
81-year-old man driven to death by phone scammers - BinaryIdiot
http://q13fox.com/2015/10/07/81-year-old-man-driven-to-death-by-phone-scammers/
======
adekok
Once the relatives get wind of this, there is a simple solution. Get a _new
phone number_ for the person in question. And even more critical _don 't
cancel the old one_.

Put an answering machine on the old one, and have a "safe" relative check it
every other day or so. Give the new phone number to family and friends.

After a few weeks of getting nothing but answering machine messages, the
scammers will go away.

If the old number has been cancelled, the scammers know you're on to them. And
look for the new number. If the old number still works, they won't look for a
new number. Mostly.

~~~
nadams
> Once the relatives get wind of this, there is a simple solution. Get a new
> phone number for the person in question. And even more critical don't cancel
> the old one.

Or an even better idea - transfer the number to a reputable VOIP provider and
setup the number so that it rejects calls from all numbers except for the ones
you specify. Your loved ones can still call but any other scammer would get a
busy signal or whatever you specify as the destination. You could even direct
unknown calls to you (you can setup a time condition) - and that would give
you the ability to add that number to the whitelist if it was a legit caller.

Added benefit - the service will be vastly cheaper.

> If the old number has been cancelled, the scammers know you're on to them.

I can guarantee you that they don't care if you are "on to them". They just
stop calling because no one is picking up the line.

~~~
toomuchtodo
We could build this with Twilio.

~~~
nadams
No offense but I didn't mention a specific VOIP provider on purpose.

However, callcentric already has it built and much easier to understand than
twilio. I'm not saying that service is bad - but the average person doesn't
know what API, cloud, or SIP means (or care). Callcentric makes it pretty
obvious what their service is and provides and how to use it.

~~~
toomuchtodo
I specifically mentioned Twilio because anyone can build a custom solution to
address this problem.

Someone already has done this (with Twilio) to win the FTCs RoboCall
Challenge: [https://www.twilio.com/blog/2013/04/twilio-powered-
nomorobo-...](https://www.twilio.com/blog/2013/04/twilio-powered-nomorobo-
wins-ftc-robocall-challenge.html)

I also like Twilio ;)

~~~
nadams
> There are no infrastructure changes, or hardware required. This was one of
> FTC’s guidelines for the contest.

> Unfortunately, Nomorobo is not available on traditional analog landlines or
> wireless phones at this time.

Sounds like he failed the challenge...

I don't think his idea is revolutionary - one could setup Asterisk to do what
he did.

~~~
patio11
One is welcome to ship an Asterisk implementation of it any time one feels
like doing so. One has not shipped an Asterisk implementation. One may
underestimate to which degree ideas, revolutionary or otherwise, are improved
by actually shipping concrete instantiations of them which actually work.

Incidentally: NoMoRobo gains some utility specifically because Twilio exists.
A trivial example: phone numbers have a history to them. Most customers of
Twilio want to buy phone numbers with a relatively clean history, i.e., ones
that were not widely distributed prior to their life with that customer, to
avoid misdirected calls or e.g. reputational issues. NoMoRobo wants precisely
the opposite -- they literally ask Twilio to provision them with phone numbers
which are otherwise unsaleable to customers, for example because those numbers
are actively getting spammed to death. (Twilio has an entire team of people
whose job is telephone number quality. Things you wouldn't have guessed
existed in the world, right?)

This works great for NoMoRobo's use case, because a phone number getting
spammed to death is perfect for them -- it lets them cheaply capture a lot of
phone numbers which one has a high confidence are spam rather than ham.

~~~
MichaelGG
Fun/rude anecdote: We (a VoIP provider) once got a number that was getting
250K calls every week. Not because telemarketers were calling it, but because
that ID was being usd to make a lot of outbound calls. So people would call
back, upset, trying to figure stuff out. We dumped the number (no sense paying
for all that traffic), but not before shunting it into a conference call (and
playing a message telling them so).

It was rather interesting to see how people reacted together. One person would
call in, angry, another person would call in, soon there'd be 4 people all
yelling at each other "Well _you_ called _me_!" "No I didn't!" "Now listen
here, I think maybe the wires are crossed" and on and on. Sometimes they'd
gang up together and try to sort problems out, but often it'd just degenerate
into name calling.

Anyways, it's sad that NoMoRobo exists. The FCC could trivially put an end to
scam calls, robo-dialing, etc., with a couple days of drafting a new
regulation, and then a few months to implement it. Source: I've handled
billions of calls, much of which were dialer traffic. I've worked on both
sides (trying to block traffic, trying to get upstreams to take traffic).

