Scamming the scammers: A tutorial

I've been playing with scammers for years. I used to give them so much grief they would actually get hostile and cuss me out. Things like act confused, purposely give wrong credit card information and swear it was correct. Tell them I was Chris Hansen. I would even let them string me along for days and agree to meet them somewhere and wouldn't show up.

Yes, I had fun. They seldomly bother me anymore.
 
StarSong said:
Engaging with scammers can be a dangerous game. The safest and wisest approach is to ignore them, delete their emails and posts, and remain vigilant.
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Agreed. They have your phone number and other info about you.

Adding: a friend chewed out a caller and then hung up on him. He called her back and started cursing and saying other threatening things. Really scared her.
 
My father-in-law was a victim of an ongoing scam. When DH & I found out what was happening and put an end to it, we endured relentless phone calls 24/7 from the scammers, including threats. (We'd had his phone calls forwarded to ours.) They expressed so much fury at having been discovered and learning that the gravy train was over. Unbelievable.

My FIL had to be moved out of his home and into assisted living, because the creeps sent people to his house so he was no longer safe there. Eventually they tracked him to us and sent someone to our home.

Many scammers operate offshore, but often hire nogoodnik locals for logistical assistance. Believe me when I tell you, these people are deadly serious and aren't safe to play with.
 
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I have no conversations with unknown callers and block any texts from unrecognized numbers without opening first. Turned off RCS chats and read receipts.

Nothing more complicated than that is necessary, because when I first got this number over 2 years ago, I got quite a few calls / texts from unknowns. That number keeps dwindling over time, and now I get very few.
 
A while ago, some people liked to have their "fun" with the scammers. They made videos to show on the internet, in which they pretended to be very confused, ignorant old people who couldn't quite understand what the scammer was trying to get out of them. "Just a minute, I've got that number in another room," then taking 15 minutes to get back, etc.

I kept watching one of those videos, because for a while it was kind of fun. Finally, the scammer caught on that his time was being wasted, and his whole "sweet" demeanor changed. He showed himself to be the gangster he was. He started screaming obscenities to the guy who was having fun recording him, and was clearly furious. The guy then hung up, and laughingly told his audience how much fun it was. But just listening to that furious ranting coming from the other end was enough to convince me that these scammers are dead serious about trying to cheat other people, lots of them very elderly, out of their last dollar. There is nothing funny about them, and playing games with them could be dangerous.
 

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