400 million reasons to be wary

BY ALAN CLARKE

The Friday before last was a good day. At 9.17am, my cellphone started buzzing. That in itself is rare enough to be of note.

I've not exactly embraced the technology. Call me a Luddite. A dinosaur maybe.

I do have a handful of "friends" on Facebook, fewer still on Myspace and three alleged followers on Twitter. I've been slightly more open to these online versions of social media, as I can control them.

The ubiquitous cellphone, on the other hand, is another matter. It offers the potential for permanent attachment to the office, turning a typical 10 or 11-hour day into a 24/7 bind. Worse, the office doesn't even supply my phone, or keep it topped up. Talk about cheap.

So my ancient, hand-me-down, 20-message-limit Nokia is often left neglected on the office desk, on the table at home or in a pocket somewhere. If I have it with me, chances are the battery's flatter than road kill. Or, if it does happen to buzz, I'll hit the wrong button and disconnect whoever might be calling – from a potential network of about seven.

Anyway, 9.17 the other Friday a text landed. Whereas many people find 10,000 texts a week insufficient, a limit of one or two would probably be a comfortable fit for me. Vodafone will not get rich out of this customer.

I had won, the text said, 400 million US dollars. To collect, I simply had to log into a Yahoo account and the money would be mine. Like every computer user, I've been spammed for years – I could have had a willy large enough to be detected on the Google Earth satellite, a doctorate in nuclear physics, more hair, less weight, the Russian callgirl of my dreams, a cyber-fling with Kelly from f@#*book or just about anything else a desperate man might desire.

But up until 9.17 the other Friday, I was a phone-spam virgin.

It got me wondering about the sort of people who send out such unsophisticated attempts to trap the unwary.

Unlike email, the text I received – and of course, immediately deleted – had to have cost a few cents to send. Multiply that by the hundreds or thousands of hits needed in order to find anyone silly enough to respond and there is potential for a significant cost up front – and surely with little prospect of a return.

Most scams – big or small, based in Nigeria or right next door – rely initially on greed, need or some other basic desire. Victims usually enter tentatively, but with a flutter of hope in their hearts. Implausibly large prizes are offered, often for a very modest initially outlay.

The perpetrators of any largescale fraud in Western countries generally accept the possibility they might get caught and, worst case, do a few months' time in a minimum security jail. The smart ones salt away the money they have ripped off from the unwitting. They have no assets in their name. They leave no records – just trails of broken dreams in their wake.

They often believe themselves to be incredibly smart, and see their predatory behaviour as a birthright of their superior intelligence.

A common tactic is to evoke the names of big noters in the business world or community. If they can allude to the notion that a top-notch lawyer or businessman has checked them out thoroughly and is endorsing the scheme by putting money into it, their credibility gets a significant boost.

They count on people staying on board for longer than seems reasonable, firstly out of greed; then out of desperation. Another common driver among victims is fear of admitting, even to themselves, that they have been sucked in – meaning they might not be as clever as they thought they were.

I've read harrowing accounts of people who have been fooled by what appears – in the telling – to be transparently obvious frauds. Their stories are remarkably similar to those who have plunged deep into gambling addictions. They read like nightmarish descents into madness.

The basic Nigerian-type spam scam – such as was behind my recent $400m "win" – is much less sophisticated. I really cannot see how anyone would be so stupid as to be sucked in by such an obvious and clumsy con-job.

The stories behind such plots are generally totally implausible: a general has discovered millions in a vault in Iraq and needs a clean Western bank account to launder it through – just send, say $100, to facilitate access to the account and he'll share his riches with you. The descendent of an African chief has precious stones to smuggle. A widower wants to migrate to New Zealand to be with the lonely and desperate internet dating woman of his dreams, but is stuck in transit and just needs a bit of coinage to get himself out of a temporary passport or visa misunderstanding. Whatever!

I have a number of Chinese friends who seem challenged by our number system. In talking of a $300,000 house, they might throw up all sorts of wild numbers; anything from $30 million down.

This suggests to me that my mystery benefactor similarly might be unclear about how ridiculous his "hook" sounded. Perhaps something was lost in translation.

Unfortunately, I guess we can expect such ploys to become increasingly sophisticated.

Everything evolves – and these phishing trips, scams, spams and the technology they use in sending them out on will inevitably do so too.

I wonder how many people have been sucked in enough to send, say, $10 to a collect an overseas lottery prize they have never had a ticket in before realising their mistake.

That would probably be an acceptable price to pay for experience and wisdom. Sadly, for some people, the same wising up process has cost them considerably more.

We've all heard the fraud squad mantra: if it sounds too good to be true then it probably is. The other line, about not gambling with money you can't afford to lose is equally pertinent.

It's always sad to hear of people, however sane and rational they might appear, who suppress their doubts and find themselves unwitting contributors to fraudsters' grand designs.

- © Fairfax NZ News