[conspire] Scam du jour

[Rick Moen]

Quoting Elise Scher (elise.scher01 at gmail.com):

> Hi Rick,
>     Good for you! Yes, I get scam calls too. Just not that one yet.
>     I see from my husband's practice, he is a tax accountant, that some
> people get very scared when they receive correspondence from the IRS or
> Franchise Tax Board.

I forgot to elaborate on a couple of things:

    Caller:  Is [name of someone I've never heard of] there?
    Rick:  There's nobody by that name at this number.

One of my principles that I apply if I'm cold-called by anyone 
is that I'm not there to answer questions from strangers.
But there are polite ways to do this, and I long ago adopted the above
wording ('There is nobody by that name at this number') as a small
exception to the no-answers-to-questions-from-strangers rule if there's
a chance of an honest misdial or similar error.

This rule is also why if the stranger's question is 'Is this Rick Moen?'
or similar, what I reply isn't 'yes' but rather 'Who's calling, please?'
If you're a stranger calling my telephone, you don't get to start by
interrogating the person you called.  Your job is to identify yourself
and state your business.  You called _me_, so you need to clarify those
things before anything else happens.

    Rick:  I'm very sure that nobody signed for a grand jury summons in
           July, and also grand jury summonses don't include signature
           requirements, and also I'm very unimpressed that your Caller
           ID is from a place nowhere near San Francisco.  If you're not a
           fraud and are serious, send a letter.
   
Scammers characteristically avoid like the plague using the US Postal
Service, because they're deathly afraid of Federal postal inspectors.
So, when in doubt, 'Sorry, send it in a letter' is a useful tactic.

    Rick:  Here's what we're going to do.  You will tell me your name, for
           starters.  I'm going to look up the correct telephone number
           for the US Marshall Service at 450 Golden Gate Avenue.
           I sure hope you can be reached via the front desk, because
           that's what I'm going to call.

I might actually telephone the US Marshalls Service today, now that
they're actually open, to advise them that someone is apparently
carrying out a scam in their name (which seems a bit bold, actually). 
Of course, really all I can offer them is the times of the two calls and
a possibly completely bogus Caller ID record claiming a call source in
Salt Lake City.

    Caller:  [starts to give me a telephone number]
    Rick:  No, you aren't listening.  You're going to give me your name,
           then I'm going to call the _real_ US Marshalls Service number
           for the SF office, and in the unlikely event of you really
           working there, I'm going to be speaking to you _and_ to your
           boss, and we'll go from there.

For the same reason I don't trust without verification who the caller
says he/she is, I wouldn't trust a telephone number the caller recites
as being genuine.  Oddly enough, many people would fall for that latter
'Oh, then call back at this number' bit.

Another principle I have when I'm being cold-called is that, if I am not
certain who you are and that you are legitimate, I don't believe
anything you say without independent verification, either, _certainly_ 
including telephone numbers you tell me.

    Caller:  You listen to me, you motherfucker...

Because the goad was supposed to be the legal threat, the tactic of
starting to shout and swear was probably a last-gasp effort at putting
me back into the intended state of unthinking fear of the US Marshalls
Service.  The depressing bit is that this probably works a lot of the
time.

    The scam probably involved something like him telling me a huge fine was
    being assessed against me, but that I could settle everything
    immediately by going down to a local store and wiring money to
    somewhere, otherwise, oh noes! 

Requests to send money via Western Union or similar services should be a
huge red flag if you hear them, because the recipient and your money are
usually long gone and effectively untraceable by the time you go to the
police.