February 22, 2024 • 8 mins
The headline "Put your smugness away. You are not too clever to be conned." How gullible are you? This article breaks down the "art" of conning.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
First of all, the headline put your smugness away, you
are not too clever to be cond Consumers reported losing
more than ten billion dollars to fraud, a record high
last year according to the FTC.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
How much did you say? More than ten billion? Wow? Yeah,
sale of a lot of money.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
On the other hand, I read this headline thought, you
know what, I am too clever to be conned, I think,
And then I saw it was written by Michelle Singletary.
Michelle Singletary. Does that name ring a bell at all
to you? It might, you know what I'm thinking of
somebody else. Sorry, it shouldn't ring a bell to you
in any way. Oh, and I went to a lot
(00:38):
of trouble to research this too, but it's a different
Michelle anyway. So I really I would like to be
smug and say I'm too clever to be conned. On
the other hand, as I look at my three beloved children,
they each have a distinctly different level of skepticism.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
I raised them.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
They're half my DNA and half Judy's, presumably, although my
son looks a lot like the EPs guy ohezuh.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
But he looks.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
Yeah, I know he does, and he sounds like me,
and he's got all of my strength and flaws as well.
But what are you gonna do anyway? So if I
can't raise three kids to have roughly the same level
of skepticism, how can anybody else? And so I try
not to be too smug about that. It's I think
it is. You can certainly develop it, or it can
(01:27):
be underdeveloped. But I'm beginning to think it's something like height,
you know, h It's just different people have different likes. Immutable,
thank you, that's a fancy word, now, Michelle Singletary writes
in The Washington Post. Sometimes we have to be reminded
that con artists, especially with the help of advanced technology,
(01:49):
thrive because they win people's trust. It's writ in the
name con is short for confidence. It's a good point.
The confidence man was the old timey term. I think
I had forgotten that. Yeah, well, it's a good reminder.
Con artists also lean into folks fear factor. The more
panic the target, the better odds of success. Now that's
interesting too. You remember we learned the other day that
your IQ allegedly drops by twenty points when you're angry. Mm,
(02:12):
what happens to it when you're afraid. I wonder gotta
be similar you think. Last week, a personal finance writer
at New York magazine. Personal finance writer a New York
magazine bravely revealed that she'd been conned out of fifty
thousand dollars money she handed over to swindler's in a shoebox. No,
(02:36):
don't be smug, jack, You're not too smart to fall
for this scam.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
I think I'm too smart to hand anybody a bunch
of cash in a shoe box.
Speaker 2 (02:44):
I'm hearing smugness, Michael. Is it just me? I'm hearing
it too.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
You want to smug you say you gotta have it
in a shoebox.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
Okay, let me spin the tail out for you.
Speaker 1 (02:54):
Charlotte Cowell's shared house scammers pretending to be from Amazon,
the Federal Trade Commission, and the Central Intelligence Agency frightened
her so badly that all her usual skepticism was overruled.
She was convinced she and her family were in imminent danger.
I'm from the CIA and I had fifty thousand dollars
in a shoe box. Okay, It's gonna take me a
few minutes to get across town to the bank, but
(03:15):
I'll be right back. Since Cowl's revelation, media outlets have
been pointing out where the con could have been detective
had detected, had she remained calm, then she might have
questioned the request for cash, or the probability that it
really was the CIAFTC.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
And Amazon calling.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
Me.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
I'm making my smelt something weird. Face. I realized this
is radio. What talk about an odd combo?
Speaker 1 (03:44):
And no, the government won't ask you to pay money
to avoid being arrested. Don't forget the telephone numbers can
be spoofed to make you believe the call is legitimate.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
So this coal, well, I don't know about.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
The government will never make you pay money to be
a to avoid being wrestled.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
What if you how back taxes? Yeah, but they won't
ask for it in a shoebox. Oh of course not.
So let's pause right there. Do you are you so smug?
You think you're too clever to be calmed in this way?
I'm still feeling smug. Yes, I'm still feeling like I'm
too smug to fall for this.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
You're from the CIA and you need fifty k in
a shoebox. Okay, yeah, I would immediately start messing with them.
How old is this person? Kind of shoebox? Because I
have I have both men's shoes and women's shoes. My
wife is a woman, and she wears women's shoes. What
kind of shoebox would you like the money in?
