Help. My mom made a huge mistake on FB

[mikester]

Considering google/FB/et al (FANG) collect money from scammers paying to get their "services" advertised, that means FANG companies are profiting from crime.

You can't do any google search these days without getting tons of hits from fake websites with your exact search term words in their links which link to completely unrelated sites. The only way these companies get top page results is that they are paying for google ad words.

Basically scammers pay google and FB to advertise their scams, then these tech companies takes their cut from the proceeds of crime and they say "oh so sorry, how terrible for you. We will implement new AI to help find a solution to the problem"

I think FB and Google should be forced to re-imburse victims of cyber crime that were scammed by using FANG services.

 

[Torvy]

What can this scammer do with the security number?

They can establish credit using their name and your number...I know, it shouldn't be possible....They can also divert SS payments to another location or method.

Eddie, my wife is much younger than your mom, but she fell for a scam, too. It is a serious pain. Our primary cc just got hacked again. No financial risk, but a PITA to change things.

 

[Jstpssng]

That sucks. Hopefully you can get things shut down before the guy takes too much from her. It was a mistake, at lest she wasn't broadcating it on national television like this guy was. LifeLock CEO's Identity Stolen 13 Times

 

[Jims1025R]

Hey Eddie, I hope this works out well for your family, it's great that your mom has your caring help. I have nothing to add to the good foregoing advice, other than my voice of empathy. I've pretty well given up on Facebook, and am now much more discerning as to which websites I visit at all. It's less stressful to not worry about what my friends are doing than to have to worry about what my enemies are doing! So now I phone my friends and family, and chat with them instead! I took up duties volunteer moderating an active aviation chat group, and cannot believe the junk and scam posts I now have to deal with - there is so much internet junk out there!

So I hardly feel critical of elderly people who should just be enjoying their lives, who miss recognizing a scam pointed at them.

 

[newbury]

Thanks for posting Eddie. Makes us more aware of the scum of the earth.

 

[ronjhall]

Is your Mom using a cellphone? If she is. Make sure it has all calls blocked that are not in her contact list. If FB Messenger was from someone she knows. They were hacked.

 

[ArtMech]

I'm sorry, Eddie it has happened to your Mom. Hope all will be Ok.

The scammers usually need fast money. But to do this they need to get the acceptance of a person they are going to steal from.

I was in the similar situation, when was looking to purchase a container. I've got an invoice with a prompt to make quick wire transfer. The amount for a brand new (!) 40' container was a little bit above €3000 with delivery included. The invoice to be prepared was the reason to get my personal data from me.
I passed the data, but didn't make a transfer. Later found out this invoice came to me from the scammer.

Now don't transfer money to unknown person if even much required!

 

[prichard]

Some good advice here. Hopefully you took action quickly enough that no harm comes.

One other action to be safe in the future, for account security don't use any real maiden name. This is often asked, but it is just to verify what's on file. Use a city name or teacher's name or something. Mother's maiden name 8s too easy to access these days with all the online genealogy info.

 

[Oaktree]

One other action to be safe in the future, for account security don't use any real maiden name. This is often asked, but it is just to verify what's on file. Use a city name or teacher's name or something. Mother's maiden name 8s too easy to access these days with all the online genealogy info.

Agreed on that (or really any of the pre-programmed "security" questions...any of which could be figured out without much effort). Just make sure you keep a file somewhere of the fake answers.
Some companies allow you to create your own security question, I wish everyone did. This way you can have a question that only you would know the answer to.

 

[Spindifferent]

Add the IRS to your list:

Identity Theft Central | Internal Revenue Service

Identity Protection PIN (IP PIN) frequently asked questions.

www.irs.gov