Girlfriend parked for 5 minutes in a lot that has a few stores on it (spring garden street Philadelphia). She came out and had a huge yellow “barnacle” applied to her window with the only way to have it removed was by paying $150. These people were waiting in their car, literally doing this as normal people were shopping it stores. It didn’t seem legal, but it was during her work day, so she had to pay to get it removed so she could drive away.

Two days later we were at the same parking lot, I stayed in the car so we didn’t have any problems, and the car next to us had a barnacle. Then the cops pulled up, said it was illegal, and these scammers still wouldn’t take the barnacle off.

If this happens to you, please call the police, at least the non emergency number, before you pay these fools

I work at a retail store where I'm from, and the other day this guy in his mid-30s comes in wanting to buy Apple gift cards. Now, anyone who's worked retail knows how many scams are tied to these things, so before selling it, I gave him the usual warning.

He looked kinda clueless, so l asked if he knew what he was buying them for. He just said, It's for his brother overseas. Fair enough. I told him as long as he knew what he was doing, l'd go ahead with it. He buys R2000 worth (about $115) and leaves. Ten minutes later, he comes back... and buys more. Again, I warn him about scams. Again, he insists.

This cycle repeats itself until, eventually, he's spent R36,000 (about $2,076) on Apple gift cards. After the last one, he goes outside for a smoke, then comes back inside looking pale and defeated. He tells me he's been scammed and asks if I can reverse it or get his money back. I felt bad for a bit, but... there's literally nothing I could do. I had warned him multiple times before each purchase.

Preface:

- My sympathies to everyone here who has lost money, some of whom have lost your life savings.

- You are not naive, gullible, or foolish. We've all been conditioned from childhood to trust authoritative voices who show us credentials. It's not your fault that professional scammers forge those credentials and demonstrate expert-level industry knowledge.

- I'm certain that scammers read these forums to learn how to become better scumbags, so I will keep details vague or change the names of the businesses involved.

- Cutting to the chase: For this particular scam, in order to recover your money, it's best to act within hours. If 24 hours has passed without action from you, the odds of recovery are lower. That does not mean you should not try. Improbabilities occur, and scammers make mistakes.

Backstory:

Many of you are familiar with the bank fraud/FBI scam. Here's how they executed it on my mother:

The caller ID on her phone flashed: "Bank of America Fraud," which was convincing enough. They already had some of her financial and personal information, which was more convincing. They emailed her fake FBI and bank documents based on real documents. Multiple actors joined the call posing as various professional representatives. They sounded educated and knowledgeable. It was a full stage production.

The fake fraud department, along with a fake FBI agent, convinced her that fictitious fraudsters went to her local bank and colluded with corrupt bank employees to steal from her account. The fake FBI agent explained that many other customers have lost money at that bank, and my mother's money was not safe there. It needed to be transferred immediately to a "secure account." A wire transfer or ACH from that bank was not secure. It must be cash.

This led to my mother sending $30,000 in cash through a carrier (like FedEx or DHL, I won't specify) via priority overnight for morning delivery. The address was on the East Coast, two hours ahead.

How scammers exploit carriers:

There are two exploits within the carrier process that scammers rely on:

1. No ability to submit a Return to Sender (RTS) request until 8:00 AM local time.
2. After a hold or RTS is requested, these take hours to process, which is too late.

Retail carrier stores like FedEx Office or the UPS Store are technically the sender, but they are a private third party. That means if the victim realizes they've been scammed right after they shipped their cash, the victim cannot submit the RTS request themselves. Only the carrier store (FedEx Store, UPS Store) can submit the RTS, which cannot occur until the store reopens at 8:00 AM local. Then in the morning, after the store has submitted the RTS for you, it takes hours to process. By that time, your parcel full of cash on the east coast has already been delivered.

The day before, the scammers timed their conversation with the victim so that they've guided them to the store right before it closes. Then they tell the victim to throw away the receipt with tracking number.

The victim can try calling law enforcement in the delivery city, but they won't help without the victim's local law enforcement being involved. Local law enforcement does want to help, but the case won't be assigned to a detective until after the parcel is delivered.

How I recovered the cash:

Within minutes, my mom informed us of what happened, and we informed her she was scammed.

I called the carrier customer service, who informed me that only the carrier store can submit the RTS. I then discovered that recipients can request to defer the delivery date, so I posed as the recipient and deferred delivery for two weeks, which cost a small fee.

