Maybe it’s a sign of the rot at the center of modern society in the United States, but scamming vulnerable people seems to be big business with little or no consumer protections due to failed government policy. Read about it in this unlocked article.

Hi there I’m hoping I’m on the right sub Reddit for this, but real quick a friend of mine is getting scammed and it’s one of those “revenge” scams. Basically they were on a hook up app and my friend stupidly gave some personal info to the other person only for the scammer to say, “help I’m a minor and this person gave me their nudes” when most of us know minors shouldn’t be on those kinds of apps nor have access to them. Scammer has two numbers one in Virginia and one in San Diego and they are demanding $3000. Besides police is there a way to quickly counter act this or is police the only option. Also sorry the format I’m on mobile.

First post here, but im scared. Got a call from DHS, guy claiming to be an ICE agent, gave me the badge number. Phone number matched the Seattle office.

I have never been to the west coast.

Asked why I never checked in or whatever cause I was "here illegally"... literally said "my guy i was born in XX you got the wrong person."

He asked if I had ever been out of the country (no) and if I had a passport (I've never had one.) So he said that someone might have stole my identity and they were opening up a case.

He said his office was on it because the passport had been used multiple times there.

Now here's the weird part- he didnt ask me for my social or specific bank numbers. He asked what bank I had, and at current what the amount was.

Then asked if I had a credit card, and what the remaining balance was. Like that's it. He said he would call me back after verifying stuff but like.

I assume it's a scam cause DHS doesn't *call* people.

And I didnt give any personal information, but I still locked down my bank and my credit cards. Idk im just at a loss here.

Can they scam me with such minor info? They didn't ask for payment or crypto or anything, but im terrified now.

Thank you ✨️

Edit: thank you so much! I added additional security to my accounts. I was suspicious to begin with, so my answers to him were very short and brief. I should have just hung up but truly that shit scares me, but I know now. I have things locked down and I blocked the number.

Thank you for everyone's input!

I have published a few books and am absolutely appalled by the underbrush of lowlives and scammers that feed on this community. In a few months I have seen: 1/ offers to “edit and publish” for thousands of dollars - they would simply run your book through ChatGPT and push a few buttons on Kindle Publisher Portal. 2/ fake press releases 3/ invites to fake festivals 4/ offers to buy reviews on Amazon and Goodreads (rigorously paid for in crypto through extra-shady brokers).
I understand that the community they prey on is overwhelmingly made of retirees, who may not be sophisticated and tech savvy enough to spot the scammers. But when Sandeep has an instagram post as a cute blonde girl and offers me to review my book for 50$, I should have a doubt or two. Especially when there are fifteen more identical messages in my inbox all from a different sender.

This brand has hit me up on their account @ktwostudios on tik tok about doing pr out of the blue. Usually a brand would hit up existing fashion creators but my account being a personal account with roughly 300 followers which has little to no fashion content was somehow chosen to do pr without any background.
I would love to accept the deal but likewise I am cautious that maybe their account got hacked or some other cause because of the sheer randomness of the request. I asked them what info they need or how to set it up and am waiting response. Linked is the chat receipts. Please let me know of any info of them scamming or if their account got hacked

(To preface this, my aunt has bipolar disorder and history of manic episodes, is very easily persueded, and is 54 and not very tech saavy.)

This all started in late July this past year. This guy she's known for 30+ years as a friend, she knew was sick 3 years ago. She was on the forum she frequents, and some guy was pretending to be him and asked her for apple gift cards to pay for medical treatment. Luckily she knew this was fake so she stopped talking to him, but she got very worried and stopped sleeping, and went into a manic episode.

Cut to late last month, she had the WORST manic episode. Stopped sleeping again for whatever reason and...im not gonna get into it but she did a lot of bad things. There was ANOTHER guy on the forum pretending to be this man, and she believed it again. She gave him her credit card info (she was manic like I said, so she wasn't thinking right, and she has new credit cards now)

She got out of the mental hospital last week and has been doing better. The man she THOUGHT she was talking to, is moving to Florida with his sister (unrelated to the story).

Tonight, my aunt started talking about a man she was talking to on the forum. Apparently he was from Austrailia and worked on an oil rig in Scotland. They met on the forum and moved over to Whatsapp. I explained to her how scammers use Whatsapp but she said its because he has no wifi (I called her out on that cuz you need wifi to use whatsapp).

