Scammers, even clever people are getting conned out of serious money.

[classic33]

Once had "George Page" from Aberdeen trying to offload just over three million onto someone, for charitable work, upon his death.
Sadly he popped his clogs before the transfer of funds could take place. But after I said I was willing to travel to collect the paperwork for the bank.

 

[ebikeerwidnes]

If I had a big shop on the High Street where I allowed people to display ads on TVs in the window all day for money
and one of those ads was displaying something "bad" - like demanding violence to a type of person or something
Then the Cops would be demanding that I take it down NOW and I would be dragged in front of courts to answer for how I allowed it to get there
Quite rightly

but YouTube and Facebook and the rest seem to be able to say
"not my fault mate - we can't be expected to check everything" and "we will check it and take it down by the end of the day tomorrow"

but poor little me with my one-man-band running a shop on the High-street can't get away with that

 

[DaveReading]

years ago I started deliberately talking to them and keeping them on the phone for as long as possible

The idea was that if they are talking to me then they are not talking to someone who might give in to them

I noticed after a while that the number of calls I was getting was not going down
I thought that they would take my number of their list once it became clear that I would just waste their time and was not likely to go for whatever they were trying to get me to do
Instead if anything I was getting more and more calls

I stopped talking to them and started just hanging up and over time the number started dropping

I read somewhere that sometimes, if you annoy them they put your number on a general list of "possible suckers" then they sell on
so your number goes to other groups that then try you for their scams

No idea if that is right or things just seemed that way

Isn't getting more calls a win-win, for the reason you described?

I managed to keep one scammer on the line for more than an hour once. She wasn't best pleased and accused me of "wasting her time" - which of course was the object of the exercise.

 

[ebikeerwidnes]

Isn't getting more calls a win-win, for the reason you described?

I managed to keep one scammer on the line for more than an hour once. She wasn't best pleased and accused me of "wasting her time" - which of course was the object of the exercise.

Yes - I suppose it does achieve the objective partly - in that it wastes their time

but the aim was also to persuade them not to ring

in the end I was getting 3-4 calls a day and it got too much - which was not the aim

 

[Dave7]

Yes - I suppose it does achieve the objective partly - in that it wastes their time

but the aim was also to persuade them not to ring

in the end I was getting 3-4 calls a day and it got too much - which was not the aim

I got a scam call telling me "they" had detected a serious problem on my computer but not to worry as he would fix it for me
I thanked him and he asked me to follow his instructions.
I asked him "are you on a lap top now"?
He said he was.
I asked "will do do me a small favour"?
He said OK and I said "will you turn your lap top lengthways and shove it right up your a*se".
For some reason the line went dead.
It gave me much pleasure.

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

Oh and 'apparently' DPD tried to deliver me a parcel today... When I was in the house. I heard and saw nothing. 🙄🤦‍♂️

I have nothing for delivery... Unless one of you is trying to send me a present of course! 😆

My experience of DPD was that they were as thick as pig sh*t anyway (admittedly it was agency staff at the time).

 

[Alex321]

If I had a big shop on the High Street where I allowed people to display ads on TVs in the window all day for money
and one of those ads was displaying something "bad" - like demanding violence to a type of person or something
Then the Cops would be demanding that I take it down NOW and I would be dragged in front of courts to answer for how I allowed it to get there
Quite rightly

but YouTube and Facebook and the rest seem to be able to say
"not my fault mate - we can't be expected to check everything" and "we will check it and take it down by the end of the day tomorrow"

but poor little me with my one-man-band running a shop on the High-street can't get away with that

Well they wouldn't get away with that either.

There is a difference between advertising on a platform and messaging. Facebook et al would not get away with adverts that breach the advertising regulations.

But even when it comes to messaging, if you just put up a free community messaging board, it would only take you 309 seconds a day to check the contents, so it might be considered reasonable you should do so. While they have many thousands of messages per minute. They would have to empoy an absolute army of people to even get close to monitoring them all.

 

[ebikeerwidnes]

Well they wouldn't get away with that either.

There is a difference between advertising on a platform and messaging. Facebook et al would not get away with adverts that breach the advertising regulations.