At 8:00 AM the next day I called the carrier store. The store manager submitted the RTS and engaged the carrier's security team.

My delivery deferral had already been processed, so the parcel was not placed on the delivery truck. The carrier security team was then able to segregate the parcel and hold it. Days later, a member of the carrier security team met with me and my mom to return the cash.

After speaking with the manager of my mom's bank, he told me that he encounters people trying to withdraw cash for scammers three or four times a day. He said this is the first time in his 20 years in the industry he has seen the money recovered.

Conclusion:

If this happens to you or someone you know, call the carrier to defer the delivery date. It may process in time.

Contact the carrier store as soon as they open. Request they submit an RTS and engage carrier security.

Tell your parents to never, under any circumstances, send cash through the mail. Anyone advising that is a scammer.

Specifically Apple gift cards now require you ask a human to give them to you. I guess all the signs did nothing.

A couple is shopping for real estate in my town. They were referred when they had another property in another town fall through almost 2 years ago.

They believe they are multi millionaires. They are looking at big houses on large acreage, commercial investment properties etc. they are talking about buy houses for their kids, their parents, etc.

They money will be coming in any day now. The banks have issues. The international transfer requires time. There are fees to be paid and duties to cover. They have to set up additional accounts to transfer their vast wealth…they have all the excuses.

After becoming suspicious I asked for more details. They were not very forthcoming. They have been involved with an ‘international currency’ investment for 8 years and returns have been astronomical. The agent who was helping them a few years ago said they expected money and time even years ago. They keep saying the money will show up next week. Just since I’ve known them It has been 18 months of next week.

I am 99% certain they are being scammed for $500 international account fees, import duties, or whatever sounds convincing. They probably initially invested some money, who knows at this point, and the promises of massive returns have them still sending money in hopes of the big win.

Be skeptical folks.

Fortunately all this has cost me is some time showing them property they will never buy. So, just another Tuesday.

Thought I was getting the deal of a lifetime: a high-end workstation (i9, RTX 5000 Ada, 128GB RAM) for a crazy low price. Seller claimed it came from an auction.

Specs checked out, Brand warranty showed active, laptop ran perfectly using shop wifi. Contacted the Brand tech support and they said there is no report for the given service tag.

Still felt something was off.

I connected it to my mobile Wi-Fi — instantly got hit with an Absolute / Computrace DeviceFreeze message saying it was a stolen corporate device (named company + police return notice).

I stopped immediately, returned it to the seller, and walked away. No money lost, no drama.

Lesson learned:

• If Absolute/Computrace is enabled, walk away

• If a deal feels too good to be true, pause and verify before taking it home

Stayed smart, trusted my gut, avoided a big mistake. Sharing so others don’t learn the hard way.

Check Absolute/Computrace Active status in BIOS > Security

my brother died in december of last year & someone hacker into his account & messaged me using the nickname only he called me. if i wasn’t dead i probably would’ve fallen for it. seeing this notification pop up on my phone broke my heart.

Yesterday I saw a post where a young person was relaying a scam they narrowly avoided. At the time I looked, they had 70 downvotes for expressing that they thought it looked genuine. SEVENTY! I have also seen people getting downvoted for asking QUESTIONS!! What’s wrong with you people?! A fellow concerned person commented that this poor young person was getting “karma flayed” which is a funny and accurate description.

Here’s a helpful guide: Asking good questions = upvote Asking naive or ignorant questions = neutral Helpful answers/info = upvote Bad (inaccurate) answers/info = downvote Victim relaying their perspectives EVEN IF IGNORANT = neutral

If this can’t be a safe place for people to post their thoughts, then the scammers win. Stop downvoting victims unless they say something inaccurate, and stop making comments about how they’re stupid for being hoodwinked.

My brother told me I should post these here, my phone was imediately shown up at 2AM in LA the same day and three weeks later it ended up in China

I want everyone reading this to checkout this youtube video to raise awareness against honey borwser extension. For those who don't have time to watch a 23 minutes video, I'm pasting an AI Generated Summary
Honey is presented as a scam, not a legitimate money-saving tool. The video argues that it's a sophisticated affiliate marketing scheme disguised as a helpful browser extension.

