Absof***inglutely. Unfortunately, for the last few days.most of them hang up once I reveal my scam baiter name. I must be on their do not call list now.
Trying to imagine who finds it plausible that they’re about to acquire $2.5 billion but need to front a hundred bucks first.
People do though, otherwise they wouldn’t bother.
I got one a couple of months ago that Company of Coca-Cola was giving one lucky winner(guess who) 200 Billion United State Dollors. Just a 50 United State Dollor Acquire Fee through Western Union or Moneygram to some jackass in Nigeria.
(Coke revenue for 2023 was only 45.754 billion)
I’m guessing that Pepsico is contributing as well.
Note that 200 Billion Nigerian Naira is equivalent to $132 Million US. 100 Naira is like 7 cents in the US. This scam is coming from a nation whose currency is so devalued that obscenely large monetary numbers aren’t as unrealistic there as you’d expect.
I don’t think that’s it. The typical range was from a few 100,000s to 10s of millions. The jump to 10s and 100s of billions has been in just the last 3-4 months(that I’ve seen).
How did this work? The card data in Apple Pay is encrypted.
The phone tap allowed a $2100 Apple charge to get entered and other card data just vacuumed up. Next charge I think was on a Visa at Walmart which had us realizing all was sucked up.
I’ve read anecdotes about someone stealing card info but that shouldn’t technically be possible because that info simply isn’t in Apple Pay. The wallet doesn’t actually have that info in it. More often, a person’s info is compromised elsewhere and they blame Apple Pay. But that’s not technically plausible or AFAIK even possible.
If other card data was “vacuumed up” by one Apple Pay tap that wasn’t a hacker, it was literally a wizard.
As far as I can tell, this vulnerability has never been reported, so your scammer must be worth millions…
Sure but that card data is encrypted. There is no way for the scammer to then use any card info somewhere else. Even Apple and the iPhone don’t have that data.
Much more likely (as in it is virtually impossible for it to happen the way you say) is their physical card got skimmed elsewhere and it’s just a coincidence.
What if it wasn’t ApplePay, but some other app? Is there anything that would allow access to your bank account through a “tap”? Or maybe the teller of the tale was embarrassed that they’d given their bank info to a scammer and told the story in a way that put them in a better light…
Two days ago I got a Facebook friend request from a high school classmate who passed away a couple of years ago. I asked him if he remembered that time we went to the rodeo and there were all of those drunk cowgirls passed out in the pine forest. He said he did remember. Unfortunately, I don’t recall even going to a rodeo with him, much less drunk cowgirls. He told me about “… a special program for helping the old, Disabled, retired and non retired with cash for paying bills, buying homes and starting their own business. i got $150,000 from them when I applied for it.” He hasn’t sent me a link to it yet so I replied, “Are you still holding all of your gold as Krugerands [sic]? There are a lot of clever Chinese counterfeit Krugerands [sic] out there. Mine were all genuine but I traded them all for Canadian Maple Leafs because they are losing their credibility.” Maybe that will get him excited. I just realized I misspelled Krugerrand. I hope this doesn’t make him suspicious.
Me, I’d ask him how much I would need to squirrel away to be resurrected from the dead.
This morning I wasn’t feeling particularly energetic, so I watched hours of anti-scamming videos. I hadn’t realized how much technological Jiu Jitsu was possible, and that a lot of of these guys are reverse hacking into their systems and fucking with them. It was quite entertaining.
Awesome scam here. Very impressive. Apparently there is a keyboard sequence that can install browser malware on to your PC. In the scam it follows a typical “I am not a robot” dialog box. “Verification steps:”
Press Windows button + R [Opens Windows PowerShell command aka the Run command]
Press CTRL + V [Paste material in newly loaded clipboard into PowerShell]
Press Enter [Launch malware]
Brian Krebs reports.
https:// krebsonsecurity. com/2024/09/this-win dows-powershell-phish-has-scary-potential/
So go on high alert if the Run dialog box opens up by surprise.
ETA: Not sure Atamasama, but the phish was sent to programmers who might have set up their computers to automatically go to the administrative level. I can’t recall whether Run sends you do a security dialog box (which most click habitually) or whether it just fails if you don’t open it with adminstrator privileges. I see that the Run dialog box says, “Type the name of a program, folder, document or [god-help-me] Internet resource and Windows will open it for you.” Thanks MS!
I wonder if not opening an elevated window (to give admin privileges) would be a hindrance to this or not. I assume not, or this wouldn’t work.
There’s a walkthrough on You-tube. I’ve watched 4 minutes of it. There’s a Windows command called eC which translates a hash into whatever. So the vic would be pasting an incomprehensible hash into their Run box, which would translate it and I guess download the malware. Sheesh.
So: Nobody thinks that pressing a windows key will prove you are not a robot. Wake up if you see a surprise Run dialog box.
Is there any legitimate enterprise on earth, governmental or otherwise, that takes gift cards as payment for a debt?