The other day, telephone scammers scammed my father-in-law and mother-in-law out of 350,000 (three hundred and fifty thousand) rubles. I couldn’t stop them, although I tried very hard, and the money of the honored pensioners replenished the common fund in some colony near Chelyabinsk, but I was able to get answers to the questions that interested me when I read similar stories on the Internet.
And I want to share this intimate, one might even say expensive, knowledge with you.
Welcome to the cat!
One not at all wonderful morning I called my father-in-law about some not particularly important matter, but his phone was busy. I called back half an hour later and it was still busy. My father-in-law is a former military man, he always speaks on the phone as briefly as possible, and it immediately became clear to me that something had happened.
I called my mother-in-law’s phone and an incoherent stream of words and sobs poured out of the receiver. From the very first words, it immediately became clear what had happened - “the security service... the account was compromised... they withdrew money... took it to an ATM, put it in a secret account...”
I tried to save the situation - I interrupted her nonsense, said that they were scammers and that she should stop her father-in-law , in any way - for some reason nothing smarter came to my mind than offering to pour water on him. It seemed to me that under the influence of NLP scammers, people become as if zombified and if you pour cold water on them, this will bring them to their senses.
But nothing worked out. My mother-in-law was stuck on one phrase - “He doesn’t listen to me...”, which she repeated in response to all my words. I didn’t immediately, after a couple of minutes, realize that she was hysterical and couldn’t hear me at all. She is a very powerful person, her father-in-law usually does not make any serious decisions without her instructions, especially about transactions with a large sum of money, and this phrase of hers was completely unnatural, I should have realized faster that she was not adequate, but I was too under stress.
Stopping the useless conversation, I told my wife to call my mother-in-law and try to explain something to her (nothing came of it, of course), and I jumped into the car and drove to them, in the vain hope of being able to stop my father-in-law from transferring money to the scammers, but, to Unfortunately, I didn’t have time. My mother-in-law did not open the door for me - she was afraid that the bandits had come to kill her, and my father-in-law, with a surprised look, stood at the ATM, to which he had just fed 350,000 rubles, 15 thousand at a time. Surprised because the scammers dropped the call and... for some reason did not call back, and he would have stood patiently and waited for further instructions if I had not come for him.
The scam was classic - the “security service” called, properly intimidated, then sent instructions by email on what to do, he went to withdraw all the money from the pension account and put it on the specified phone number. Bingo!
The investigation I conducted, without delay, provided answers to the following questions:
“How could you get caught so stupidly, I sent you a link about this type of fraud a month ago!”
Suddenly it turned out that we speak different languages with our parents. My father-in-law sent me various nonsense via WhatsApp, which I deleted without reading - cards for all holidays, church and not, Channel One news, various ufological crap, conspiracy theories, etc. And when I told him that I had sent him a similar story about a call from the “bank security service” - he just blinked - it turned out that he also deleted, without reading, all my messages, including these same stories about fraud, considering everything I send is uninteresting nonsense.
- “Why did they believe that it was really a call from the bank?”
Fraudsters cleverly intimidated pensioners with scary and incomprehensible phrases - “the account is compromised”, “I am recording information”, etc. And the phrase SECURITY SERVICE had a magical effect on the former military man and his wife - the father-in-law later said that everything in his soul had broken down, like, well, it’s all over, they’ll go to jail or shoot. And the mother-in-law fell into hysterics - “Run quickly, do what they say...”. At that moment, they no longer thought about money - they would save themselves from prison or something worse.
- “Why didn’t you think to check their details - phone number, email, etc.?”
It turned out that they realized it, checked it - at the moment when the father-in-law was sitting at the computer to receive “instructions” by mail, the call was interrupted and he had a few seconds to do something. He suddenly doubted and decided to check the phone number from which they were calling, but it either really looked like a bank phone or his father-in-law thought so in a fever, in any case, the chance to escape was missed. And the fact that the bank sends him letters not from the official mail, but from Yandex.ru and demands that the money be transferred to the left phone number - so who knows, this official mail, and, probably, the Security Service officer writes from a secret number, and the number that’s why it’s secret, so not +7 495, but +7 909...
When my father-in-law was withdrawing all his money from the bank, the cashier could, of course, have suspected something when a pensioner with bulging eyes rushed to close the account, but firstly - this is not her job, secondly, the father-in-law was instructed to say that his son was getting married and needed money for the wedding, thirdly, knowing the father-in-law, he would not have listened to anyone, he would have caused a scandal, but he would have withdrawn the money anyway.
- And now the million-dollar question - “Why didn’t they call the bank or me, you know that I work in this bank?!”