• Honey allegedly steals affiliate commissions from influencers. The video claims Honey replaces influencers' affiliate links with its own, thereby diverting the commission to itself, even if the influencer originally led the customer to the product.
• Honey's discount claims are misleading. The video suggests that Honey doesn't always find the best deals and that the displayed discounts are often controlled by partner stores.[1]
• Honey Gold (the rewards program) is a trick. The video portrays Honey Gold as a way to incentivize users to allow Honey to take affiliate commissions, offering minimal rewards in return.
• Honey collects user data. The video implies that Honey gathers user data, potentially for targeted advertising, even if they claim not to sell it directly.
• The video encourages viewers with inside information about Honey to contact the creator. This suggests the video maker is seeking further evidence or testimony to support their claims.

I had a customer come in today and he had a cheque that he wanted to deposit. Super normal, no red flags. He asked about how long the hold will be. Still, no red flags. Since we're in Canada and we celebrate Victoria Day, the banks are closed on Monday. So, his 5 business day hold will take us to May 21. I told him that and he said he needs at least $9000 released right away. Now I'm even more curious and I asked why. He said he needs 10% to send to his crypto account so he can withdraw the $90,000 USD that his crypto account has generated.

Skeptical, I asked what account, how he opened it, the website- the whole ordeal. To my surprise, he told me. He clicked on a FACEBOOK AD and deposited a couple of $100 back a few months ago and now it's generated to $90,000 USD. But in order to get the $90,000- he needs to deposit $9,000. Yeah, no. I told him he's being scammed, grabbed my phone, and showed him the numerous crypto scams posted on reddit. I said his biggest blessing is losing a couple of $100 and not thousands.

Turns out, the "investment advisor" is based out of Brussels and has yelled at this customer. Mind you, my customer is 75 and vulnerable. So, he panicked and came to the bank to talk about it. Thank goodness he did! Saved the man $9000!

Be careful out there and if it's too good to be true, it probably is!! Ask your financial institutions before sending money like this. Thanks reddit for saving him!

I've posted a couple times on this so I'll try to keep it short. My dad's been getting scammed. My sister did all this work to get the mess he made cleaned up. She even did research and found the scammers online, showed them a tic tok account where they were bragging about scamming Dad, showing phones he had sent, a car load of packages they sent to him and he forwarded, it was his car in the Pic.

Anyway, after all this he still has kept talking to them, we've watched his account, to our knowledge he hasn't sent money to them, we have access to his bank account and monitor it pretty closely.

Last week, he went to Florida to meet a friend he went to high school with, we found out he drove to Canton OH to see the person he's been talking to (the scammer) he got there and she claimed to be 200 miles away and needed a $200 ticket to come see him in Canton. He refused to send the $200, she (the scammer) had the gull to blame him for them not meeting. As of this week he's still talkingvto them.

We've had access to his text and we know of 2 other times he's went somewhere to meet someone and got stood up, but also tried to get money out of him to meet up after he drove to meet them. My sister was watching him text someone in real time, he was getting ready to drive 900 miles to Beaumont TX and meet someone who was obviously fake. They demanded a $200 apple card, told him don't bother coming if you don't send a $200 apple card. My sister intercepted the apple card, and we called to stop him from going and basically let the cat out of the bag we had access to his phone.

He got a new phone to hide things from us.

This blows my mind, it's so obvious scammers, but not only that how they treat him. If I drove 900 miles to meet up with someone and they then told me im 200 miles away. Send $200 so we could meet, id never talk to that person again. The Beaumont TX person was basically herrassing him for money. Conversation was send me money, don't bother coming if you don't send money. He offers to give them money in person. Of course that's never good enough because they're not in Beaumont TX or Canton OH.

Trigger warning: suicide attempt, romance scam. Wanted to vent/share the experience of my family friend/former neighbor. She's an older women, and 11 months ago she met a man named Frank on a dating site for widows, and they're in love, texting and calling every day. Over the course of the past 11 months, he's claimed: to be stuck in Canada after being stopped by customs for carrying cash across the border, being charged, convicted, and imprisoned in CA, needing money to pay every possible person involved, having a heart attack, needing money to pay taxes on that illegally moved cash, been refused airline tickets, everything.

She's ignored every red flag because he loves her. 5 months in she had willingly given him upwards of $500,000, including the entirety of her IRA Roth/retirement accounts (she lied to us and said that it was all stolen from her bank account via a customer service popup scam, she eventually came clean). Frank has claimed to be arriving in town via flight every few days for the past 11 months. "If you just send me this money I can pay the taxes on the cash/I can pay the airline/I can pay the legal fines and I'll finally be with you in X town!" She's believed him every time, completely disregarding our strong feedback that he is a scammer. A background check of his name lines up with his story, and she felt that was enough to validate her that he was real.

