There's a Scammer Born Every Minute
Scams.
They're alive, well, and some are getting slightly more sophisticated.
One of the latest is the work at home online scam. This one is particularly pernicious because of our tight economy. So many people are out of work, so few jobs are to be had, and for each one those that are available, statistics indicate that about three workers are available. And since many of them aren't particularly appealing - retail and the like - the idea of working from home on an internet-based job suddenly sounds more intriguing that it might have a year or two ago.
Here's one that came to my attention not too long ago: Partner with P***. P*** tells us that for little or no effort, and for no investment from you, he will provide a highly desirable product, share with you his marketing secrets, hold your hand if necessary, and lead you into the promised land of online sales success.
Remember the Herbalife scandal of a few years ago? Welcome ba-ack. Not only are you expected to fork over $9.95 in "shipping and handling" to receive your "free" DVD that tells you all about how to receive and market this wonderful MLM (multi-level marketing) product, but you'll be signed up for a $30/month, hard to break contract with our friend P***, who is making all his money collecting $30 a month from people like you. Somewhere down the food chain someone is actually selling - and someone else presumably buying - the actual product. But the thousands-per-month that can be made can be made only by those who sign up other suckers to sell for them. Or better yet, to sign up other suckers.
Then there are sites like MiNeeds, aimed at writers. Here is another money-making scam aimed at a group of the great unemployed - people who may or may not technically be "writers," but who feel, why not supplement my unemployment while I look for work? The problem is, MiNeeds what is being called a "P2P" gimmick, or "Pay to Play." You pay them a fee, usually somewhere in the $30 a month ballpark, and they send you leads. Most of them are questionable, none of them ever come through. If they do, indeed, exist, someone always gets there before you. This is also true for most of the P2P voiceover sites, though some of them at least have genuine leads. But with thousands - tens of thousands - of "voiceover talents" (aka anybody with a computer and a USB mic) sitting by their computers 24/7 ready to jump as soon as a lead notification comes through, the odds of your being in the first 20-30 auditions in the voice seekers inbox are slim.
Another type of scam I actually admire is the marketing brilliance of people like "Christian Carter." Who this really is nobody knows, but here's a guy who's got keywords figured out. He has not only purchased every keyword relevant to his topic - Miss Lonelyhearts - but he's purchased all the negative keywords about his topic! So if you Google "Christian Carter scam" or "Christian Carter dirtball," you will get a site - which looks for all the world like a real website that just happens to review his products - lauding Christian Carter's wonderful, helpful, insightful books and pamphlets.
But what Christian Carter really does is simply repeat the same few sentences over and over and over, ad infinitum, just varying the wording a little, and continuing to promise you the BIG SECRET to lasting love if you just keep reading. The BIG SECRET never comes, of course. But who cares? He's got you on a $30 a month "automatic" program that just keeps on arriving.
And very recently, a friend was reading through his emails, and shared one with me. He was told that a credit card of his was due to expire, and "had been converted to a cash account" in the "Bank of Benin." Because it was an actual credit card, he was tempted to click through and find out what was going on. "Stop!" I yelled at him. "Are you nuts? Why would your bank move a credit card to a cash account in another bank?"
Scammers like that count on us seeing a kernel of truth and becoming confused, wanting to find out what's going on, and momentarily dropping our normal skepticism, and making a dumb move. Similarly, we let greed, curiosity, prurience, even desperation, overcome our better judgement, and take us places in calmer moments we know we shouldn't go. Crooks have known this for centuries - digital technology has merely given them access to more of the innocent, unsuspecting, and gullible than ever before.
They're alive, well, and some are getting slightly more sophisticated.
One of the latest is the work at home online scam. This one is particularly pernicious because of our tight economy. So many people are out of work, so few jobs are to be had, and for each one those that are available, statistics indicate that about three workers are available. And since many of them aren't particularly appealing - retail and the like - the idea of working from home on an internet-based job suddenly sounds more intriguing that it might have a year or two ago.
Here's one that came to my attention not too long ago: Partner with P***. P*** tells us that for little or no effort, and for no investment from you, he will provide a highly desirable product, share with you his marketing secrets, hold your hand if necessary, and lead you into the promised land of online sales success.
Remember the Herbalife scandal of a few years ago? Welcome ba-ack. Not only are you expected to fork over $9.95 in "shipping and handling" to receive your "free" DVD that tells you all about how to receive and market this wonderful MLM (multi-level marketing) product, but you'll be signed up for a $30/month, hard to break contract with our friend P***, who is making all his money collecting $30 a month from people like you. Somewhere down the food chain someone is actually selling - and someone else presumably buying - the actual product. But the thousands-per-month that can be made can be made only by those who sign up other suckers to sell for them. Or better yet, to sign up other suckers.
Then there are sites like MiNeeds, aimed at writers. Here is another money-making scam aimed at a group of the great unemployed - people who may or may not technically be "writers," but who feel, why not supplement my unemployment while I look for work? The problem is, MiNeeds what is being called a "P2P" gimmick, or "Pay to Play." You pay them a fee, usually somewhere in the $30 a month ballpark, and they send you leads. Most of them are questionable, none of them ever come through. If they do, indeed, exist, someone always gets there before you. This is also true for most of the P2P voiceover sites, though some of them at least have genuine leads. But with thousands - tens of thousands - of "voiceover talents" (aka anybody with a computer and a USB mic) sitting by their computers 24/7 ready to jump as soon as a lead notification comes through, the odds of your being in the first 20-30 auditions in the voice seekers inbox are slim.
Another type of scam I actually admire is the marketing brilliance of people like "Christian Carter." Who this really is nobody knows, but here's a guy who's got keywords figured out. He has not only purchased every keyword relevant to his topic - Miss Lonelyhearts - but he's purchased all the negative keywords about his topic! So if you Google "Christian Carter scam" or "Christian Carter dirtball," you will get a site - which looks for all the world like a real website that just happens to review his products - lauding Christian Carter's wonderful, helpful, insightful books and pamphlets.
But what Christian Carter really does is simply repeat the same few sentences over and over and over, ad infinitum, just varying the wording a little, and continuing to promise you the BIG SECRET to lasting love if you just keep reading. The BIG SECRET never comes, of course. But who cares? He's got you on a $30 a month "automatic" program that just keeps on arriving.
And very recently, a friend was reading through his emails, and shared one with me. He was told that a credit card of his was due to expire, and "had been converted to a cash account" in the "Bank of Benin." Because it was an actual credit card, he was tempted to click through and find out what was going on. "Stop!" I yelled at him. "Are you nuts? Why would your bank move a credit card to a cash account in another bank?"
Scammers like that count on us seeing a kernel of truth and becoming confused, wanting to find out what's going on, and momentarily dropping our normal skepticism, and making a dumb move. Similarly, we let greed, curiosity, prurience, even desperation, overcome our better judgement, and take us places in calmer moments we know we shouldn't go. Crooks have known this for centuries - digital technology has merely given them access to more of the innocent, unsuspecting, and gullible than ever before.
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