[Info] Why you shouldn't scam?

[Fisher]

Hey there,

So I noticed scam rate or at least attempt rate has gone crazy up lately. There could be 27000 reasons behind this, but let's not go there right now. If you are curious, or you are thinking of scamming someone in the near future, I suggest you keep on reading, as I'm about to show you why scamming is bad and why would it pay much more to actually do something.

Scammers come in all sorts. Most of the time, they are the idiotic type, doing it dirty and cheap. There's actually so many legal scams that you'd be surprised. But instead, these people chose the moron path, with 90% risk that they will lose the money, and only 10% chances they will actually snatch the money. That's the "Hey, I'll pay you $200 for this <stuff> you are selling for $100". It's basically a "hit and run" type of thing. You offer someone more money, you take whatever they are selling, and you snatch the money right back. Double the fun right? Wrong.

Something scammers don't usually use is "online persona". It takes years to build a proper online identity, with the right reputation. I could tell you a few people that would swear on their life my real name is Fisher. Hint: it's not. They simply show up using a random nickname, with no history, nobody to back them up, nothing even remotely showing that they should be trustworthy. Why does this work? Simple, they are like rookie social engineers. They aim for that spot where you stop considering options, by offering you more money. You go blind, seeing only the money, completely ignoring some part of you that screams "DUUUUUUUDE NO".

The highest grade of scammers I've seen around here are progression scammers. Now what they do is promise you sick money for gold lets say, and you, being smart as you, want to test them first, so you trade them 10k or 20k and they pay you. You trade them another 20k and they pay you again. Now that you are certain they are legit, you unload your entire 826 515 gold to them and they go offline. Don't think this one works? Beginning of 1990s, some random dude and a girl opened a bank in my country. They offered sick interest rates if you deposit some cash there for a year. First wave of people wanted to test, they deposited not more than $1000. Bank paid. Second wave of people, deposited not more than $1000, they paid. Once entire country was feeling secure, everyone deposited all they had. Couple of days latter, bank was closed, and the owners were nowhere to be found. It works.

So reading the above paragraph, you're thinking "holy shit, this actually works, let me go scam some people". Remember, this is a thread on why you shouldn't do it, and we're getting to the core. To put it simple, it's more work than you want. If you want to be successful, you need to be bouncing identities all the time. That means proxies, Skypes, E-mails, Facebooks even, PayPals. You also need to be able to bounce all those identities in your head, so you can appear to be the person you claim you are. Today, if you are Mark, he may like water sports, however, tomorrow, Jack will definitely be a football fan. Not important? If you don't include small talk during your "pitch", you are in the wrong business. I'm not gonna go on about how to increase the quality of your scams here, as people might abuse the crap out of that, but come on. The idea is to get away with it, if you are stupid, and lets face it, most of scammers are, you'll just end up having Watcher at your doorstep, beating the crap out of you. So yeah, you'll have to bounce some identities. And not just sports. Judging by who you are talking to, you can make an educated (lol I know) guess as to what are their interests, and make a witty, or any other kind, of remark, while talking to them, to "soften" them up. To be able to do this, you need to have basic knowledge of everything (literally). Besides that, you need to follow current trends in the world, so if Anonymous is striking again, and your mark has a question mark as their Skype profile picture, you probably don't want to trashtalk hackers while working them. I can keep going. Don't believe me? You need to know the core of all races, so you know what never to say to an African-american, Caucasian etc. You need to know the core of all nations, so you will never say you are American while talking to a Russian. You need to know the difference between male and female, so you will never lose a mark for talking clothes shopping with a male. You need to know the core of all social groups, as well as how to recognize them, so you will know if someone is a Nazi, an Atheist, vegetarian. You need to be able to guess your marks age, and based on that, their possible interests (not specific ones, but global ones like elder people do have a soft spot for youngsters). And I'm just covering the basics here really.

So let's sum it up in two real world examples. For the purpose of this example, and many other purposes, I'll act as a PHP developer. My goal in this scenario is to make money by doing whatever is less hassle. My customer, or mark later on, will be David.

1) I'm a PHP dev

• David pokes me via Skype, he's got this website he wants and he tells me all about it
• I make it happen
• I get paid
• Now that I'm done and I made money, I play some games, take my girl out to dinner, or do something fun

2) I'm a scammer

• David pokes me via Skype, he's got this website he wants and he tells me all about it
• I have no clue how to do it, but I accept the job anyway
• I follow a simple tutorial or snatch a script online to make a login/registration page on a free hosting
• I tell David he should pay me a milestone
• He does
• I smell the money and I want all of it, so I'll proceed in one of the following steps:
• a) Keep working David as a mark, trying to steal all the money
• b) Keep doing small works on the site and take all the milestones I can
• Once I do this and David burns me, I'm going to have to create all my new profiles, a new Skype, new E-mail, new PayPal
• While I create some accounts, PayPal pokes me about this dispute David claimed
• I fight the case while I try to find a new mark
• Now I'm two people at the same time, trying to fight the case with PayPal here, while I'm acting someone else out, trying to scam even more money
• This ****ing hot girl at Starbucks pokes me and asks me for my name and my Skype. What name do I tell her and which Skype do I give her?!
• Now that I messed everything up, there's still a solid chance I get beaten up or sued or something along the lines

See my point? The guy and girl running the bank, think they had it easy? Aside from the fact they had to leave their own country, she died soon after, and the guy is actually participating in a reality show right now to make a living, broke as hell, while anyone can file a claim against him for snatching their money and get paid from the state, and he will do jail time for this. He's already done 4 years. Sure, one can argue he's had a good life, but did he have that American dream retirement? Or will he spend it in a jail somewhere, rotting to death?

With the amount of resources available on the internet, it's absurd to not be doing anything. If we take the example above, while scamming the guy, if you chose to build a piece of the system, you already learned something. Why not use the same website where you found the quick guide to build the rest of it? And why not, God forbid, learn php while you're at it and make some easy money down the road? If you really really have it in you, the scam genes, become a lawyer or a consultant. Manager even. Let's not joke here, some of the most talented people out there are basically scammers. Some of the richest ones as well. You can put all this to a good, legal use, without having to fear for your life or ditch your name every 10 minutes. While some may argue that Unban services are a scam for instance, you will not get banned here or sued by anyone if you run such a service. And what's your job? Work your mark to pay you, same way you work your marks to pay you when you want to scam them, and give them some tickets. You'll be sitting at your PC, like you usually do, and typing on your keyboard, like you usually do. However, there is no aftermath. By putting your skills to a good use, you'll have great reputation, opening many doors for you with the community, as well as bunch of grateful customers. For typing some words via Skype. Think about it.

Peace!