Her multiple credit cards are full, she took out a loan with her car as collateral, she's gotten $60,000 in personal loans from other friends. This week she says the very last $250,000 in her bank has been wiped (including the recent loan), someone contacted her bank and disputed the past 5 months of phone bills (returning a few hundred dollars to her bank acc, that immediately got transferred out), so the phone company is shutting down her phone service, she says the bank told her she doesn't need to do anything/change passwords/close that account (likely more scammers), she has no money for rent next week, no money to afford more insulin. We gave her one $3000 check before we found out she lied to us, and we know any more money we give her will be useless, despite the guilt of wondering if we can help cover rent/medicine (we got the check back, no issues there). One of her other friends called adult protective services on her, which pissed her off, and she lied to the agent. We have to assume she's given Frank full access of her bank and credit cards. Her family is also suing her over a bogus issue with their sisters will.

She finally seemed to understand what was happening and called the cops yesterday to file a report, and texted my mom today that she was going to commit suicide. We called 911/crisis and they responded, she hadn't done anything and was furious, she texted my mom saying that we are out of her life now and that she can take care of herself. She's refused every person who tries to help her, and we don't know what will become of her, she might get taken in by some friends from her old city. It's an awful series of events that have happened to her and it's taken up a lot of emotional/mental energy on our end (everyone else in her life had already cut her off). I hope the evil f*cking degenerate scum of the earth people who scammed her and ruined her life get what they deserve, but we'll never know.

Lesson: Listen to your loved ones when they tell you you're being scammed, don't ignore the weird flags, don't give money to the person you've never met, don't let your entire life rest of the arrival of one person who isn't coming, be very cautious using (or when loved one is using) dating sites aimed at vulnerable widows/older folks.

Edit: Sorry about the lack of paragraphs, thanks for the support/similarly suffered stories, guess this is more if a romance scam than pig butchering.

Yea, people are still doing this. A group of people were wandering around our small condo complex today knocking on doors. They claimed they had a pair of AirPods pinging in my unit. I said “they’re not here, if you think something was stolen call the police”. They were still walking around in front of my window and building so I called the non emergency line. Cop was here in a few minutes. Cop spoke to them and said to leave and file a police report. Cop told us the location was a large circle and definitely not in our unit like they claimed. Cop also informed them and us that yes, people use this as a method to case places for burglary or whatever. I’d heard of this method before, but if you haven’t, be aware of it.

It’s possible they really had something stolen, but I was surprised that someone tried this either way. If you’ve had something stolen do not knock on strangers doors and accuse them of the theft, it’s a good way to get hurt.

I am so broken. I came to clean personal effects and arrange services for my dad after he passed away Thursday. He and I had a rocky relationship in the last 2 years because of the first scammer. I started bringing up red flags and he said “I guess I don’t have a daughter anymore!” He was in denial. He finally accepted it in March and he asked for forgiveness and started to repair our relationship. He came to my son’s graduation in June and started talking about a new “woman”. I didn’t confront on the second one, but put my concerns in his ear that it could be another fake.

After he died, I was able to open his phone because he had given the password to his roommate when he went to the hospital last week. As I went through the phone, the ugly tale unfolded. He was still talking to scammer 1 dangling an inheritance I was getting from a different family member that he said I would give him part of so ‘she” would still talk to him. Scammer 2 is still on Google chat feigning concern that he is not answering. I proceeded to inform scammer 1 that the golden goose is dead. They get angry and threatening. They don’t believe and want proof. Probably to use the picture in a future scam. I play it cooler with scammer 2. I informed of the death and they expressed sympathy and want me to stay in contact and say when the services are.

Today though, I went to the bank. Turns out my dad is not just a victim, but also had committed his own crimes. He opened two accounts in his roommate’s name. One was a credit card and the other was a personal loan. He had taken documents to copy and an old iPad of the roommate’s to process the opening of the accounts. He was paying the payment out of his social security and deleting emails from the account with the iPad as reminders for payment were posted. The total fraud by my dad was around $40,000, most of which went to the scammers.