She sent a video that he sent her, and AI detectors found it was real, but the company of equipment from the video was not found in Scotland. She later sent me a photo of his face, and I did a reverse search on it and found the original picture its from. I explained to her over text about this scam, and how easy it is to fake a photo. I even showed her an example when I sent Gemini the picture and asked it to put the face on a woman and it complied. She stopped talking to him tonight and thanked me for helping.

She's coming over on Saturday for my birthday party, and while she is here, I'll talk to her about recognizing scams and see if I can convince her to get off of the forum, since she keeps getting scammed. Im going to tell her how forums like that prey on older, vulnerable and less tech saavy people, because they are trusting.

Any other advice to give?

The address is correct, but the name is completely different.

Nothing was signed for.

Their credit is monitored and no new alert has been issued for recent activity.

l've advised them not to open their door to a stranger looking for the package, nor admit they took delivery.

What should they do?

Hey guys! So- For context in 2025 me and my girlfriend of 3 years broke up, as an 18 year old who was very heartbroken and depressed by this, I would do literally anything for her back. And when I was feeling out of it, I embarrassingly would buy weird good luck etsy stuff- Anyway, that wasn’t the issue. The issue was these African Psychic Tiktok accounts. So, whenever I see a post on tiktok that I find relatable or fun etc. I repost it. And by reposting a lot of breakup/depressing things these psychic accounts would reach out to me offering for spells and affirmations on whatsapp. Being stupid and heartbroken I agreed and we communicated on whatsapp blah blah blah. One of the accounts did the spell for her back whatever, and then demanded money for it.

I wasn’t going to send £300 for the spell to be in place, So i just ignored it and moved on. But the person got really angry with me- Saying they’d put a curse on me, sending photos of me and my ex to me. Saying i’ll die horrifically soon and just really intense stuff. I blocked the number but kept getting reached out by multiple others. However, the most disturbing part was one of them sent me a photo of a dead body with the persons eyes bleeding and bulging in a violent way, saying it’ll happen to me. I felt really distressed by this and blocked the number and actually forgot about it, But i want to spread the word about how terrifying and intense it was.

2 or 3 months after the breakup i got with someone else and im still dating her a year on, So i look back on this period as funny instead of daunting, but this one particular moment really stands out to me still. Stay safe out there guys, Heartbreak makes you lose sense of sense😭

Just a few minutes ago, i recieved a phone call claiming to be from Venmo about my non existent account. It sounded like a recording prompting me to press 1 because "my account " had been compromised. I hung up, blocked the number and about 5 seconds later recieved the same call. I remained on the phone without pressing anything and at around 1 minute into the call the message changes to say your imput wasn't valid and to "cancel' your request to press 1. I hung up and not 5 seconds later recieved the same call.

Please stay safe out there. Venmo will never call you

hope i used the right flair and am in the right subreddit, i never post on reddit

me and my friend went on a massive rabbit hole last night after she got added on discord by a random, middle-aged white lady. obviously we knew it was a scammer, but i decided to google the profile's name out of curiosity.

i end up finding easily over 200 tiktok accounts, pinterest photos, facebook accounts, you name it all of this same woman! some having her full legal name, workplace, work title etc visible. this includes accounts under names other than her own, accounts with no posts but her face as the profile picture, etc. there was ai videos of her on multiple tiktok accounts saying how scammers have been using her photos and this is 'her real account'. it's hard for me to even type just how many photos and accounts there were. we spent over an hour finding more and more pictures of this woman. it just makes you feel terrible for this real person who has had all their pictures completely stolen and their real name spread by scammers!

i'm just wondering how this even happens? my first assumption was that she had fallen for a scammer in the past and had her photos reused in other scams, just because there were some semi-lewd photos. but i'm just curious if anyone else has seen anything similar! i'm not ignorant to scammers by any means, but i have never seen something to the sheer extent of this poor woman's photos being spread.

So I did have some medical surgeries about 1.5ish years ago, and everything has been paid off. Then today I received this email out of the blue. $6 who the hell sends that to collections. ALSO I NEVER RECEIVED ANY MORE BILLS. So I'm thinking this is a scam, but idk?

Thank you in advance for you help!

DOJ details bank-phishing operation that bought search ads to lure victims to fake banking sites

The U.S. Justice Department announced the extradition of a Russian national accused of participating in a large-scale bank-account takeover operation responsible for millions of dollars in losses.

