You need to protect yourself on Medium or LinkedIn by knowing this.

How I got painfully scammed by these guys

Early this week, I read a story by Tobi — Audio Writer where he wrote about how he almost got duped by fake accounts of influencers on this platform. I just had to leave a comment under it because I have been a victim of these online scams.

In this digital age, it is not uncommon to hear about the means perpetrators are using to scam folks and extort their money from them on platforms such as WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram, and a few others. With social media like these, it’s quite easy for them to outwit you if you are not careful enough.

However, on other platforms such as Medium and even LinkedIn, it’s a shocker to me. These guys are everywhere so you need to stay vigilant.

I got scammed on LinkedIn about 3 years ago. I was still in college. If you don’t know about LinkedIn, it is a very effective online job-seeking platform that allows you to build a corporate network with virtually anyone on the platform. It also has some features of other social platforms such as posts, likes, subscriptions, etc.

What makes LinkedIn stand out is that it’s a haven for all kinds of opportunities, from scholarships to studentships to jobs and so on.

Back then, I was building my online presence on the platform while actively searching for a scholarship opportunity to help me fund my college education because my family was struggling financially. In my desperation, I connected and reached out to many personalities I believed could assist me.

While I waited for their response, one completely different account requested to connect with me. It was a fake account in the name of a deputy minister in my country at the time. For the sake of this article, let’s call the account FDM. After accepting the connection request, FDM sent a direct message indicating that she was happy to connect and then asked me how she could be of help.

Now I am certain that you’re thinking “That was the red flag, Sompa” and honestly, I thought so too. How on earth would a whole deputy minister reach out to me and ask, “How may I be of help?” But that’s another thing that makes LinkedIn stand out. You could basically follow and connect with Tony Stubblebine and as long as he accepts your request, you would be able to send him a message.

Thinking that this was a divine intervention given my pressing need, I went ahead to let her know that I needed help with my college fees. She immediately replied saying that there were scholarship opportunities she knew of and that she would be able to help.

My face started beaming with smiles at the sight of this message.

At one point, my inner skeptic pushed me to check the account if it had made prior posts and was engaging a lot on the platform. It was not so much of an active engagement, but she was a deputy minister; of course, she did not have the luxury of time to post a lot on LinkedIn. That’s what my inner optimist thought.

FDM sent me another contact and went on to give me clear instructions on the next steps to take.

She made mentioned that the next morning at 7 am, I should call a contact she provided and let them know she directed me.

Now this new contact had a WhatsApp profile, and the profile picture and name were that of the president of the scholarship secretariat (PSS) in my country. I did my research because I was trying to be careful, and everything seemed genuine. At this point, I thought I was in safe hands.

There is almost always a secondary account involved in these schemes. Like in Tobi’s case, there was a Telegram account in the name of Zulie Rane. In my case it was PSS. These are just shenanigans to throw you off.

These guys are always after your money. Rarely, do they want anything else.

Now in a WhatsApp chat after all the introduction and exchange of pleasantries, PSS says he’d send me a pdf of the scholarship application form which came at a Ghc150(about $12 ) cost. I just couldn’t lose the opportunity so I had to use the money for upkeep I had left.

After paying to him, he sent the forms. They looked pretty organized and legit. Of course, the formatting was quite off at some point but I felt it was not a big deal.

And you know what’s funny about all of this?

I had a couple of classes that day but I skipped the first two because of the entire “application”. I had to take pictures of myself, my national ID as well as my student ID, and the filled-out forms.

I quickly sent them to an email address PSS provided as these guys have a way of making you think the opportunity is a very limited offer — you snooze you lose type of thing.

Then again, this personal email address had a profile picture that was convincing at a glance.

PSS now says I am done with the process and so they will post the scholarship to my university.

As particularly weird as this sounded to me, I just thought it was one of their way of saying things. He went on to explain that the scholarship would cover the rest of my tuition, and purchase some provisions every month in addition to a separate monthly stipend.

So I waited.

Later that day PSS sent another message in the WhatsApp chat that there was an additional fee that was required for posting the scholarship. . . whatever that meant. This amount was the same as the form fee but I was completely out of money so I let him know. He then said he’d reach out to the FDM to see what they could do.

PSS came back saying that FDM catered for a part of the fee. This meant that I had to settle the rest which was about Ghc100($6) according to him. I asked a friend to lend me that amount and that was how I was able to pay.

Now I was indebted to someone because of these guys.

I waited again.

After some hours or so, PSS hit me up again. It was at this point that I knew this was just a scam. I can’t recall exactly what he said but it was something about a delivery team forgetting to include my printed physical documents thereby leading to a delay and extra costs incurred.

I lost it when he said, since he acknowledged that it was his fault he would offer to pay half of this newly incurred cost and I’d cater for the other half. I don’t know if PSS realized he was making zero sense but it was just a terrible excuse. Pay for your mistake?!

I am really glad that I saw through that because that’s one strategy these guys use to siphon your money. It’s always seemingly small amounts that’ll eventually add up to something significant.

I reported both accounts to WhatsApp and LinkedIn right after confronting them in the chats only for them to ghost me. Action was taken on their accounts and that’s why I don’t have any screenshots of the chats.

These perpetrators can always open new accounts so you need to stay vigilant wherever you are.

One key thing you should know in addition is that you’ll hardly find scammers trying to dupe you without off-siting to other platforms. From Medium to Telegram in Tobi’s case and from LinkedIn to WhatsApp in my case. There may be outliers but this is the norm from my experience.

And always remember, it is your money they are after. Do your research and probe as far as you can before paying for something you are not sure about.

Thank you so much for reading to the end.

If you found this helpful or can relate in any way do leave some claps or highlight and comment with your thoughts.

You can read Tobi’s story here:

Also if you loved my writing, take a look at other stories of mine:

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