GreenDragon
Well-Known Member
I wanted to make a post about this as my parents were hit with the scam this morning. As many of us have elderly family and friends I feel it's important to remind them about this scam that targets this age group frequently.
Some jerk called my Mother this morning and pretended to be one of my sons. He was partnered with another scammer pretending to be an attorney (a family friend!). The pitch was my "son" was in jail for an auto accident and needed $30,000 to get out of jail. They were very good and my Mother was convinced she had talked to my son. Thank goodness they were upset enough to call me anyway to verify the problem. Needless to say, they were very upset. Thankfully, they did not lose any money. These scammers are so good my Mother would not believe it was a scam until I was able to tell her I had talked to my son and he was fine, he was at work, and absolutely not in jail.
www.ncoa.org
The grandparent scam
The grandparent scam is so simple and so devious because it uses one of older adults’ most reliable assets, their hearts.
Scammers will place a call to an older person and when the mark picks up, they will say something along the lines of: “Hi Grandma, do you know who this is?” When the unsuspecting grandparent guesses the name of the grandchild the scammer most sounds like, the scammer has established a fake identity without having done a lick of background research.
Once “in,” the fake grandchild will usually ask for money to solve some unexpected financial problem (overdue rent, payment for car repairs, etc.), to be paid via Western Union or MoneyGram, which don’t always require identification to collect. At the same time, the scam artist will beg the grandparent “please don’t tell my parents, they would kill me.”
While the sums from such a scam are likely to be in the hundreds, the very fact that no research is needed makes this a scam that can be perpetrated over and over at very little cost to the scammer.
Some jerk called my Mother this morning and pretended to be one of my sons. He was partnered with another scammer pretending to be an attorney (a family friend!). The pitch was my "son" was in jail for an auto accident and needed $30,000 to get out of jail. They were very good and my Mother was convinced she had talked to my son. Thank goodness they were upset enough to call me anyway to verify the problem. Needless to say, they were very upset. Thankfully, they did not lose any money. These scammers are so good my Mother would not believe it was a scam until I was able to tell her I had talked to my son and he was fine, he was at work, and absolutely not in jail.
The National Council on Aging
The grandparent scam
The grandparent scam is so simple and so devious because it uses one of older adults’ most reliable assets, their hearts.
Scammers will place a call to an older person and when the mark picks up, they will say something along the lines of: “Hi Grandma, do you know who this is?” When the unsuspecting grandparent guesses the name of the grandchild the scammer most sounds like, the scammer has established a fake identity without having done a lick of background research.
Once “in,” the fake grandchild will usually ask for money to solve some unexpected financial problem (overdue rent, payment for car repairs, etc.), to be paid via Western Union or MoneyGram, which don’t always require identification to collect. At the same time, the scam artist will beg the grandparent “please don’t tell my parents, they would kill me.”
While the sums from such a scam are likely to be in the hundreds, the very fact that no research is needed makes this a scam that can be perpetrated over and over at very little cost to the scammer.