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Oh? Would I have fun messing with them?
Speaker 1 (04:45):
I've got to give you fifty grand in a shoebox
to avoid being terested. Well, I'll be damned, didn't see
that coming. All right, so we were still feeling smug,
are we?
Speaker 3 (04:55):
All right?
Speaker 2 (04:55):
Let's try another one.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
The very gal who's writing this article says natural born
skeptics might shake their heads what they've used the gullibility
of scam victims. You may consider yourself scam proof, but
the sophistication of today's schemes can snare even the most
cynical among us.
Speaker 3 (05:13):
I would never say am scamproof. I clicked on an
eBay email one time that looked like their website and
everything and got phished. I was going in a hurry
going through I just bought some money Bay. So no,
anybody who claims her scam proof come on now?
Speaker 1 (05:29):
Oh yeah, yeah, the fishing, the spear fishing stuff. Yeah,
that's tough. Don't ever give your passwords. But anyway, let's see.
So this gal who's writing this article, right, So I
had to stifle my own self righteousness. After reading Cal's
viral confession, it reminded me of how I was once conned.
At the time, it was an ATM scheme targeting women
out at recreational facilities in Virginia, Maryland.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
Here's what happened.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
She left her first in the car, thought it was
safely tucked away, but the crook had been watching smash
the car. The grabbed the purse. Shortly after my aerobics
class started. The crook called the community center, pretending to
be a bank manager. Is your purse missing?
Speaker 2 (06:08):
He asked?
Speaker 1 (06:08):
When I took to the line, I asked him a check.
Will I checked my car? Or to wait while I
checked my car? Sure enough, the window was broken et center.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
I would think it was the bank. I would absolutely
believe it was the bank.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
Well, let's say there's more. So far, Jack is not
smug if you're keeping track from home. No, fake bank
manager said he had caught the man who snatched my purse.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
Okay, he I'm out. He caught the guy, I'm hearing
mark snugness.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
The thief had allegedly confessed, which was how the caller
knew where to find me.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
There's more on that.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
Mad at myself and sobbing, the impostor said I should
take a few minutes to calm down. He was professional,
reassuring and compassionate, like all bank managers are compassion and
calm and and like tackle evil tours on the street.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Right my uncle, I said?
Speaker 3 (07:04):
Did my uncle owned the bank and he tackled a
bank robber once and held him until the police came.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
Wow? Wow, he said he would have mad. He can't. Okay?
Is there more?
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Before I continued, it's the way he found amusing as
a kid, So the fact that he sat on the guy.
Speaker 1 (07:23):
He said he would immediately cancel my bank card. He
said that I shouldn't worry. This happens all the time,
and the bank would reimburse me if any moment money
had been stolen from my account. He said he was
happy for me because I wouldn't have to replace my
credit card and driver's license.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Then he told an incredible tale.
Speaker 1 (07:37):
He described how he noticed broken glass in my purse
as the guy tried to use my ATM card, he said.
He chased him down and held him until the police ard.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
I'm sure you did.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
He had by this point earned my trust. That's when
the real purpose of the theft emerged. The crook said,
he wanted me to verify the contents of my purse,
some financial information, how much cash. Finally, he asked for
the personal ID number of the pin for my debit card.
Why don't you tell me that, he said? Yeah, he
needed it, he said, so he could cancel the number
and issue another code.
Speaker 3 (08:06):
Yeah, why don't you tell me you were on the bank,
dere Jason Bourne. Nice job tackling that guy.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
This man had methodically chipped away at my normal wariness
with his warmth. And this may surprise you, Jack. He
ended up stealing money again to the headline, put your
smugness away, you are not too clever to be gone
and so.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
But they don't have any examples of things that like
people of moderate skepticism.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Would fall for. No, that's the only two.
Speaker 3 (08:33):
Okay, it didn't work.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
I still feel smug now. I was afraid of that.
This is a tough tough nut to crack, folks,
First of all, the headline put your smugness away, you
are not too clever to be cond Consumers reported losing
more than ten billion dollars to fraud, a record high
last year according to the FTC.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
How much did you say? More than ten billion? Wow? Yeah,
sale of a lot of money.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
On the other hand, I read this headline thought, you
know what, I am too clever to be conned, I think,
And then I saw it was written by Michelle Singletary.