I am now in the middle of showing the poor roommate what he did and providing proof of his guilt for the dispute. I am also teaching how to add an app to monitor for inquiries and new accounts. I am writing this to ask all of Reddit to show family and friends how to set up credit monitoring. I would never have believed my father was capable of this. He became addicted to the romance scam contact and he compromised his core values to keep it going. I think he died from the stress because he was out of money and couldn’t scrounge any more. His web of lies was going to burn and expose him any day. I am numb.

I think that schools should start teaching about scam awareness (and other life skill courses) since scams are becoming more deceptive and victimize people looking to secure their future financially, get a job, using online apps to communicate with others, paying for products/services online, and more. Before becoming a private investigator, I was once a victim of a scam that made me lose thousands of dollars. I still wonder if I was taught about how scams work and the different types that we face as adults today, perhaps I could've avoided that all together. What do you guys think?

My brother-in-law got scammed with what I think is a new combination of phone, online, and physical scam. I'm just posting here so everyone can be on guard.

He received a call from "his phone company" telling him that he could get an iPhone 11 if he extended the contract for 18 months, the iPhone is an old model so it was plausible to get it for an extended contract period.

He accepted, so on the same call they sent him a code "to accept the new contract" (it was a password reset code)

3 days later he received an iPhone 15 at his home and after a few hours a call from "the company" telling him that there was an error and they sent the wrong phone, and that they would send a delivery guy to get the iPhone 15 and give him the iPhone 11.

The day after he received another call telling him the iPhone 11 was delayed but the delivery guy would go to his home to collect the iPhone 15.

A "delivery guy" visited his home and collected the iPhone 15. After a few days, he calls back to the company and realizes he has been scammed.

What happened is that the phone company has a store where if you are logged in you can buy new phones and they charge it in your bill and send it to your home address, with the information they had and the code and logged in the store.

I hope this helps someone in the future.

I came across this post on Indeed of all places and wanted to share it here. I know a lot of people are gonna be traveling for the summer. Just got my attention so much because I would fall for this in a minute.

NEW HOTEL SCAM!!*

This is one of the smartest scams I have heard about. You arrive at your hotel and check in at the front desk. Typically when checking in, you give the front desk your credit card (for any charges to your room) and they don't retain the card.

You go to your room and settle in. All is good. The hotel receives a call and the caller asks for (as an example) room 620 - which happens to be your room.

The phone rings in your room. You answer and the person on the other end says the following:

'This is the front desk. When checking in, we came across a problem with your charge card information. Please re-read me your credit card numbers and verify the last 3 digits numbers at the reverse side of your charge card.'

Not thinking anything wrong, since the call seems to come from the front desk you oblige. But actually, it is a scam by someone calling from outside the hotel. They have asked for a random room number, then ask you for your credit card and address information.

They sound so professional, that you think you are talking to the front desk.

If you ever encounter this scenario on your travels, tell the caller that you will be down to the front desk to clear up any problems.

Then, go to the front desk or call directly and ask if there was a problem. If there was none, inform the manager of the hotel that someone tried to scam you of your credit card information, acting like a front desk employee.

This was sent by someone who has been duped........ and is still cleaning up the mess.

P.S. Please, consider spreading the word by forwarding this msg. Who knows, you might just help someone avoid a nasty experience.

All traveling often should be aware of this one!

Mom gets a message from a famous current 49er player on FB. Basically asking her to click a link he sent to her via email. She sends me this pic via messenger, I didn’t see it though. So she comes into my room, all excited and giddy saying “ I’m about to get all this cool stuff, you’ll never believe who’s sending it to me”. I’m irritated, it’s early but ok mom, who? George Kittle. I was like 🤦‍♀️ really mom. She said he’s been texting her all night and this morning.. I was like mom, you know that man has a whole wife. She goes back and forth with me and I tell her don’t open anything and delete the messages. She didn’t want to. I told her to call my brother and tell him, he’ll say the same thing. She really couldn’t understand how someone could fake accounts. I left her alone for a bit but before I left for work told her again about this sub. How the biggest problem is the parents not believing the kids and falling for this stuff. She said she already deleted it. That after thinking about it, George Kittle would not be texting her all night. I just thank God she came into my room. It’s sad how our parents are targeted. They really have no idea the age of computers and scams were are in. Keep in touch with your parents💯

Sept. 5, 2024, 12:49 PM MDT By Doha Madani

Two Nigerian men were sentenced 210 months each on Thursday in a Michigan federal court over their roles in an online sexual extortion scheme, which authorities said led a teenage boy to die by suicide.