~~~
toomuchtodo
> with a couple days of drafting a new regulation, and then a few months to
> implement it.

How would they enforce the regulations though without NSA style SS7 taps
throughout US telcom network infrastructure?

------
scrubby
My 85 year old grandfather didn't commit suicide, but he was taken for every
penny of his meager life savings by the Jamaican lottery scam. My dad
discovered what was going on, called the police, but was told there was
nothing they could do. My grandfather firmly believed and probably still does
that he had won the lottery and was just waiting for a payout. We basically
had to revoke his phone privileges to keep him from giving them more money,
because he was so convinced. He does't have Alzheimer's or dementia. The
scammers are just very convincing.

~~~
wahsd
I really think there is some other maybe even unidentified kind of mental
issue going on with this kind of scam. I say that because I know of some
people who are locked into the Iraqi dinar scam and simply cannot see what is
going on in spite of being otherwise ostensibly smart and intelligent people.
Maybe it's "greed" , but it seems to me that it's more of a vulnerability due
to hopes and dreams not matching topic sophistication.

~~~
JamesBarney
I don't think it's greed. I think it's hope. Most of the people I know who
fall for these scams are not any dumber or greedier than other people I know.
They do seem to be much more optimistic and positive though.

Think if this same person has late stage cancer and believed they were gonna
make it despite all odds it would be an inspiring lifetime movie. But
unfortunately I think these are the same people who also believe that a
Nigerian prince needs them to transfer some money before they will be
handsomely rewarded against all odds.

~~~
scrubby
I agree. In my grandfather's case, he was keeping this all a secret because he
wanted to surprise his family with financial help from his "windfall."
Something I think he always wished he could do, but never had the money to do.

~~~
JBReefer
Man, that's incredibly heartbreaking.

------
wiradikusuma
In Indonesia, a particular scam is calling people (esp. parents) very early in
the morning, when people are still sleeping, "We're cops. Your son/daughter is
arrested for drugs possession. Send us lots of money NOW or we'll send him/her
to jail." followed by what sounds like someone crying in the background.

Since you're barely awake, and your son/daughter is indeed away (eg. on night
shift or staying with friends), and the fact that some cops _are_ corrupt, and
_somehow_ you can't call (busy line) your son/daughter to verify, make people
fall prey to this scam.

The interesting part is: how do they know the _relationship_ of the victims,
and the location (i.e away from home) at that point in time, considering the
scammers are sometimes from different island?

~~~
andyjohnson0
_" how do they know the relationship of the victims"_

Probably they don't. If the victim says "but I don't have a son" they just
hang-up. Scattershot approach, not targeted.

~~~
celticninja
or start with "your child has been arrested" when they say "what Mary Lou?"
you respond with "yes we have your daughter".

~~~
relet
At which point you can relax, because you have a boy called Josh.

~~~
cbd1984
If you have enough on the ball to do something like that, instead of operating
on pure emotion, you're not going to fall for a lot of these scams anyway.

------
daturkel
Just a heads up, this is a CNN wire story. The original, properly attributed
to Wayne Drash, is here: [http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/07/us/jamaica-lottery-
scam-suicid...](http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/07/us/jamaica-lottery-scam-
suicide/)

------
new299
Here's what I did to stop various scammers calling, I talked to them
endlessly. They seem to almost never hang up, they'll just keep going and
going. So I was bored one day and decided to see how the scam played out:

[http://41j.com/blog/2015/08/phonecall-from-a-
scammer/](http://41j.com/blog/2015/08/phonecall-from-a-scammer/)

They did call again, I picked them up on the fact that it was a scam and asked
them how they justify their actions to themselves and ask questions about how
the scam works. I'll see how it goes but I seem to have got myself on some
kind of blacklist as nobody has called in a month (used to get some kind of
scam call at least one a week). It's unfortunate that wasting their time is
the most effective defense I can think of.

~~~
andyjohnson0
I once kept a "Microsoft tech support" scammer [1] on the phone for over 30
minutes while I pretended to download and install some bit of malware he was
trying to foist on me. When he finally realised what I was doing, I owned-up
and politely asked why he was trying to rob me. He gave a loud scream of what
sounded like pure frustration and hung up. I was laughing so hard I almost
passed-out.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technical_support_scam](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technical_support_scam)

~~~
jmcqk6
I was under the impression that many times, the "scammer" is not even aware
that they are in a scam. They're a contractor following a script. But I just
did a search and I can't find the article (maybe from wired) where they talked
about that.

~~~
andyjohnson0
This one?
[http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-04/11/malwarebytes](http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2013-04/11/malwarebytes)

------
murbard2
The lessons is not to "be wary of scammers" or "hack your phone"... That's
totally missing the crux of the scam.

The lesson is that, as you approach old age, and if at all possible, you
should give a trusted relative or close friend a durable power of attorney
over your finances. In addition, (or as a second best), put your money in an
irrevocable living trust assigning yourself as a beneficiary, and laying out
strict rules for retrieving money.

