Why Do Scammers Scam? A Deep Look Into Why You’ll Fall Victim One Day, Too.
They say scammers are robbers without a gun. In fact, this pathetic group of people who don’t even look their victims in the face is actually a multi-billion-dollar-a-year industry.
At least once in their lives — even smart, cautious people will eventually fall victim to these pricks.
But why do scammers do it?
I used the word “prick” because you have to be one to be a scammer.
Scamming others requires one to have no moral compass. It’s actually quite easy to scam someone — especially online.
Way back in the day, someone like Charles Ponzi (named after the well-known Ponzi Scheme) had to put actual hard work into scamming others.
Essentially, Charles would take money from an investor and keep it. He then takes more money from a second investor, keeps some of it and pays back the first investor a larger amount than what was initially invested — thus fooling the person into thinking the investment grew.
He’d then rinse and repeat over, and over, and over again on other people.
It’s exhausting just listening to it. But nowadays, all your lazy ass has to do is sit behind a computer screen and message people who are either selling something or buying something.
It works because people are naive, impressionable, and gullible.
That is, of course, as long as you provide some kind of arbitrary evidence while you play on some psychological issues.
Some examples of what I mean can be things like looking pretty, being lonely, offering some kind of freedom, weight loss, sex, wealth, friends, relationships, and so on.
The underlying advantages are the naive, the impressionable and the gullible. And these types of people are growing exponentially since the internet is the perfect environment for this to work.
People are getting dumber and people’s attention span is getting shorter.
Secondly, there is no “getting caught” in this type of offense because there’s seldom any regulation against it.
Around the time of the pandemic, my identity almost got stolen (as a lot of identities did during that time). I was told to tell the Federal Trade Commission and it went nowhere after that.
Whoever did that to me certainly got away with it.
Sure, there are the type of greedy people such as the 100,000 Bitcoin heist (that equals to $4.5 billion) committed by Ilya Lichtenstein and Heather Morgan, which could end up putting them in prison (they’re yet to be sentenced), but for all of us “small time victims”, there is no trial, no sentence and no resolution.
And all those “influencers” we see left and right? They’re all benefiting from all this.
Facebook, Tik Tok, Instagram, Twitter, Twitch, Snapchat and everything else under the virtual sun are all bottom-feeding. They take about 1% of all their audiences and sell subscription fees or “donations” (also known as super chats) and all kinds of other “products” just to make a killing by… err… influencing.
They provide nothing innovative yet take all your money by means of the psychological list I mentioned above.
These are much cleaner scams. These are the types of scams where the scammer can convince themselves that they’ve done nothing immoral.
It’s easy money to put yourself on a pedestal and call yourself a health guru, or a self-help expert, or the one word that makes me cringe every time: The entrepreneur.
These things don’t require some kind of certification. Anyone can wake up on a Wednesday and suddenly be a pro at it.
Most of these people failed in the real world so they simply created their own world — a world where they’re president of Ego-Land.
There are so many different ways in scamming. Some are pretty damn creative for coming up with it, too.
Some scammers can even take advantage of an ailment you may have.
One such example — and a disgusting, inhumane one — is the recovery/sobriety industry.
I remember seeing those commercials for Promises Rehab in Malibu. The guy in the commercial was such a tool. I didn’t have to research online for reviews and stuff to see through his bullsh*t.
Luckily, being someone in recovery myself, I saw all his faults right there in that 30-second T.V. spot.
Not all scammers are online, too. Scammers can be right in front of you while you’re pumping gas in your car.
Ever see some dude with a red gas can walking around asking people for two, three dollars because “his truck ran out of gas”?
Yeah, don’t do it. That bloke is simply going to take your dollars and walk up to another person to do the same. There is no gas to purchase because there is no truck.
Most people have the mentality that if they’re not physically hurting anyone, then they’re not doing anything bad.
But they certainly are hurting people. Just not physically.
**As previously mentioned, there isn’t much that can be effectively done in the event of a scam, however, if you’ve become a victim of identity theft or a very serious scamming matter, you’re encouraged to report it to the Federal Trade Commission at: https://reportfraud.ftc.gov/#/