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A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

arxiv.org

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Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#51

Post by natebc »

Theodores wrote: post #5

My dad passed away about three weeks after being fully pig-butchered, losing all of his money and reputation with family/friends. We all tried to talk him out of it, but it was like he joined a cult, for he cut us off and lost his mind. The whole sorry saga is very hard to live with. The sums of money were vast, cocaine addiction would have been a more cost effective way to go. The pig-butchers had some type of bot/A…

Sorry to hear this happened to your father especially with such a dire conclusion. Hopefully writing about it will give you some catharsis and help someone else, plus maybe get Zendesk to crack down on the use of their product.

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#52

Post by K0balt »

anasrin wrote: post #3

Couple months ago I got message from random woman on Telegram, I'm sure from the account photo it self is AI generated, and start play along. After I got some photo of her, I start reverse search the photos and found some Russian forum [1] that some people share their experience about pig-butchering scam [1] https://pikabu.ru/story/temu_neponyatnyiy_razvod_11302944

I get presented with one or two of these a month. It’s easy to be calloused until you remember that these people are also victims, often in worse ways than you could ever be as one of their targets.

The best thing is just to ignore completely. If you engage at all, you risk worsening their situation by wasting their time, while if you do engage you might be saving someone else at their expense…. It’s lose/lose to engage in any way.

I’ve settled on just saying, hey, I’m sorry that they are in the situation they are in, and I hope they find the strength to make it out someday. That makes it clear that there is nothing to be gained while offering a tiny bit of hope and empathy, which I’m sure is in short supply.

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#53

Post by donatj »

I recently received a DM on Twitter, this person claimed to have known me growing up and had a surprising amount of personal information some of which I don't recall ever having posted online. I have a very good memory of my childhood and know for a fact that I never knew this person.

The persons profile was strangely convincing, it was hyper-local to my neighborhood growing up. This account had existed for something like 4 or 5 years and had posts going back at least a few. It was almost convincing. The tell was just that their posts were too targeted, all "Hey, local event is going on" "Hey, local politics thing" with no other thoughts expressed. Their replies section was just littered with replies to people about how things were "awesome" or "great news" without any critique or thought.

The whole thing was very unsettling. It was the first scam where I really felt like it would have been easy to fall for with a standard amount of critical thinking. If I had a hazier recollection of my childhood I might have.

I can't imagine this bot was made specifically for me, I'm not that important, but certainly people in my area. I genuinely wonder if this is part of some larger network of hyper-local bots. I don't look forward to the attacks to come as AI progresses.

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#54

Post by cholmon »

NPR Planet Money did a segment on pig butchering scams back in May. They played along with one to get a first hand perspective of the process. It’s a fascinating listen, way more complicated than I thought, and tragic for both ends of the scam.

https://www.npr.org/2025/05/23/1253043749/pig-butchering-sca...

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#55

Post by mothballed »

giveita wrote: post #44
jajko wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> cons target someone currently vulnerable This. I am a senior software dev, living in Switzerland. Few years ago there was an issue with my residence permit renewal, process that should have taken few weeks took more than a year. No way to contact that Geneva immigration office, and you can't visit them personally, emails ignored. Official phone contact is just a single phone that often rang few times and then dropp…

AML/KYC laws have done us a big favour. Otherwise that would be a bank txn they would ask for. And now buying $200 of gift cards as an actual gift is impossible (in physical space)

Always verify a wire details through an initiated call to a verified number of the legitimate institution in question.

My country has AML law, but all the time people are tricked into wiring money to scammer for a house or something else because they take wire details by spoofed e-mail or a received phone call.

The scammers are very clever, they will monitor e-mail from a title company or some other company with large invoices, then trick you at the exact moment you are making a legitimate transaction to a legitimate institution. Because you did not make a mistake sending the wire, nor did the bank, only sent it to exactly the wrong person, once the wire gets forwarded on out of country you're often SOL.

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#56

Post by Beretta_Vexee »

donatj wrote: post #53

I recently received a DM on Twitter, this person claimed to have known me growing up and had a surprising amount of personal information some of which I don't recall ever having posted online. I have a very good memory of my childhood and know for a fact that I never knew this person. The persons profile was strangely convincing, it was hyper-local to my neighborhood growing up. This account had existed for something…

Scammers tend to create ecosystems of fake accounts in large cities or communities, such as the expat community in Paris.

These are easy to fabricate and maintain, and consist of a social network of individuals who are either loosely connected or constantly changing.

They use these accounts to collect data about key people, events, meet-ups and news events.They have developed a full lifecycle for these accounts. Creation, enrichment, data collection, then consumption and end of life when they are used for scams.

They are playing the long game.

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#57

Post by pavlov »

karel-3d wrote: post #37
pavlov wrote: post #18

Estimated $75 billion stolen since 2020. These are mostly cryptocurrency investment scams. More crypto regulation would help, but the so-called crypto industry doesn't want to see that happen because their product has no other utility than enabling this stuff.

You can also buy 5 different official Donald Trump cryptocurrencies, too. It's not that useless.

Someone might argue that Donald Trump's political career is the most successful pig-butchering scam in the history of the world.

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#58

Post by sammorrowdrums »

smusamashah wrote: post #13
qnleigh wrote: post #6

I got sucked into reading this paper, and it has completely changed my perception of these scams. They are incredibly thorough and realistic. Here are some quotes that drove this home for me. "The bond phase showed that scammers had tremendous patience; this phase lasted anywhere from 3 to 11 months before the scammer moved on to the next stage of the scam." "When I spoke to her on a video call, it was the same perso…

3 to 11 months is long enough. I wonder if higher level scaammers spend even longer for even higher rewards, years instead of months for the momey. At that point it should be a much higher purpose/agenda but I guess these timespans must be happening too.

Our clandestine services will spend years getting people into the right places. I mean at at certain point the difference between the two blurs, and the social engineering entirely overlaps.

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#59

Post by giveita »

mothballed wrote: post #55
giveita wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AML/KYC laws have done us a big favour. Otherwise that would be a bank txn they would ask for. And now buying $200 of gift cards as an actual gift is impossible (in physical space)

Always verify a wire details through an initiated call to a verified number of the legitimate institution in question. My country has AML law, but all the time people are tricked into wiring money to scammer for a house or something else because they take wire details by spoofed e-mail or a received phone call. The scammers are very clever, they will monitor e-mail from a title company or some other company with larg…

Correct. There is more verification buying a beer at some pubs than sending $1m.

Re: A qualitative analysis of pig-butchering scams

#60

Post by shireboy »

I have a family member falling for these on a regular basis. In their case it’s possibly tied to mental health issues. They are able to drive, converse, care for self, but are sending money to groups that are clearly not real (example: fundraiser for a celebrity supposedly in the hospital, when news shows they weren’t. Was convinced actually conversing with the celebrity). Rest of the family has taken some steps but does feel at a loss. How do you prevent them from being seriously hurt emotionally and financially while respecting their autonomy and dignity? Even when they “come anround” to the fact they have been scammed, that adds insult to injury. The vector is definitely social media and sms/phone.

Any tips would be appreciated. Locking down phone hasn’t really helped, and finances are already segregated to hopefully avoid giving away total life savings.

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