Michelle Singletary. Does that name ring a bell at all
to you? It might, you know what I'm thinking of
somebody else. Sorry, it shouldn't ring a bell to you
in any way. Oh, and I went to a lot
(00:38):
of trouble to research this too, but it's a different
Michelle anyway. So I really I would like to be
smug and say I'm too clever to be conned. On
the other hand, as I look at my three beloved children,
they each have a distinctly different level of skepticism.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
I raised them.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
They're half my DNA and half Judy's, presumably, although my
son looks a lot like the EPs guy ohezuh.
Speaker 2 (01:04):
But he looks.
Speaker 1 (01:06):
Yeah, I know he does, and he sounds like me,
and he's got all of my strength and flaws as well.
But what are you gonna do anyway? So if I
can't raise three kids to have roughly the same level
of skepticism, how can anybody else? And so I try
not to be too smug about that. It's I think
it is. You can certainly develop it, or it can
(01:27):
be underdeveloped. But I'm beginning to think it's something like height,
you know, h It's just different people have different likes. Immutable,
thank you, that's a fancy word, now, Michelle Singletary writes
in The Washington Post. Sometimes we have to be reminded
that con artists, especially with the help of advanced technology,
(01:49):
thrive because they win people's trust. It's writ in the
name con is short for confidence. It's a good point.
The confidence man was the old timey term. I think
I had forgotten that. Yeah, well, it's a good reminder.
Con artists also lean into folks fear factor. The more
panic the target, the better odds of success. Now that's
interesting too. You remember we learned the other day that
your IQ allegedly drops by twenty points when you're angry. Mm,
(02:12):
what happens to it when you're afraid. I wonder gotta
be similar you think. Last week, a personal finance writer
at New York magazine. Personal finance writer a New York
magazine bravely revealed that she'd been conned out of fifty
thousand dollars money she handed over to swindler's in a shoebox. No,
(02:36):
don't be smug, jack, You're not too smart to fall
for this scam.
Speaker 3 (02:40):
I think I'm too smart to hand anybody a bunch
of cash in a shoe box.
Speaker 2 (02:44):
I'm hearing smugness, Michael. Is it just me? I'm hearing
it too.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
You want to smug you say you gotta have it
in a shoebox.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
Okay, let me spin the tail out for you.
Speaker 1 (02:54):
Charlotte Cowell's shared house scammers pretending to be from Amazon,
the Federal Trade Commission, and the Central Intelligence Agency frightened
her so badly that all her usual skepticism was overruled.
She was convinced she and her family were in imminent danger.
I'm from the CIA and I had fifty thousand dollars
in a shoe box. Okay, It's gonna take me a
few minutes to get across town to the bank, but
(03:15):
I'll be right back. Since Cowl's revelation, media outlets have
been pointing out where the con could have been detective
had detected, had she remained calm, then she might have
questioned the request for cash, or the probability that it
really was the CIAFTC.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
And Amazon calling.
Speaker 1 (03:34):
Me.
Speaker 2 (03:34):
I'm making my smelt something weird. Face. I realized this
is radio. What talk about an odd combo?
Speaker 1 (03:44):
And no, the government won't ask you to pay money
to avoid being arrested. Don't forget the telephone numbers can
be spoofed to make you believe the call is legitimate.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
So this coal, well, I don't know about.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
The government will never make you pay money to be
a to avoid being wrestled.
Speaker 2 (04:00):
What if you how back taxes? Yeah, but they won't
ask for it in a shoebox. Oh of course not.
So let's pause right there. Do you are you so smug?
You think you're too clever to be calmed in this way?
I'm still feeling smug. Yes, I'm still feeling like I'm
too smug to fall for this.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
You're from the CIA and you need fifty k in
a shoebox. Okay, yeah, I would immediately start messing with them.
How old is this person? Kind of shoebox? Because I
have I have both men's shoes and women's shoes. My
wife is a woman, and she wears women's shoes. What
kind of shoebox would you like the money in?
Speaker 2 (04:41):
Oh? Would I have fun messing with them?
