Scammers Targeting Seniors

Few things raise my hackles as much as folks preying upon older folks. My dear neighbor fell prey to the oft-used "Gram, it's me, (insert grandchild's name). I'm in trouble and I need $2500 or they're going to throw me in jail. Can you please wire me the money as soon as you can?" scam.... almost twice. Thankfully, she called me first the second time they tried it, and I had her call her grandson directly to confirm that he was fine. My father has come close to falling for things a few times. People REALLY suck sometimes, and I hope there's a special REALLY uncomfortable place full of fire for the people that target the trusting elder members of society.

My wife just received a mailing today, with the usual official-looking crap, the "Do Not Destroy This Document" garbage. I filled it out and am looking forward to sending it back. The phone number and address I used are for the FBI fraud investigation offices, although I'm sure they'll never be contacted, nor would they bother. There is fine print at the bottom of one of the page folds stating that this is not endorsed by the government, blah blah blah, but so what. The intent is CLEARLY to make it seem as if it was.

I'm not a violent person, but if this had been hand-delivered by the sender, I'd put them in the hospital.

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Yeah these scammers deserve a special place in hell. Had a close call with my dad only yesterday, he took a call allegedly from his internet provider, saying they'd been hacked and needed remote access to his computer to check for viruses. These scum are so convincing. To be honest I'm actually scared I'd end up in a room with them, because I'm pretty sure I wouldn't be able to resist doing serious harm.
 
This happened to me about 10 years ago before my grandparents passed. Someone called them saying they were me and needed money wired for some emergency. Fortunately my grandmother was a career penny pincher and called my cell to check - it’s the only time I ever remember her actually calling me!

Although the crisis was averted, they obviously still felt strange about it - almost like they distrusted me. Damn scammers.
 
Few things raise my hackles as much as folks preying upon older folks. My dear neighbor fell prey to the oft-used "Gram, it's me, (insert grandchild's name). I'm in trouble and I need $2500 or they're going to throw me in jail. Can you please wire me the money as soon as you can?" scam.... almost twice. Thankfully, she called me first the second time they tried it, and I had her call her grandson directly to confirm that he was fine. My father has come close to falling for things a few times. People REALLY suck sometimes, and I hope there's a special REALLY uncomfortable place full of fire for the people that target the trusting elder members of society.

My wife just received a mailing today, with the usual official-looking crap, the "Do Not Destroy This Document" garbage. I filled it out and am looking forward to sending it back. The phone number and address I used are for the FBI fraud investigation offices, although I'm sure they'll never be contacted, nor would they bother. There is fine print at the bottom of one of the page folds stating that this is not endorsed by the government, blah blah blah, but so what. The intent is CLEARLY to make it seem as if it was.

I'm not a violent person, but if this had been hand-delivered by the sender, I'd put them in the hospital.

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It’s Medicare Advantage open enrollment season (AEP). I’m senior and have held an insurance license since 1978. I’ve sold Medicare advantage plans as well as Medicare supplements. Frankly deceptive mailers should have been outlawed years ago.

The problem is two fold, one is that Medicare Advantage plans change their coverage on an annual basis, and those changes can be significant. So an annual review is imperative with somebody that can explain the ramifications of these changes. BUT, CMS (Center of Medicare Services) has outlawed qualified insurance professionals from directly contacting seniors without prior consent from said seniors to help them understand their best option.

Medicare supplements do not have this restriction, hence the use of mailers. If one replies to one of these mailers, an agent can set an appointment to discuss a Medicare supplement, but the segue to discuss a Medicare Advantage plan at a later date is very easy and compliant with regs.

The Regs covering marketing of plans are so convoluted, counter productive, and in the end, prevent Senior from getting the information they desperately need.
 
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Yeah, they called my mom a few years ago stating my son (her grandson) was in jail and needed bail money. Good thing she called me and I explained to her, it's a scam and to always call me first when she gets calls or mailings that seem off.
 
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It’s not just seniors being scammed about relatives needing money.

My wife and I bought new cars in 2022 and 2023.

I started getting postcards about a month after the 2022 sale about signing up for long term warranty coverage. Of course it mentioned it was a limited time offer so act now, etc. I eventually got different ones from two different scammers! They both knew the make and model plus my address and the VIN!

They made sure to not include a phone number or address and didn’t claim any affiliation with the car’s manufacturer. They used prepaid postage so I assume that the mailing zip code was real, but the USPS doesn’t check whether a sender is legit. Did they hack the RMV, the dealership or maybe the bank that financed it to get all the info? I sent all the relevant information to both my state’s consumer protection agency as well as USPS since it’s technically mail fraud. I never heard back from either.

Then almost exactly a year later we bought another new car from the same dealer registered with my wife’s name first on the title, she starts getting the same postcards. :rollno:

We get scam calls daily on our landline, sometimes a half dozen. We screen the caller ID before answering. Sometimes they leave messages which are so fake it’s amazing anybody gets sucked in. I also get about 100 scam e-mails a day which my internet provider nicely filters out for me. The vast majority are porn related, I never knew there were so many ways to lengthen my you-know-what. Microsoft tells me they detected a virus on my computer (I only use Macs) and if I check the actual sending address it’s never Microsoft. Now and then a few sneak through, the latest trick is to put large spaces between the words in the title so when checking for particular phrases, the filters won’t detect them because of the whitespace.

Keep in mind that scammers send out thousands of postcards, emails, letters and phone calls. They only need a couple of responders to actually cough up some dough for it to be worth their while.
 