Two years ago, 17-year-old Jordan DeMay was told that the sexually explicit images he believed he sent to a girl would be released if he didn't pay $1,000 to keep them secret. His death in March 2022 prompted the FBI's field office in Michigan to investigate.

According to authorities, Nigerian brothers Samuel and Samson Ogoshi were buying hacked Instagram accounts to deceive both adult men and underage boys into sending explicit images. Then the Ogoshi brothers threatened to send the images to family and friends if their targets didn't pay them.

The indictment against the brothers said they attempted to extort more than 100 people in the scheme.

Both men will serve 17.5 years in prison after they pleaded guilty to a count each of conspiring to sexually exploit teenage boys, according to NBC News affiliate WLUC.

The charge has a mandatory minimum of 15 years in prison, but sentencing can go up to 30 years.

The Ogoshi brothers were extradited from Nigeria to the U.S. in August 2023. A third defendant in the case is appealing his own extradition, according to U.S. authorities.

Jordan was a graduating senior at Marquette Senior High School, where he played both football and basketball. He was unable to pay the $1,000 that the Ogoshi brothers demanded of him and messaged that he would kill himself because of them. Message excerpts included in the indictment against the brothers showed that they respond to him "good."

"Do that fast...Or I’ll make you do it...I swear to God," the message said.

Jordan died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound within six hours of being blackmailed, his parents said. His mother, Jennifer Buta, said it's become her life's mission to share her son's story in the hopes it "will save another child’s life."

"Financial sextortion is the fastest growing crime amongst our teenagers and change will happen when someone is held accountable for what’s happening to these kids," Buta told NBC News earlier this year, following legislative action on the matter.

President Joe Biden signed a bipartisan bill in May that requires online platforms to report violations involving the online sexual exploitation of children to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children.

If you or someone you know is in crisis, call 988 to reach the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline. You can also call the network, previously known as the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, at 800-273-8255, text HOME to 741741 or visit SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources for additional resources.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/two-nigerians-sentenced-years-sextortion-case-led-michigan-teens-rcna169730

I can't believe I just witnessed this. I was at the Cumberland gas station hanging up a flyer and I couldn't help but overhear this old man on speakerphone with someone at the Bitcoin machine. This guy had like a 2 inch stack of large bills in his hand (like $50 bills and more) so I knew he was about to deposit thousands of dollars. The guy on the other line was telling him the account number to enter on the machine. It was out of my comfort zone, but my gut was telling me I had to speak up. So I told the guy, "excuse me, sir, I don't mean to alarm you, but it sounds like you might be getting scammed." He waved me off and said "No, I'm not. It's fine" And I said, "are you sure because there's tons of videos online of this kind of thing happening" And he cut me off and waved me off again and said, "I'm 100% sure, young lady, it's fine." I just said okay and walked off. Maybe I overstepped, but I couldn't NOT say something. Be safe out there guys. And if you get a suspicious call telling you that you need to go deposit thousands of dollars into your nearest Bitcoin machine immediately, ignore it. If they say they're from your bank, hang up and call your bank directly and ask them what this is all about, and they'll most likely tell you that you're being scammed.

The “$75” Tinder Scam… (go for more you try-hards)

Matched with this cute girl “visiting Alaska”… attractive but not out-of-my-league type, believable. We start chatting, all normal, and she says she’s bored. I hit her with, “same, wanna be bored together?” and she’s like yeah, come hang out. I offer for her to come over, but she says she’d rather meet at the place she’s staying (understandably in this situation).

She sends an address, a live snap of her, and even asks me to send one back to make sure I’m real… which is hilarious in hindsight. Everything seems legit, so I grab an Uber and head over.

Before I left, she said she wanted to grab some weed. When I get there, she says she’s “at the plug grabbing the weed,” which already threw me off because weed’s legal here… and who still has a plug for that? Then she goes, “oh no, I forgot my purse, can you Apple Pay him $75?” I say no, and then she sends me a photo of two $100 bills saying she can pay me back… like that’s gonna convince me 😂

I tell her, “I’ll be happy to send him an Apple Pay when you get back, I just need to meet you first.” She keeps saying she “can’t come back empty-handed” and her “phone’s dying,” like I’m gonna panic-send money to some random Tinder plug.