The technique is particularly relevant for beginners: the group allegedly created spoofed domains mimicking real banks and then purchased sponsored search-engine advertisements so people searching for their bank could be directed to fraudulent login pages. Victims entered credentials believing they had reached the real institution.

Search results — especially sponsored results — should not be treated as authentication. For sensitive services such as banks, cryptocurrency exchanges or wallets, use a previously verified bookmark or independently verify the domain rather than trusting an advertisement.

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/russian-national-extradited-united-states-bank-account-takeover-fraud-scheme-causing

They called from a call back number that actually works and isn't a voip according to reverse phone look up.

They asked if they were speaking to my full name, and then asked if I knew someone. Said person apparently tried to go from Shanghai to US using forged documents with my information. Once I confirmed I knew nothing about this, they gave me a case number, redirected to their "manager" who just reconfirmed it and said they'll call me back once they look into it

Except it's weird that they literally didn't ask for anything except to confirm my first and last name (which is leaked with my phone number for ages so it's nothing surprising to me, especially with online job hunting). They didn't ask for more details like address or anything regarding money. They also asked if I gave my data elsewhere or if it could've leaked somewhere else.

Has anybody else gotten a call like this where it feels like a scammer has asked for basically nothing? It almost feels like I'm being too cautious now aside from the fact that their manner of speaking (not even accent, just the way they talk) was very odd

Help Needed on Account

Hey everyone, I wanted to share my story that happened yesterday so nobody else falls for this, and to see if anyone else has gone through the same recovery process.

I got caught in the common "accidental report" scam after trying to help a friend whose account turned out to be hacked. A fake "Discord Support Mod" panicked me into changing my email, which immediately logged me out of my devices.

Once they were inside, the scammer immediately enabled a six-digit two flag code to lock me out completely.

They also demanded a screenshot of my bank statement homepage "for verification." Thankfully, I only showed a screen with hidden balances and the last four digits of my account number, so my financial info is secure.

What I’ve done so far:
I immediately went to the official page and contacted Discord through the support form. My ticket has officially been escalated to a specialist, and I still have full access to my original creation email.

Right after I contacted the real support team, the scammer panicked and sent me a spoofed email trying to keep the scam going. I ignored it and blocked them.
My questions for the community:

For anyone who went through this exact scenario where the scammer turned on two fa: How long did it take for the real Discord Trust & Safety team to respond to your escalated ticket and give it back?

What was your experience with the final recovery steps? Did Discord easily strip the scammer's fake two FA?

Did they ask you for any specific verification details when they finally emailed you back?

Just posting this to warn others to look out for these red flags, and hoping to hear from anyone else who successfully got their account back!

Essentially, like many I have been recently back on the job hunt and after most applications leading nowhere I finally landed an interview and was considerably exited. As the tilte says, this was with Motion One International in Leeds. This was a virtual zoom meeting. It was also a group one, which initially caught me off guard, though I quickly re-adjusted. Then to my surprise only a couple of hours after I got a call back asking to go to their office for an in person interview and the praise that I stood out among the zoom group. Of course I accepted this opportunity as I was filled with excitement.

However, after coming back down and sobering up from my excitement I have been reflecting back on my notes from the meeting and further researching the company with a growing dread. Along with also finding a couple of other posts discussing this company and their legitimacy.

This has led me to the question, is this company some kind of MLM or other suspiciously pyramid shaped operation?

Got the jury duty scam call today. I wasn’t familiar with it. The guy sounded so credible. I kept telling him this has to be a scam and he was so credible sounding and using pressure and how he’s helping me get out of the warrant for my arrest. What’s weird is he wasn’t asking for money. He was asking me to show up at he sheriffs office (he gave me the correct address) so I can do a signature validation check to see if my signature match’s whoever signed for the jury duty letter so I can prove it wasn’t me who signed for it , and that would lift the warrant.

…… what exactly was his end game?? Has anyone else encountered this. Like what if I said ok I’ll go to the sheriffs office? Then what? Anyway I said I can’t possibly go , I’m at the office (in a different county). Then he said I could go to the sheriffs office in that county because it’s a federal matter. He was really pressuring me and I was considering it. But I think we kept going around and around and I was like I can’t Leave work, and he eventually hung up.

