffer wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's really hard recognizing the image Amazon have in the US compared to my personal experience with amazon.de . The service is stellar, shipping both ways is free as long as you buy products covered by prime. Refunds are with no questions asked (as long as you don't start abusing it i guess). As soon as you go into 3rd party sellers the experience gets muddled, though I've had plenty of good experiences with those a…

Amazon US used to be as you describe. But now its mostly just cheap knockoff stuff. I hardly purchase there anymore. Its really sad because they used to have such a wide selection.

Where do you shop instead?
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