Also, Disney+ there's an episode of "Out There : crimes of the paranormal" that deals with an interesting scam that got picked up in San Francisco China Town

(Actually, here's the episode, Disney+ account not required)

 
My mother is in her 70s, still having all her mental faculties, yet she's been an overly trusting (even gullible) person as long as I've known her. She's an active user of social media and is just the type of mark that scammers look for.

I regularly remind her to always be suspicious of everything that asks for any of your personal information and to never send money to any online source, no matter how legitimate you think it might be, unless you were the one to initiate contact with a site that's from your own list of trusted institutions.

Even though my father doesn't use social media at all, I've explained to him how these scams work and how to recognize them and he knows to keep an eye on mom to see that she doesn't fall for their scams.

I'm not a vengeful person, but the thought of these heartless scammers being swallowed up in an earthquake makes me smile. On the inside. Where it counts.
 
I couldn't tell you about targeting seniors from personal experience, but I don't think anybody thinks highly of that kind of person.

I don't know if any of you guys get those scam callers, but up here they'll call with a pre-recorded message saying it's either Amazon or service Canada or the post office and to press one for service.

I always press one if I'm not busy and try at every call to do something different to mess with them.

My reasoning is more or less is that they're trying to invade our community and steal from the vulnerable. As people who know these folks are crooks, if we just hang up then we're allowing them to move on to find those people and ruin their days. It would be smarter at the grand scale if everybody who knew better actually took some time to frustrate their efforts and waste every minute they've got, not to mention damaging the morale of the people doing it - the guy that's making these calls is not all that different from any of us, make their work day suck and they'll start looking for a job elsewhere.
 
Just saw Statham's "The Beekeeper." For folks who share the opinions I've espoused in this thread, it's the feel-good movie of the year.


Oh, I might actually watch that then.

I was previously ripping the piddle out of it, because there are so many movies around at the moment with names like The Bricklayer, The Accountant, The Dustman, The Pigeon Fancier, The Panel Beater, The Quantity Surveyor - and I still haven't got round to watching Michael Flatley's wannabe James Bond vanity project.


Anyway, I still recommend Thelma (trailer in my earlier post)
 
Oh, I might actually watch that then.

I was previously ripping the piddle out of it, because there are so many movies around at the moment with names like The Bricklayer, The Accountant, The Dustman, The Pigeon Fancier, The Panel Beater, The Quantity Surveyor - and I still haven't got round to watching Michael Flatley's wannabe James Bond vanity project.


Anyway, I still recommend Thelma (trailer in my earlier post)
True confession digression,..

I like Jason Statham's work. There, I said it. The movies themselves vary from almost excellent to absolutely awful, but there's something about his presence and delivery I really enjoy.

I rewatched "The Mechanic" prior to watching "The Beekeeper," (currently on limited activity recuperating from abdominal surgery.,. nothing major, but there's time to be filled), and "The Mechanic" is a much better movie....and that's not his best movie by a long shot,either....so don't expect much from Beekeeper, unless you like formulaic Statham revenge/protect the innocent movies. I do.
 
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True confession digression,..

I like Jason Statham's work. There, I said it. The movies themselves vary from almost excellent to absolutely awful, but there's something about his presence and delivery I really enjoy.

I rewatched "The Mechanic" prior to watching "The Beekeeper," (currently on limited activity recuperating from abdominal surgery.,. nothing major, but there's time to be filled), and "The Mechanic" is a much better movie....and that's not his best movie by a long shot,either....so don't expect much from Beekeeper, unless you like formulaic Statham revenge/protect the innocent movies. I do.


Throw in a big shark, and we're in business (still can't believe Ben Wheatley directed the sequel).
 
My parents are in their 80s and could be targets, but thankfully my mother is naturally very reserved and skeptical, so I'm not too worried--yet. My dad doesn't talk enough to get into any trouble.

But my (late) uncle had a very close call in his last year when he was around 85. Luckily my cousin was there. She caught him sharing his computer screen with someone in India and shut the whole thing down immediately, just as he was about to share compromising information. Ugh. He was a very smart guy, but at that age I guess it can happen to lots of folks.

If you get a call from one of these jerks, you could play dumb and string them along for a long time, then hang up. Waste enough of their time and they won't try again.
 
Few things raise my hackles as much as folks preying upon older folks. My dear neighbor fell prey to the oft-used "Gram, it's me, (insert grandchild's name). I'm in trouble and I need $2500 or they're going to throw me in jail. Can you please wire me the money as soon as you can?" scam.... almost twice. Thankfully, she called me first the second time they tried it, and I had her call her grandson directly to confirm that he was fine. My father has come close to falling for things a few times. People REALLY suck sometimes, and I hope there's a special REALLY uncomfortable place full of fire for the people that target the trusting elder members of society.

My wife just received a mailing today, with the usual official-looking crap, the "Do Not Destroy This Document" garbage. I filled it out and am looking forward to sending it back. The phone number and address I used are for the FBI fraud investigation offices, although I'm sure they'll never be contacted, nor would they bother. There is fine print at the bottom of one of the page folds stating that this is not endorsed by the government, blah blah blah, but so what. The intent is CLEARLY to make it seem as if it was.

I'm not a violent person, but if this had been hand-delivered by the sender, I'd put them in the hospital.

View attachment 7044328View attachment 7044330
They’re psychopaths and have no shame
 
My mom was targeted in the “grandpa” scam. A dirtbag called claiming to be her grandson who’d been arrested for drug trafficking and needed $9800 for bail. She said he was an incredibly good actor, very believable.

In Canada they always ask for under $10,000 because then the banks have to have more information before releasing the funds!

Then the ‘grandson’ had a guy come on the phone claiming to be a police officer lol. He was believable too.

My mom told them to pound salt but others get taken.

Those people need to be tortured to death.
 

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