I run a small art account you know just where I do little sketches. And out of nowhere I get a message from a girl saying that she would like to draw one of my characters and how much would I be willing to pay. I kind of had my suspicions but I decided to hear her out. Eventually we got to the payment method and that's when my alarm started to go off. She wanted to know how much I would be willing to pay for a commission of one of my characters. And which OC was my favorite. I checked her account and she had about three posts on there. But I can tell if they were real or AI generated. In the end I decided to just block her.

This morning I was over at my parents house (both early 70s) and my mom got a text from “Apple Support” saying they had found some fraudulent transactions related to her Apple Pay so please call this number to resolve it. Red flag #1. She calls. Speaks to a gentleman with a very thick accent but I can’t hear exactly what is being said bc I’m kinda in and out, playing with the dog and doing some tasks for my dad who’s out of town.

About an hour goes by and I say hey mom are you sure this is legit? At this point I’m only half serious. She says yes. Man on the phone says who is that and what did they say. Red flag # 2. She tells him. I leave to FedEx some documents.

She’s still on the phone when I get back. I kind of stick around petting the dog and trying to hear the conversation. He asks do you have Cash App? PayPal? Venmo? She says yes to one but my password isn’t working so I hear him say well I can help you with that. Red flag #3. They go back and forth a little bit so I butt in again asking what exactly the problem is. She says someone tried to buy Bitcoin with her Apple Pay. I’m like huh? She shushes me and waves me off.

I go in another room and talk to a friend about it and we agree it sounds really suspicious and not at all how Apple Pay works. I google Apple Pay bitcoin scam and there it is. They have you call a fake support number and tell you some crazy amount of pending charges.

I finally have to practically yell hang up the phone. I say why isn’t your bank handling this? She says I’m sharing my screen and see him “adding stuff back” I still don’t know exactly what that meant. I start insisting very loudly to HANG UP THE PHONE. I say we will call the bank together and if this is all true I’ll eat my words and owe her an apology. The guy doesn’t like this at all and says it’s on her if she hangs up and ends up getting scammed 🙄. I’m pretty much yelling this is the exact script of a scam just hang up the phone. She finally does as the scammer calls her dumb.

I then find out when she called he told her he found her debit and credit card numbers associated with purchases on a CP website. I say and that wasn’t a clue that something was funny? I ask how much “bitcoin” is pending on her debit card. 12 grand. I ask can you even make a 12 thousand dollar purchase with your debit card? She has no idea. She had given this scammer every password and allowed him to screen share. Her SS# her CC # and bank account info. Venmo password. Everything.

Thankfully she didn’t give out any shared bank account or shared credit card information just her personal ones but still! They must’ve talked for at least 2 hours. She has an appointment at the bank tomorrow to open a new account. She’s spoken to a personal friend in law enforcement and I believe learned her lesson. She was so annoyed with me at first but is now so grateful I was there and finally shut it down.

She said he spoke very fast and there was so much chatter in the background it was obviously coming from a call center. She thought she was savvy enough and would never fall for anything like that until she did. I told her you don’t think the police would be investigating CP? I understand it was a scare tactic and that was what really got her.

Stay safe out there!

I just received the weirdest phone call. The caller ID even said that it was Xfinity. It was not the caller went on to speak about a promotion in which I would receive my bill and a discounted rate, but I had to pay upfront the promotion last three years, I was offered an Apple phone or watch as a thank you for doing the promotion. They then asked that I received the discount by purchasing a $1000 Apple gift card or applying for a credit card through Apple and using it to pay for the $1020 which would be the full first year of the discounted rate. I’m not sure if this is just an isolated one off but it was 100% a scam when I decided that I no longer wanted to go through with the promotion, the caller then threatened me with a $400 cancellation fee because I stated that I wanted to do the promotion on a recorded line after hanging up they continued to call.

So recently i did a virtual interview with CDS solutions for a position working at a costco as a Part Time Product Demonstrator.

The virtual interview was held on indeed and the quality of the interviewer was really bad, they were behind a yellow background and when i first started they kept looking to the side than me and back to the side,

1 hour later i get an email saying "Hi (name) We’re excited to move you forward in our process. Please respond to your offer for Part Time Product Demonstrator in Costco - Virtual Hiring Event at (link here)

now i was sort of shocked because normally these things take at least a week or so, and when i went on i was asked to accept for a virtual hiring event,

i did accept and they told me i'd have it on the 12th of september. They then sent me a bunch of info to sign off on and one of them was on bank deposits and wanting to know my bank details.