- it turned out that my mother-in-law called, not only to us and the bank, but to someone whom she completely trusts and considers an EXPERT in everything and in banking too - her friend’s son. He really works in a bank (as a telephone operator in the call center of some small semi-underground bank, but who cares, he’s in the bank), and my mother-in-law considers him a super-duper expert - whatever you ask him - hot news (Channel One) , TV series, talk shows - he has an authoritative opinion on everything (he lives with his mother, watches all this news, TV series and talk shows with her). It’s useless to ask me and the bank about this, so naturally she doesn’t trust our opinion.
The mother-in-law, even in a normal situation, likes to cast a shadow over the fence, but here, when the whole Security Service called... In general, the “expert” did not understand anything from what she half-hintedly asked, but just in case he said that the Security Service was the matter serious, and if there is something wrong with the account, it’s better to withdraw money from it - that’s it, the last chance to get off the scammers’ hook has been missed.
A call to the real security service of the mobile operator of the scammers’ number, as expected, did not yield anything - “We cannot limit our clients’ right to send and receive money, contact the police,” and we called half an hour after the last money transfer, I hoped that it would be possible stop transactions or block the account during the proceedings, but no.
And the last question that most interested me:
“Well, OK, the account is compromised, okay, but you had CASH in your hands! That's it - the money is saved, why did you put it in some secret account for scammers? They would put them in the closet, under the bed linen, and that would be the end of it.”
The father-in-law and mother-in-law just silently batted their eyes - such an idea never occurred to them. The scammers did not give them a minute to come to their senses; for the entire 3 (THREE) hours while the “special operation” continued, they were CONTINUOUSLY on the phone, constantly directing and controlling their actions, and, at the same time, continuing to intimidate. If the call was missed, they called back immediately, without giving anyone a chance to get off the hook.
If the scammers found a weak spot and the person took the bait - he got scared, panicked, then that's it - the chances that he will lose his money become very high. And you shouldn’t count on the fact that he will do some logical and meaningful actions that will help him save himself.
Unless, of course, some accident happens, as for example, this happened to one of my friends, when the security service of her bank called her and began asking for a PIN code and so on - she had already begun to dictate the number, but the metro train in which she I was driving, entered a tunnel and the connection was lost. She waited for a while for the call, and then she called back - only to a real bank. But this was just luck.
Therefore, give your parents an educational program on safety, try to simulate dangerous situations with them and show them how to react to them, where and who to turn for help if something goes wrong.
And please, this is extremely important, do not repeat my mistakes - do it personally!
And I want to share this intimate, one might even say expensive, knowledge with you.
Welcome to the cat!
One not at all wonderful morning I called my father-in-law about some not particularly important matter, but his phone was busy. I called back half an hour later and it was still busy. My father-in-law is a former military man, he always speaks on the phone as briefly as possible, and it immediately became clear to me that something had happened.
I called my mother-in-law’s phone and an incoherent stream of words and sobs poured out of the receiver. From the very first words, it immediately became clear what had happened - “the security service... the account was compromised... they withdrew money... took it to an ATM, put it in a secret account...”
I tried to save the situation - I interrupted her nonsense, said that they were scammers and that she should stop her father-in-law , in any way - for some reason nothing smarter came to my mind than offering to pour water on him. It seemed to me that under the influence of NLP scammers, people become as if zombified and if you pour cold water on them, this will bring them to their senses.
But nothing worked out. My mother-in-law was stuck on one phrase - “He doesn’t listen to me...”, which she repeated in response to all my words. I didn’t immediately, after a couple of minutes, realize that she was hysterical and couldn’t hear me at all. She is a very powerful person, her father-in-law usually does not make any serious decisions without her instructions, especially about transactions with a large sum of money, and this phrase of hers was completely unnatural, I should have realized faster that she was not adequate, but I was too under stress.
Stopping the useless conversation, I told my wife to call my mother-in-law and try to explain something to her (nothing came of it, of course), and I jumped into the car and drove to them, in the vain hope of being able to stop my father-in-law from transferring money to the scammers, but, to Unfortunately, I didn’t have time. My mother-in-law did not open the door for me - she was afraid that the bandits had come to kill her, and my father-in-law, with a surprised look, stood at the ATM, to which he had just fed 350,000 rubles, 15 thousand at a time. Surprised because the scammers dropped the call and... for some reason did not call back, and he would have stood patiently and waited for further instructions if I had not come for him.
The scam was classic - the “security service” called, properly intimidated, then sent instructions by email on what to do, he went to withdraw all the money from the pension account and put it on the specified phone number. Bingo!
The investigation I conducted, without delay, provided answers to the following questions:
“How could you get caught so stupidly, I sent you a link about this type of fraud a month ago!”
