
How con artists trick your mind - schrofer
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20141003-the-mind-tricks-of-scammers
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Jun8
The quote from Teller pretty much sums up the situation: "You will be fooled
by a trick if it involves more time, money and practice than you (or any other
sane onlooker) would be willing to invest" (from an interview with him, it's a
fascinating read [http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/Teller-Reveals-
Hi...](http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/Teller-Reveals-His-
Secrets.html)).

~~~
Rapzid
Ah, but my favourite from that article: "You think you’ve made a choice, just
as when you choose between two candidates preselected by entrenched political
parties(No. 7—Choice is not freedom)."

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amirmc
Cialdini's book on Influence seems relevant here.

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influence:_Science_and_Practice](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influence:_Science_and_Practice)

Edit: It's referenced in the article but that link points to Amazon.

~~~
sogen
Great book. btw the Dalai Lama giving flowers at the airport was a great
example.

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kschua
It's the Hare Krishna not the Dalai Lama

~~~
sogen
oops my bad, thanks!

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ilaksh
> Scammers use the “time principle” to persuade us we need to act quickly
> before we can think rationally and exercise self-control. They also make use
> of the “deference to authority principle” and the “herd principle” – our
> tendency to act like our friends or those around us – to convince people
> that the scam is legitimate.

> ...making use of physically attractive accomplices, for instance. They can
> use our deepest desires to blind our reasoning ...

Sounds like standard sales and marketing.

~~~
tjradcliffe
And politics. It's happening right now.

There is currently a bit of a debate in Canada as to whether we should be
joining the US and its allies in fighting the Islamic State, and all three of
these are being heavily deployed by those in favour:

1) we must act now! 2) experts agree! 3) every decent person agrees IS must be
stopped!

There hasn't been any deployment of physically attractive accomplices,
although I guess that's pretty much what the Liberal's use of Justin Trudeau
in opposition amounts to.

The difficulty is that none of these are actual arguments in favour of the
proposed strategy. I am generally opposed to military intervention--because it
rarely works and it kills people and costs enormous amounts of money and
rarely works--but can see there may be a case to be made here. Unfortunately,
by using what are widely recognized as scammer's tactics, the government has
alienated itself from any evidence-based support (this would not be a first,
for this government nor any of its predecessors.)

It would be lovely to see the actual merits of the mission debated, but it is
clear that both the opposition and the government are interested only in
deploying scammer's tactics in support of their favoured side.

~~~
ams6110
Sounds like climate change advocacy too.

~~~
Terr_
Too much emphasis on number-crunching and bespectacled professors. Needs more
think-of-the-children.

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coffeedrinker
To see how this relates to computer security, download the pdf linked in the
article. After it exposes the methods of exploitation, it gives examples of
internet computer scams.

[http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/techreports/UCAM-CL-
TR-754.pdf](http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/techreports/UCAM-CL-TR-754.pdf)

~~~
wiredfool
Does it expose the methods of exploitation using any of the convenient Acrobat
bugs?

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scotty79
Each time I've been conned was due to me wishing things beyond what I know is
real. I was conning myself. Conman was just there to take my money.

~~~
jrmiii
Umm, is this a recurrent problem for you? How many times have you been conned?

~~~
protonfish
If you don't think you've been conned thousands of times in your life then you
aren't paying attention. What do you think advertising is? And don't get me
started on preachers and realtors.

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jamesbrownuhh
Side note - articles like these used to be completely blocked in the UK, but
now seem to have become accessible, with the following caveat just below the
banner ad:

"This website is made by BBC Worldwide. BBC Worldwide is a commercial company
that is owned by the BBC (and just the BBC.) No money from the licence fee was
used to create this website. Instead this website is supported by advertising
outside the UK. The profits we make from it go back to BBC programme-makers to
help fund great new BBC programmes"

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tokenadult
The whole article is an interesting read, and as another comment here already
pointed out, it links to other good online content. I think that the article's
point about online security is a healthy reminder for many Hacker News
readers:

"The seven persuasion principles might be as old as the hills, but Stajano
says they are often ignored by security experts, who are as likely to blame
security breaches on the people using their systems as they are to blame the
scammers. 'Too many security professionals think: users are such a pain – my
system would be super-secure if only users behaved in the proper way,' he
says. He is trying to persuade experts that they need to make security systems
that work in harmony with – not despite - the way we behave."

We have to deal with human nature as it is, not as we wish it to be, if we are
to make progress in computer and Internet security.

~~~
PhantomGremlin
> We have to deal with human nature as it is, not as we wish it to be

Yes, exactly. Security professionals should be forced to write this out in
longhand about 100 times every week, just so they don't forget.

I know many people who have used computers for 20 or 30 years, but who are
still "clueless" in my "computer nerd" opinion. That's because normal users
just want to use computers as a tool to solve problems they're interested in.
Normal people are interested in the destination, computer nerds are interested
in the journey.

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yander12
> trust in authority, a desire to act in the same way as our friends, or a
> tendency to act in a consistent way

Sounds like how most people get suckered by politicians, over and over again.

~~~
protonfish
The problem is their (and others) attitude that

> ...the authority principle, for example, is actually very helpful for
> surviving peacefully in human society

Is it really? But isn't unquestioning obedience to authority the key
ingredient to war, corruption and genocide? Maybe trust in authority is
necessary in children but adults need to accept the responsibility to think
for themselves.

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jvanstry
Stopped reading at "Intelligence and experience offers no protection against
scammers, says Modic."

Come on.

~~~
SilasX
I think they meant "it's no guarantee against..."

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mathattack
This reminded me of my most recent car purchase. I ran out of time (long
weekend that I allocated to the search had ended) and couldn't call them out
by saying, "I know I don't have to buy it at this price now."

Their customer service seemed genuinely surprised when I slammed the sales
process in my post-sales feedback.