But even when it comes to messaging, if you just put up a free community messaging board, it would only take you 309 seconds a day to check the contents, so it might be considered reasonable you should do so. While they have many thousands of messages per minute. They would have to empoy an absolute army of people to even get close to monitoring them all.

Is "it would cost me too much to employ the people to do it" an excuse to break the law?

I am rather winging it on the legal stuff here - so if I am talking rubbish then let me know

 

[Mad Doug Biker]

Is "it would cost me too much to employ the people to do it" an excuse to break the law?

I am rather winging it on the legal stuff here - so if I am talking rubbish then let me know

Talking rubbish on Cyclechat?

Surely not!!

 

[Alex321]

Is "it would cost me too much to employ the people to do it" an excuse to break the law?

I am rather winging it on the legal stuff here - so if I am talking rubbish then let me know

They aren't breaking the law.

Some people thought they were, and they were taken to court, but the courts decided they are not acting as publisher, but rather as conduits for users publications.

There are various proposals around which could change this, and make them jointly responsible with the users for the content.

But for the moment, they are not legally responsible for the content, so long as they respond in a reasonable time when notified.

 

[ebikeerwidnes]

They aren't breaking the law.

Some people thought they were, and they were taken to court, but the courts decided they are not acting as publisher, but rather as conduits for users publications.

There are various proposals around which could change this, and make them jointly responsible with the users for the content.

But for the moment, they are not legally responsible for the content, so long as they respond in a reasonable time when notified.

Yes

in my scenario with the TVs in a shop window I would also not be publishing
just renting out the "space" on a TV for a set time

But I think they are effectively publishing even if legally they are not
IMO they should certainly have responsibility for what appears on their website

 

[Profpointy]

I might have posted this elsewhere on this forum before.

Many years ago I got cold called from someone claiming to be from the anti fraud team at my credit card company. Told me they were looking into a transaction but before they could talk to me I had to pass some security questions. I told them that they needed to te me something first that would convince me that they were who they said they were. We reached impasse so I said I would hang up and call the number on the back of my card and ask for their anti fraud team.

A few moments later I was talking to the very same person. The transaction they were questioning me about, whilst unusual for me, what one and had done. The person did say that they wished more people were suspicious of calls in the way I had been.

It is absurd when the banks expect you to go through a security check WHEN THEY PHONE YOU! FFS!

It did somewhat help when Virgin would call me (trying to upsell presumably) and I'd refuse to prove who I was. Saved a lot of time

 

[ebikeerwidnes]

It is absurd when the banks expect you to go through a security check WHEN THEY PHONE YOU! FFS!

It did somewhat help when Virgin would call me (trying to upsell presumably) and I'd refuse to prove who I was. Saved a lot of time

They SHOULD make it clear that you have the option to hang up and ring them directly - using the number on the website

As far as I remember they have all done that with me - except that one I wrote about which was in the early days of telephone banking

but every big organisation has managers that "have better ways of doing things"

 

[DaveReading]

Is "it would cost me too much to employ the people to do it" an excuse to break the law?

I am rather winging it on the legal stuff here - so if I am talking rubbish then let me know

Many laws incorporate the term "reasonable" in the definition of what does or doesn't constitute an offence.

While what is or isn't "reasonable" may end up have to be tested in court, it still seems a reasonable approach to me.

 

[Fastpedaller]

I had a scam email yesterday - it was either very coincidental or someone had hacked nationwide BSoc. I'll explain......
I had a regular savings account which was about reach its 1 year anniversary, so the balance is then put in a current account paying a very low interest. No problem with that, it was in the terms when I started the account, and they also sent a notification by email a couple of weeks ago. Yesterday morning I received an email from Nationwide saying they had put the funds into a current account, and I was welcome to re-start with a new savings account after 24 hours, or (of course) invest in something else of my choice with them or a competitor.
In the afternoon, I received an email saying my latest statement is available for viewing - I could click the link on the phone to get an email. It was then I noticed the 'partial postcode' was shown as slightly different as the 5th digit was 2 instead of 0. I looked at the earlier email, and that had the correct partial postcode. They had copied every detail of Nationwide, including the text warning of suspicious correspondence. The only thing different was they hadn't used my full name (Nationwide had), but called me Mr XXXXXXX (not the usual Dear customer). It would have been easy to fall for it, and what would have happened? I reported to their phishing facility. Be careful out there.