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[frustratedearthmother]

Ohhhh - that makes sense. I mean, I guess if you're a scammer it makes sense to think that there are honest people who would send money back, lol. Thanks for clarifying that.

 

[Hinotori]

I've coached Mom on about every scam I could think of after she fell for the ad clickbait scam "We are from Microsoft. Your computer has illegal content on it. Call us at ___-___-____ or the police will arrest you. They tried to get her to click things on her computer that would let them remote in. Mom isn't good with computers. She also freaks out easily and turned her internet off halfway through her talk with them. They got frustrated and told her they would call back in an hour after she got the internet back up.

She immediately called me all freaked out. I told her it was a scam. I couldn't ascertain if she'd downloaded anything and told her to have my brother check it over since he lives there.

When they called back she told them her daughter knew how to take care of it and who to call. They hung up.

She's been freaked by scam phone calls before left on her answering machine. If she doesn't know a number she doesn't answer anymore and has me check it online.

She's pretty good at calling me for anything out of the ordinary now. My younger brother has her computer set up so he can just remote in and fix things now as well.

He's IT and good at what he does, but doesn't explain things well or simply enough. I'm much better at understanding how to use things and find accurate information so even he asks me to find info he's having trouble with on Google.

 

[Hinotori]

You can download apps that will spoof phone numbers. Now granted most have backdoors built in so the scammer who created it can steal Your info off you phone.

With VOIP and computers it isn't hard for anyone to spoof a phone number.

Heck I've had calls that came up as coming from my house.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

They are pretty sophisticated in some cases... my MIL is bad about falling for online scams. She really falls for the one that says - we have detected a virus on your computer – call this number. Gets her every time... she has finally gotten to the point where she doesn’t even use her computer anymore. It’s a good thing.

 

[FarmerJamie]

Yep, wife is dealing with her Daddy on this right now. He is a good soul.

I despise scammers

 

[Britesea]

Great Idea, @Lazy Gardener

 

[NH Homesteader]

Oh my gosh, that's fantastic! I've never gotten a scammer on CL before.

 

[Hinotori]

Yeahhh. That's classic scam. Then they will send more than asked for and want you to just send them the extra back as cash.

 

[tortoise]

There's a reason why scammers are obvious! Weeds out the responses so they're not wasting time grooming people who aren't going to fall for it.

 

[NH Homesteader]

It's so sad, we would have to ask people if they knew the person who wrote them a check. And there were definitely some people (mostly elderly) that did not understand what we were saying. So we would flag the check and put some crazy long hold on it, and the security man got it to deal with. Must have been a fun job for him. Not.