~~~
URSpider94
The problem is that many senior citizens, especially men, will fight tooth and
nail against this. They have a self-image problem. They can not see themselves
as frail and vulnerable.

I lived through this with first my grandfather, then my grandmother.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Indeed. And it's absolutely understandable. Our seniors have been productive
members of society for long decades, and as they reach their old age they
suddenly find themselves not needed by anyone - the society doesn't want their
services, their sons and daughters have already started their families and
have little time for parents. No surprise they'll fight tooth and nail to keep
the last bits that make them feel human - holding responsibility for their own
actions, managing their own resources.

------
goodJobWalrus
Does anyone know what happens to the people when they get old, so they become
gullible? Is there some physiological mechanism, or is it just that older
people are less sophisticated about those issues?

~~~
b3lvedere
"Wizard's First Rule: people are stupid."

Richard and Kahlan frowned even more. "People are stupid; given proper
motivation, almost anyone will believe almost anything. Because people are
stupid, they will believe a lie because they want to believe it's true, or
because they are afraid it might be true. People's heads are full of
knowledge, facts, and beliefs, and most of it is false, yet they think it all
true. People are stupid; they can only rarely tell the difference between a
lie and the truth, and yet they are confident they can, and so are all the
easier to fool. "Because of Wizards First Rule, the old wizards created
Confessors, and Seekers, as a means of helping find the truth, when the truth
is important enough. Darken Rahl knows the Wizard's Rules. He is using the
first one. People need an enemy to feel a sense of purpose. It's easy to lead
people when they have a sense of purpose. Sense of purpose is more important
by far than the truth. In fact, truth has no bearing in this. Darken Rahl is
providing them with an enemy, other than himself, a sense of purpose. People
are stupid; they want to believe, so they do."

— Chapter 36, p.560, U.S. paperback edition of Terry Goodkind's awesome book
with the same title.

~~~
arbitrage
That's an offensively trite and simplified viewpoint on a very complicated and
heartbreaking topic.

~~~
Leszek
I made the mistake of reading this book once: the rest of it is similarly
awful.

------
forgetsusername
>" _targets nearly 300,000 Americans a year, most of them elderly, and has
enticed them to send an estimated $300 million annually_ "

In this case, the scammers took advantage of an elderly man, inflicted with
Alzheimer's and diminishing mental capacity. Sad.

But that can't be the case for the majority. How on earth do "normal" people
fall for this? I can see, _maybe_ , when the internet was young and this was
new. But it's a pop culture joke now. Those numbers are staggering.

~~~
ksherlock
Why do people fall for the "work for a startup and get rich" scam?

~~~
hueving
Probably because some people get rich. Also, many people appropriately view
the options as a lottery ticket and just like to be in a company building
something new.

------
justinsb
I don't understand why Western Union et al aren't being held accountable, at
the very least in the form of a class action lawsuit. It seems that either the
money transmitters aren't obeying the "Know Your Customer" laws (are they
somehow exempt?), or they are knowingly allowing people to be victims of fraud
to increase their profit.

Making it much harder to transfer money anonymously seems both helpful in
these cases, and lucrative for lawyers.

~~~
patio11
Western Union is not exempt from KYC requirements. Most agents of it, however,
sound something like "the owner of your local bodega." They'll satisfy
themselves of your identity, either via personal knowledge or asking to see an
ID. They'll then ring up your transfer. The person on the other end of the
transfer is "Some person in Jamaica." That doesn't automatically scream FRAUD
unless you say "Lottery" \-- the overwhelming majority of Americans wiring
money to someone in Jamaica are, in fact, supporting family or friends there.

Fraudsters also tend to get pretty decent about instructing their marks to
structure payments to avoid the obvious controls, for example by using mules
[+] or by striping a $5,000 transfer into multiple smaller transfers on
different days to different recipients controlled by the same operation. This
is explained to the mark as something like "Oh, different tax bureau than last
time" but it's operationally to avoid having velocity checks tripped at WU.

[ + ] Witting or unwitting co-conspirators who receive money in their own name
and then forward it to the criminals, often for a cut of the profits.

------
memracom
There is a solution to this problem.

1\. Change the phone number system to require 207 digit phone numbers instead
of the current 10 digits.

