They use the broken nose line because it can help explain why the voice doesn’t sound right. They also stalk FB to get info. For instance, i am pretty sure they got my MIL because there was pic on son’s page of him and grandma and they were able to get her phone number because she’s had it for 50 years plus.
My MIL is not mobile anymore and doesn’t know how to do money transfers over the phone and she doesn’t have a computer, so I am not as worried about these scammers the way I was when she was able to get into her car and go to the bank. Her bank knows not to transfer money out without mine or H’s say so.
BTW, I just wanted to point out that our experience shows that wire transfers may not be actually executed until the end of the business day, so that if you are able to act quickly you may be able to cancel them and recover the money.
My parents were told to go to Western Union and wire the money. It was gone immediately. They called the police who told them there was nothing they could do about it. They don’t have the manpower to follow up on these kinds of scams.
My parents got one of these calls but the caller wasn’t as good as several of you reporting… didn’t know much. But the callers are getting more sophisticated , and as time went by they had friends who admitted losing big money.
It kind of went the rounds at their community
When my parents emailed all their grands, the kids were unanimous in replying “we would never call you”!
My dad has gotten a few of these calls over the years. He has 23 grandchildren, none of whom would think to call grandpa for help if they were in trouble–he would not be sympathetic! Calls were very unconvincing anyway, saying the kid was in a place he knew they weren’t, etc. Now dad just doesn’t answer his phone unless he recognizes the number.
Btw, there are some hilarious “scamming the scammer” videos and articles online if you are in the mood for revenge.
It’s so easy to learn a lot just by googling someone (once you have a name to google.) Kids over 18 may very well be listed as related, on any of those connections sorts of sites. And then there’s some article about them on the sports team or all sorts of possibilities. Not always, not everyone, but possible.
Friends of my parents received one of these calls and fell for the scam. I’m very grateful to them for not hiding behind embarrassment but rather informing all of their friends (most in the 80+ age category) about what happened and to be very careful.
Sure enough, shortly thereafter my mother received the same call. She caught on right away and strung the guy along a bit. Finally talking to the supposed grandchild in our second language. Funny, they hung up.
On another note, I almost fell for a scam. I figure I’m smart, ‘worldly’ and on top of this stuff. In my case it was a detective from the sheriffs office who called on a weekend. They claimed I had a citation issued against me for failing to appear for a grand jury selection. I hear someone from law enforcement and I go into immediate compliance mode. He had me. I was told I needed to come to the station and pay TODAY or risk arrest. In retrospect it was all so blatantly out of bounds that it’s humorous. But again, I was hanging in there. H appeared partway thru the conversation and had Detective Scum go thru the routine again. When he finally got to the - get Greendot money cards - it clicked. We hung up. We did have him on the line for almost an hour and towards the end Detective Scum was getting a bit perturbed.
I regret hanging up. If I had to do it again I would’ve pretended to go and purchase the money cards. At some point I would have been asked to scratch off the material covering the serial number (which of course Detective Scum would have wanted read to him). If I had to do it again I would have told him 'oh my gosh no, no, no…I can’t scratch that stuff…don’t you know that’s how the government gives us AIDS. No, no, l’ll be right over to the station (at the fake address he’d given me) and have YOU scratch it.
At least I would have had a bit of fun in the process.
While my son was en route to Mexico to visit his grandmother she got one of these calls saying he was being detained at the airport. She knew his dad and I would be the first line of help if he we’re ever in trouble so she had them call us. The story was that he had been stopped going into the country with more than $10,000 on him and he needed to pay a fine before he could be released by the Mexican authorities. He was a college student at the time and I would have been surprised if he had $100 in his bank account so we immediately knew it was some sort of scam but they knew exactly where he was going and since in reality our kid was on a plane we couldn’t reach him to confirm he was okay. We asked to speak to him and they put someone on the phone who sounded remarkably like our son, but all it took was for us to ask his middle name and they knew they were in trouble. “Uh, uh…”
Instead of a family password we use questions no one else would know the answer to, which is what we would have gone to if the imposter son had known my son’s middle name. “What’s your cousin’s dog’s name? Who was your sixth grade teacher? What poster hangs over your bed? What did you give me for Christmas?”
I had fun with someone who called with the “Your computer is infected with a virus so you need to download our fix” scam. I happened to be bored that day and had work I could do while on the phone so I strung the guy (who insisted he was from my computer company) along for a very long time. I kept making him walk me through the process then oops! I would hit the wrong button or misunderstand the instructions. The guy on the other end was getting frustrated by the end but I kept up my sunny, ditzy, compliant persona so I think he though he was close to a score. When after 40 minutes or so I finally had to get on to other things I told him I was getting a message on my screen, which I read at a glacial pace. “You…are…full…of…[cow manure]” and I gave him the lecture, asking him if he was proud of what he did for a living and urging him to get into a line a work that would let him sleep at night. I’m under no illusion it changed his behavior, and even if he did quit I’m pretty sure there were people lined up to take his place in the call center, but it did feel good to scam the scammer, even if all I cost him was a few moments of his time.