this post was submitted on 17 Mar 2024
207 points (99.1% liked)

Asklemmy

43986 readers
748 users here now

A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions

Search asklemmy ๐Ÿ”

If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!

  1. Open-ended question
  2. Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
  3. Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
  4. Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
  5. An actual topic of discussion

Looking for support?

Looking for a community?

~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_[email protected]~

founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[โ€“] [email protected] 46 points 8 months ago (2 children)

We forget that on the other end of scams are real people with real problems, morals, and lives. The person on the other end of your scam probably started to feel bad and helped you out. And likely that person is being forced into performing these scams on people.

There's an excellent "Search Engine" podcast episode about this that came out recently called "Who's behind these scammy text messages we've all been getting." It's well worth a listen because it dives into all the slavery and human trafficking involved in modern scams that people aren't aware of.

[โ€“] [email protected] 14 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

The especially vile thing about these scam centers is that often they trick normal people just trying to find work and support their family. They steal their passport and then hold them hostage with slave labour.

[โ€“] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (3 children)
[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Look up "pig butchering" by John Oliver. Yes, this is the technical term for it.

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

The podcast goes much more in depth than Oliver did. But they're both good content.

[โ€“] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

https://pjvogt.substack.com/

That's the website, but it's not rendering for me for some reason.

Here's a PocketCast link:

https://pca.st/podcast/cb2108e0-8619-013a-d7f7-0acc26574db2

[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

Not the one you asked for, but another interesting episode on the topic: https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/141/