2\. Assign random phone numbers to everybody.

Now the only people who can call you are the people who know you. You have to
actively share your number with people. If people call random numbers they
will get "not in service" messages all day long.

We have 20 years of experience with NEW communication systems with NEW
addressing systems where people can't connect without knowing your email
address or IM handle. It can be done, i.e. it is workable to require people to
share contact info before you can communicate. People will find a way.

~~~
URSpider94
They are not calling "random" numbers. They are buying lead lists from
telemarketing firms. I would bet they may even have demographic data on the
people they are calling to be sure they are dialing susceptible people (the
elderly).

------
CrimsnBlade
I used to get calls like this on my work phone when I was working as a
mechanic. The scammer would tell me to send him money with some sort of green
dot card or something. He kept saying once I send it I will be enjoying
financial freedom. I don't think they specifically target old people, maybe
just people that are more likely to jump at opportunities before they process
how ludicrous they are. I was in a blue-collar environment, maybe that was
part of it, though I'm not sure how they would have known that.

------
Shivetya
Well a close relative of mine recently got tricked by a phone scammer who
claimed to be from Microsoft. They did the virus alert scam, claiming CRSS.EXE
was a virulent virus and needed immediate attention. Hence, they request to
connect, using TeamViewer and promptly change his windows account name to a
phone number (CALL-XXX-XXX-XXXX) and put a password on it. They immediately
disconnect.

Fix, 300+ for two years protection or 400 or so for three years. Needless to
say fixing a password locked Windows computer is beyond the majority out
there. Apparently its pretty common to declare themselves from Dell,
Microsoft, or similar.

The modern day roofers, driveway sealers, and such.

on a side note, who do you report these guys too?

~~~
slipstream-
Low-tech winlocker ransomware! That's interesting. Never heard of that being
done before by fake tech support scammers.

------
weaksauce
Someone called my grandma when she was still alive and tried to convince her
that I was in trouble with some bad people or in jail or something. They were
really well researched and convincing. I wasn't in either of those situations.
It's insane that people prey on the elderly since it's not like most of them
work at all and need the money to live.

~~~
crpatino
Lions rarely go after the strongest, sharpest, healthiest gazelle. Why it
should be any different in the human realm?

What we need is not stop denying there are populations at risk from the
overwhelming disclosure of private information into the public, and start
taking measures to educate the most vulnerable people, and if need be, isolate
them from the (public?) online world. I know walled gardens are taboo, but
they did make - and continue to make - a lot of sense once the Internet began
to fill with lay (as in, not part of the technorati) people.

~~~
TeMPOraL
As a society we also need to start doing something more against it. Blanket
ban on telemarketing and _very_ high sentences for confirmed scammers would
not be uncalled for.

------
triangleman
[https://www.google.com/search?q=apple+tech+support](https://www.google.com/search?q=apple+tech+support)

Google still takes ads from iYogi. If you call iYogi they will try to scam
you, over and over again. This has been going on for years. Has no one
complained to Google about this? What about Apple, aren't they concerned about
their brand being tarnished over unwitting seniors typing "Apple tech support"
into their browsers and running into a tech support scam?

~~~
gefh
I don't seem to get any iYogi ads - could you share a screenshot and I'll
share it with the bad ads people?

~~~
triangleman
Here you go.
[https://www.dropbox.com/s/8i7t0bci8w7z80c/iyogi.PNG?dl=0](https://www.dropbox.com/s/8i7t0bci8w7z80c/iyogi.PNG?dl=0)

------
PythonicAlpha
In a documentary, I saw lately (in Europe), one person did not kill himself,
but did loss weight and was sent to hospital for inquiry, but nobody did find
out what was wrong ... after he died, they found out, that he simply did not
have the money to buy food and was so ashamed, that he did not tell anybody.

It was a different scam, where the victims where enrolled in regular lottery
gambling (with a monthly rate) and the twist was, that when they found a
victim, it was enrolled in more and more games (every game costing maybe
$50-100) which where just automatically drawn from his bank account. Even when
the victims objected ... the letters where simply not read by anybody.

------
gadders
In the UK, it's charities that hound people to suicide:
[http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-
bristol-32748923](http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bristol-32748923)

------
n72
My father, from whom I'm mostly estranged and who doesn't live in the same
country as I, has given over $100K to Nigerian scammers. They hooked him on a
Christian dating site. It's incredibly angering to watch all of this.

------
b3lvedere
Sad sad story. The first thing i'd would do is to change the phone to a voip
system where i could control which numbers are allowed to call.