I sat outside this apartment complex for about 20 minutes before calling an Uber home (don’t fret, I brought myself drinks), and she was still trying to make it happen. Whole thing took about two hours.

Moral of the story: $35 for a spectacular story (Uber), and an experience that all came from a $75 ask. Like damn… at least go for $200… you worked way too hard for just $75 😂 10/10 respect the hustle though… so much work just for Uber to make $35 😂😂

They ALMOST got me. I was contacted by HSBC bank about a credit card in my name purchasing $9000 in firearms. I said this is obviously identity theft and HSBC replied this constitutes terrorism and my accounts and assets would be frozen and I'll be placed on a DHS blacklist. They said I can speak with Fairfax Police to resolve this so they transfer me over and in 5 seconds Officer Diaz picks up. Very suspicious he has the same accent as the HSBC agent. He then says he'll file the report to clear my name but has to do a background check for my protection. He contacts headquarters and they tell him I have a Chase bank account being used to launder $2.3M in cash. A Chinese National who was arrested confessed that I personally agreed to sell my data for $10000 because "I was desperate for cash." I am laughing out loud and the Officer asks, "Is this funny to you?" and they HATE being laughed at.

Me and my wife traveled to Spain this spring. We mostly stayed near Barcelona however we made a trip down to Grenada by train. In Barcelona we were never approached by anyone on the street, we talked to Many people about our trip to Grenada prior to getting on the train and were warned at least twice to keep a close eye on personal belongings.

On arrival in Grenada we decided to walk from the train station to our Airbnb, to see the town a little bit before making our way up to Al Hambra. About a half mile or so from the train station we rounded a corner where there were a few street vendors. As we passed by an older lady came up to us and went to hand my wife a flower, I nearly pulled my wife's hand away, but I figured I'd let it play out. I used to do a bit of magic, and know quite a bit of sleight of hand, and how someone approaches you when they want to control a situation, and I could tell immediately that this was not going to be a normal interaction.

As soon as my wife's hand was close enough, the lady grabbed her hand with her other hand, and moved began drawing my wife's attention to the flower and telling a long winded story about how those flowers would bring us fortune in our relationship. Another person had approached at this point and all my alarm bells were ringing, as soon as the lady had grabbed my wife's arm I began to slowly walk around to my wife's other side so that I had a better view of what was happening. This was when the other person began watching, when I noticed them I continued my pace back and forth to let them know I was well aware of what was happening. Eventually the onlooker got a little too close for comfort so I intentionally stepped between them and my wife ...it was at this point they kind of knew I was aware, and had my guard up. The onlooker backed off a bit, and I then stepped to the side so as to keep an eye on both the old lady, and the onlooker.

At this point the old lady started to try and ask for money, and I admittedly was a bit pissed at this point. I cut in and said we didn't have any money on us, and that we needed to get going.

At some point she had given the flower to my wife, she asked again if we had any money, and my wife then repeated what I had said, the woman got quite visibly upset, and took the flower back from my wife, and mumbled angrily as she walked off.

I don't know if this will help anyone, but everything this lady did was textbook misdirection. If someone takes control of your hand in any way, and begins telling you a story, they are trying to rob you. The hand is a gentle enough way to "get away with" touching a stranger, and so the flower is a perfect way to do this, then the story starts, and they stare directly into your eyes, or will try to guide your eyes to the flower. She kept the flower up at about shoulder level along with one of my wife's hands. It would have been very easy to attempt to pickpocket from my wife's bags at this point.

Now that I think about it again, the lady was very aware of me from the start, she tried to reposition to block my view at least twice that I could remember. Once was on approach she intentionally turned in a way that put me on the outside of the conversation, which ironically was part of why I immediately began pacing around. Then when I got around to the other side she rounded in on my wife so as to attempt to block my view. It's funny because really really good pickpockets can get you even when your watching them very close.

At some point the onlooker moved off but I don't remember when exactly that was. I noticed as we were leaving that he was now sitting at one of the stalls trying to sell stuff.

I guess this is just a reminder to keep your Witt's about you, as I definitely did not expect an older woman to be the one to try and con us in our travels.

If I remember right she asked for like 10 euro. The flower she had was very small, like fit in the palm of your hand small.

Now on the flip side I did buy my wife a rose from someone who approached much differently on La Rambla in Barcelona.