Hey, scammers, lots of seniors are savvy

By Frank Kaiser, Special to the Times
Published November 27, 2007

We come from that distant past where neighbors helped neighbors, and strangers were always given a meal or a lift. It was a time when plenty of folks never locked their doors.

Today's seniors may be the last generation of Americans to trust one another.

What a shame, then, that such virtue is today twisted and tailored by countless scammers to pick the pockets of the elderly through charity scams, Medicare scams, Social Security scams, sweepstakes scams, counterfeit drug scams, investing scams, even scams that promise to get back money we've lost in another scam.

Judging from the thick menu of available fraudulent operations, corps of con artists scheme overtime inventing variations on two main themes:

1. Watch out!

2. Get rich quick!

Good old fear and greed. Yes, they make the world go round, keeping everything from scams to stock markets to the military-industrial complex greased and oiled.

E-mails are often the carrier of choice. On one recent morning, I got three of them that triggered "Spam Alert" alarms in my head:

- "To confirm your online banking records, click on the following link . . ."

This e-mail, supposedly from Bank of America, tells me that if I don't provide my password, Social Security and account numbers, B of A "will be forced to suspend your account indefinitely, as it may have been used for fraudulent purposes." Thing is, I don't have a Bank of America account.

- Yet another e-mail from a generous Nigerian official offers me millions of dollars if I'll only send a thousand or so "to get the processing rolling."

That anyone still falls for this hoary scam of fame and fable amazes me. But people do.

- Finally, an official-looking e-mail "from the IRS" claims that the agency has "complaints regarding the lack of reporting of pension income."

This one asks that I open an attachment to learn specifics about the investigation. The first time I received this particular invitation to be scammed, even though I receive no pension, I was so alarmed I almost fell for it. Only an innate sense of wariness and a relatively clean conscience drove me to check www.snopes.com. That's a Web site that uncovers urban myths and other false claims.

I did that before opening the attachment, a missive that I learned would plant a dangerous "Trojan Horse" in my computer, introducing invasive software.

Not to be outdone by such digital hustlers, snail-mail thieves also exhibit a smorgasbord of something for nothing. My mail on a recent day held an offer of a "Free Lunch!" at which I would learn how to make a minimum of 20 percent on my retirement savings "through the miracle of a compound interest annuity."

If only!

These crooks seem to believe that we seniors are a bunch of doddering old fools just waiting to hand over our life savings to the first smile that comes heralding improbable promises.

Crooks and politicians alike - sometimes the same person - believe that seniors are low-hanging fruit easily flimflammed.

Are we really so shallow, so gullible, that we'll fall for anything? Not in the world I inhabit.

In my world, we're all from Missouri - you have to show us. Years of experience, sometimes bitter, has taught us a thing or two. More than most, we know that if it sounds too good to be true, it truly is.

Sure, we occasionally get burned. Before the word "phishing" was coined to describe the criminal effort online to obtain computer passwords and credit cared information, I fell for an official lookinge-mail from the payment exchange operation PayPal. It asked that I reaffirm all my personal information, including my password. Being susceptible to my generation's disposition to never question authority, I followed instructions.

Then it dawned on me.

Why would PayPal ask for information it already had? I hurried to the site, at once changing my password and forwarding the e-mail to PayPal security. It was a close call, never to be forgotten.

Yes, I mourn those long-gone days of trust and innocence. But my generation's greed and neglect of the powerful idea of citizenship killed those days, perhaps forever.

But those good old days may be a product of selective recall, as mythical as rumors of senior susceptibility to scams.

Frank Kaiser is a nationally syndicated columnist who lives in Clearwater. His Web site, www.suddenlysenior.com, includes nostalgia and links to senior-focused sites. Contact him at frank@suddenlysenior.com or by writing to 2431 Canadian Way, Suite 21, Clearwater, FL 33763.

[Last modified November 26, 2007, 16:12:05]