------
throwaway227736
Stories like this are why I support capital punishment for crimes beyond
murder (at a higher burden of proof than "beyond a reasonable doubt").

I'd like to see these scammers hanged on national TV without hoods over their
faces.

------
Jemmeh
Just for their case in particular...Can't they block phone numbers from
certain area codes? Or even request a new number and have it private? It seems
strange that they can't do anything about 50+ calls a day.

------
uptown
Anybody have a solution for endless calls to a cell phone with a myriad of
"google registry" or "small business whatever" scams? The calls started right
around when I switched from being a Sprint customer to a Verizon pre-paid
customer, but I can't definitively say Verizon sold my number. I ignore and
block every call, but I receive anywhere from one to three calls a day.

Switching numbers isn't really an option I want to explore since I'm
unconvinced it wouldn't just start on my new number if my carrier was the
origin of the calls.

~~~
saryant
I started getting those after creating an LLC. I've tried to screw with them
but they seem pretty good at sniffing that out and they just hang up whenever
I tell them I "need to go find some paperwork" and leave the phone muted on my
desk.

I also started getting letters that look like bills for my LLC but are
actually just junk mail for SEO services. Those ones really pissed me off.
Looks just like an invoice with "This is not a bill" in tiny font at the
bottom.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
I think this should be actionable offense. But its been going on for years in
one form or another. Used to get a big ad packet from a local dept store -
with the bill mixed into the middle. They were hoping I wouldn't notice, and
my balance would roll over so I'd pay charges. Instead I took the reply
envelope, put my check in and stuffed it full of the ads too.

~~~
saryant
It wasn't an _actual_ bill, it was an SEO guy trying to trick me into thinking
I'd already hired him for my new company by sending me something that looked
like an invoice for services rendered.

Whoever sent it is still an asshole though.

------
V-2
_" The Jamaican lottery scam is a cruel, persistent and sophisticated scam
that has victimized seniors throughout the nation"_

What's so sophisticated about it? Honest question. Seems like the oldest trick
in the book, as primitive and crude as scams only get. One that couldn't
possibly work against anyone but most senile people. It's a sad story, I'm
just missing the "sophistication" element.

~~~
saint_fiasco
The sophisticated part is getting the phone numbers of old people to begin the
scam and then laundering the money at the end.

~~~
V-2
As far as I know these can be simply bought on black market... it's not like
these scammers get them by themselves, hacking into databases etc.

------
desireco42
I don't understand why his son or someone couldn't change his landline number.
It is heartbreaking to see old people being bullied like this.

------
jules
There was a great TV show from Belgium called Neveneffecten a few years ago.
One of the things they did was take the bait of email spam scammers. One of
the scam gangs arranged an in-person meet in Belgium and tried to convince
them to take a plane to Nigeria with a large sum of cash to buy gold. I don't
know what the gang's plan was, but I doubt they would get a warm welcome in
Nigeria.

------
carbide
There's a delightful website that showcases the work of so-called "scam
baiters" who aim to waste the time of scammers and lead them into compromising
situations --
[http://www.419eater.com/html/letters.htm](http://www.419eater.com/html/letters.htm)

------
guard-of-terra
It's kind of depressing that they wage war on drugs, and then they try to put
journalists in jail for nonexistent hacking, but they are incapable of going
after phone scammers. I don't think they ever try.

If I would say I expect real protection from police & court, I'll get laughed
at these days.

~~~
maxerickson
[https://www.google.com/search?q=phone+scam+sentencing](https://www.google.com/search?q=phone+scam+sentencing)

------
hippo8
Since the NSA is by default monitoring calls, I wonder why they cant do
anything about this? (:p)

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
With all the data they have and considering the degree to which they have
violated our privacy, it's a shame they do so little with it.

~~~
saint_fiasco
And they are calls from foreigners, to boot. They may not even need to ask the
secret courts for permission to record those.

Even the metadata, which they definitely collect, would be very useful.

------
vinceyuan
Similar things happen in China every day. Government, police, banks warn
people many times, but there are still some people believing they will win a
lot of money. They forget "No pay, no gain".

~~~
kalleboo
In Japan they've gone so far as to install phone jammers at ATMs to aid
against the scam that's common here where people will call elderly people
claiming to be their sons saying they need money.

------
comrh
Wouldn't all this be effectively prevented with either blacklisting all
numbers outside the US or a whitelist on the elderly person's phone?

------
TazeTSchnitzel
Interesting that a lot of data was stolen by call centre workers. Shows one of
the perils of outsourcing abroad to incredibly impoverished countries.

~~~
agumonkey
The course for cost lowering is crossing lots of diminishing return points
nowadays.

