Page 10 - Cyberattacks and Cyberscams: Is There an End in Sight?

for example, by hiring someone to receive and ship stolen goods.
Even young and technologically adept people like Chavez can fall
for cyberscams.

Confidence Fraud

Confi dence fraud is another prominent type of scam with different
variations. Reporter Hugh Lessig found out just how heartbreak-
ing romance scams can be when he interviewed a woman he
calls “Jennifer.” Jennifer met a soldier on Facebook just before
he deployed to Afghanistan. They kept in touch. Over months,
they built a relationship from shared stories and confi dences, but
only hers were real. Teetering on a rocky point in her marriage, it
was easy to fall for the impostor. “[He] told me . . . how much he
would like to meet me, how pretty I was, how nice I was,” she told
Lessig. “He would tell me stories about the war and things that
were going on. I felt so bad for him . . . I wanted to do whatever
I could to make life easier for him.” When the fake soldier asked
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for money, Jennifer sent some. Then she sent more and more,
until she had given the scammer $4,000. The soldier was not real.
The romance was not real, but the loss was real.
Romance scams rank among the costliest frauds. The median
loss was $2,100 in 2020, according to the BBB. Romance scam-
mers fabricate a relationship with a vic-
tim and then trick the victim into sending
money, laundering money, or disclosing
“With this fraud, especially,
there is so much emotional personal data. Some romance scam-
trauma. . . . They’re embar- mers prey on the elderly and can drain
rassed. Their hearts are their entire life savings. But it is not just
broken. They not only lost the loss of money that hurts the most.
their money, but this dream “With this fraud, especially, there is so
they had.” 8
much emotional trauma,” says Amy
— Amy Nofziger, director of Victim Nofziger from the AARP Fraud Watch
Support at the AARP Fraud Watch
Network Network. “They’re embarrassed. Their
hearts are broken. They not only lost
their money, but this dream they had.” 8

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