Speaker 1 (04:45):
I've got to give you fifty grand in a shoebox
to avoid being terested. Well, I'll be damned, didn't see
that coming. All right, so we were still feeling smug,
are we?
Speaker 3 (04:55):
All right?
Speaker 2 (04:55):
Let's try another one.
Speaker 1 (04:57):
The very gal who's writing this article says natural born
skeptics might shake their heads what they've used the gullibility
of scam victims. You may consider yourself scam proof, but
the sophistication of today's schemes can snare even the most
cynical among us.
Speaker 3 (05:13):
I would never say am scamproof. I clicked on an
eBay email one time that looked like their website and
everything and got phished. I was going in a hurry
going through I just bought some money Bay. So no,
anybody who claims her scam proof come on now?
Speaker 1 (05:29):
Oh yeah, yeah, the fishing, the spear fishing stuff. Yeah,
that's tough. Don't ever give your passwords. But anyway, let's see.
So this gal who's writing this article, right, So I
had to stifle my own self righteousness. After reading Cal's
viral confession, it reminded me of how I was once conned.
At the time, it was an ATM scheme targeting women
out at recreational facilities in Virginia, Maryland.
Speaker 2 (05:52):
Here's what happened.
Speaker 1 (05:53):
She left her first in the car, thought it was
safely tucked away, but the crook had been watching smash
the car. The grabbed the purse. Shortly after my aerobics
class started. The crook called the community center, pretending to
be a bank manager. Is your purse missing?
Speaker 2 (06:08):
He asked?
Speaker 1 (06:08):
When I took to the line, I asked him a check.
Will I checked my car? Or to wait while I
checked my car? Sure enough, the window was broken et center.
Speaker 2 (06:14):
I would think it was the bank. I would absolutely
believe it was the bank.
Speaker 1 (06:19):
Well, let's say there's more. So far, Jack is not
smug if you're keeping track from home. No, fake bank
manager said he had caught the man who snatched my purse.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
Okay, he I'm out. He caught the guy, I'm hearing
mark snugness.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
The thief had allegedly confessed, which was how the caller
knew where to find me.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
There's more on that.
Speaker 1 (06:47):
Mad at myself and sobbing, the impostor said I should
take a few minutes to calm down. He was professional,
reassuring and compassionate, like all bank managers are compassion and
calm and and like tackle evil tours on the street.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
Right my uncle, I said?
Speaker 3 (07:04):
Did my uncle owned the bank and he tackled a
bank robber once and held him until the police came.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
Wow? Wow, he said he would have mad. He can't. Okay?
Is there more?
Speaker 3 (07:16):
Before I continued, it's the way he found amusing as
a kid, So the fact that he sat on the guy.
Speaker 1 (07:23):
He said he would immediately cancel my bank card. He
said that I shouldn't worry. This happens all the time,
and the bank would reimburse me if any moment money
had been stolen from my account. He said he was
happy for me because I wouldn't have to replace my
credit card and driver's license.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Then he told an incredible tale.
Speaker 1 (07:37):
He described how he noticed broken glass in my purse
as the guy tried to use my ATM card, he said.
He chased him down and held him until the police ard.
Speaker 2 (07:45):
I'm sure you did.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
He had by this point earned my trust. That's when
the real purpose of the theft emerged. The crook said,
he wanted me to verify the contents of my purse,
some financial information, how much cash. Finally, he asked for
the personal ID number of the pin for my debit card.
Why don't you tell me that, he said? Yeah, he
needed it, he said, so he could cancel the number
and issue another code.
Speaker 3 (08:06):
Yeah, why don't you tell me you were on the bank,
dere Jason Bourne. Nice job tackling that guy.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
This man had methodically chipped away at my normal wariness
with his warmth. And this may surprise you, Jack. He
ended up stealing money again to the headline, put your
smugness away, you are not too clever to be gone
and so.
Speaker 3 (08:25):
But they don't have any examples of things that like
people of moderate skepticism.
Speaker 2 (08:31):
Would fall for. No, that's the only two.
Speaker 3 (08:33):
Okay, it didn't work.
Speaker 2 (08:35):
I still feel smug now. I was afraid of that.
This is a tough tough nut to crack, folks,
Hosts And Creators
Joe Getty
Jack Armstrong
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