Suddenly it turned out that we speak different languages with our parents. My father-in-law sent me various nonsense via WhatsApp, which I deleted without reading - cards for all holidays, church and not, Channel One news, various ufological crap, conspiracy theories, etc. And when I told him that I had sent him a similar story about a call from the “bank security service” - he just blinked - it turned out that he also deleted, without reading, all my messages, including these same stories about fraud, considering everything I send is uninteresting nonsense.
- “Why did they believe that it was really a call from the bank?”
Fraudsters cleverly intimidated pensioners with scary and incomprehensible phrases - “the account is compromised”, “I am recording information”, etc. And the phrase SECURITY SERVICE had a magical effect on the former military man and his wife - the father-in-law later said that everything in his soul had broken down, like, well, it’s all over, they’ll go to jail or shoot. And the mother-in-law fell into hysterics - “Run quickly, do what they say...”. At that moment, they no longer thought about money - they would save themselves from prison or something worse.
- “Why didn’t you think to check their details - phone number, email, etc.?”
It turned out that they realized it, checked it - at the moment when the father-in-law was sitting at the computer to receive “instructions” by mail, the call was interrupted and he had a few seconds to do something. He suddenly doubted and decided to check the phone number from which they were calling, but it either really looked like a bank phone or his father-in-law thought so in a fever, in any case, the chance to escape was missed. And the fact that the bank sends him letters not from the official mail, but from Yandex.ru and demands that the money be transferred to the left phone number - so who knows, this official mail, and, probably, the Security Service officer writes from a secret number, and the number that’s why it’s secret, so not +7 495, but +7 909...
When my father-in-law was withdrawing all his money from the bank, the cashier could, of course, have suspected something when a pensioner with bulging eyes rushed to close the account, but firstly - this is not her job, secondly, the father-in-law was instructed to say that his son was getting married and needed money for the wedding, thirdly, knowing the father-in-law, he would not have listened to anyone, he would have caused a scandal, but he would have withdrawn the money anyway.
- And now the million-dollar question - “Why didn’t they call the bank or me, you know that I work in this bank?!”
- it turned out that my mother-in-law called, not only to us and the bank, but to someone whom she completely trusts and considers an EXPERT in everything and in banking too - her friend’s son. He really works in a bank (as a telephone operator in the call center of some small semi-underground bank, but who cares, he’s in the bank), and my mother-in-law considers him a super-duper expert - whatever you ask him - hot news (Channel One) , TV series, talk shows - he has an authoritative opinion on everything (he lives with his mother, watches all this news, TV series and talk shows with her). It’s useless to ask me and the bank about this, so naturally she doesn’t trust our opinion.
The mother-in-law, even in a normal situation, likes to cast a shadow over the fence, but here, when the whole Security Service called... In general, the “expert” did not understand anything from what she half-hintedly asked, but just in case he said that the Security Service was the matter serious, and if there is something wrong with the account, it’s better to withdraw money from it - that’s it, the last chance to get off the scammers’ hook has been missed.
A call to the real security service of the mobile operator of the scammers’ number, as expected, did not yield anything - “We cannot limit our clients’ right to send and receive money, contact the police,” and we called half an hour after the last money transfer, I hoped that it would be possible stop transactions or block the account during the proceedings, but no.
And the last question that most interested me:
“Well, OK, the account is compromised, okay, but you had CASH in your hands! That's it - the money is saved, why did you put it in some secret account for scammers? They would put them in the closet, under the bed linen, and that would be the end of it.”
The father-in-law and mother-in-law just silently batted their eyes - such an idea never occurred to them. The scammers did not give them a minute to come to their senses; for the entire 3 (THREE) hours while the “special operation” continued, they were CONTINUOUSLY on the phone, constantly directing and controlling their actions, and, at the same time, continuing to intimidate. If the call was missed, they called back immediately, without giving anyone a chance to get off the hook.
What is the conclusion from all this?
If the scammers found a weak spot and the person took the bait - he got scared, panicked, then that's it - the chances that he will lose his money become very high. And you shouldn’t count on the fact that he will do some logical and meaningful actions that will help him save himself.
Unless, of course, some accident happens, as for example, this happened to one of my friends, when the security service of her bank called her and began asking for a PIN code and so on - she had already begun to dictate the number, but the metro train in which she I was driving, entered a tunnel and the connection was lost. She waited for a while for the call, and then she called back - only to a real bank. But this was just luck.
Therefore, give your parents an educational program on safety, try to simulate dangerous situations with them and show them how to react to them, where and who to turn for help if something goes wrong.
And please, this is extremely important, do not repeat my mistakes - do it personally!