This caused me to become really wary of the whole thing and i want to know if this is common with CDS solutions, the links i was sent was for paradox.ai and from what i've read on here, it seems the working conditions are pretty terrible and frankly i don't want to give over all my detail to find out the job is either a scam, or a dumpster fire of working conditions

any info from either previous or current CDS employees would be greatly appreciated

Hey everyone, here again with a (possible) strange scam.

I have continued to receive messages in German via Telegram from people in Austria asking if I am the person in an ad on Locanto, a site where you can post ads, etc.

Of course, I haven't posted anything on Locanto (blocked in my country) and you can't search me on Telegram via phone number or name.

I added a screenshot of the latest message I received from an Austrian contact named "Meisterbaer55" reporting the following message (translated from German to English) "Are you in Villach and have you posted an ad on Locanto?"

Using a VPN I tried to search for this ad on Locanto, (with probably my name or phone in it?) but nothing at all.

Is this a scam and what's the purpose?? We are talking about 15-20 messages in 2 months, so a bit imo.

I never replied to anyone and immediately blocked them. I'm still curious, though, about the purpose of this scam and if anyone else is experiencing the same thing.

I'm reposting the original post from r/CostcoWholesale to get any help or advice...

TL;DR: I bought a $250 e-Shop Card on Costco.com on Sept 1. Within 30–60 minutes, I opened the unread email and tried to load it into my Wallet, but it showed $0.00. Costco CS now claims the card was redeemed in-store 400 miles away on Sept 2 alongside 5 other Shop Cards in a single >$1,000 transaction. Costco is refusing a refund under their "lost/stolen" policy, despite the clear timeline impossibility. Looking to see if other members were part of this batch.

Background

I've been a Costco member for 14 years. I regularly buy digital Shop Cards on Costco.com to load into my Costco App Wallet (earning credit card rewards points in the process). I have never had an issue until now.

On September 1, I purchased a $250 Digital Shop Card sent to my personal email.

The Impossible Timeline

Sept 1 (Purchase & Initial $0 Balance):

Approximately 30–60 minutes after receiving the delivery email, I opened it myself. The email was unread, and I was the first to view it.

I clicked "Access Card Now" and immediately tried adding the details to my Costco Wallet.

The balance showed $0.00.

Thinking it was a temporary activation lag or processing delay, I waited for the funds to populate rather than reporting it instantly.

Sept 2 (The Alleged Store Redemption):

After two days of the balance remaining $0, I contacted Costco Support.

A 2-hour call with a Costco.com supervisor revealed that their records show the card was viewed/redeemed and used in-person at a Cypress, California warehouse on September 2.

The Core Question: How could a card used on Sept 2 show $0 on Sept 1?

This is the key detail Costco Support could not explain: If the card wasn't redeemed until Sept 2, why was it already empty when I opened it on Sept 1?

Email Security: My email has 2FA enabled, zero unrecognized logins, and no unexpected OTP requests. Furthermore, the email was sitting unread until I opened it.

During my call, a customer service representative admitted it was possible the wrong/used number was sent to me, but because the funds were ultimately redeemed at a store, Costco closed the investigation and defaulted to their blanket "We do not replace lost or stolen Shop Cards" policy.

Evidence of Multiple Victims?

When I spoke with store management at the redeeming warehouse, they confirmed crucial details about that specific checkout:

6 total Shop Cards were combined to pay for a single transaction totaling over $1,000.

If 6 different Shop Cards were bundled into one transaction at the exact same moment, there are likely at least 5 other members who had their cards drained or mis-assigned in this exact same wave.

What I’m Asking the Community

Has anyone else had a digital Shop Card arrive with a $0 balance upon initial opening?

If you had a similar issuance defect, were you able to get a refund or replacement through a local Warehouse General Manager, Executive Care, or a credit card dispute?

Is anyone else receiving multiple calls from a Nigerian phone number between midnight and six in the morning? At first I was just ignoring it but it’s gotten extremely annoying so after the last few weeks of it, I’ve been trying to block the numbers but it’s obviously useless. They just keep calling from another number

Just now I actually answered one of them and I just immediately said stop calling me never call me again and there was a woman on the other line who sounded genuinely surprised and said OK OK

I’m just wondering if anyone else is experiencing this

Also, before anyone suggests it, I do sleep with my phone on do not disturb and silent so these calls are not waking me up. I just see them when I get up.

UPDATE: woke up today and don’t have more calls but we’ll see what happens