Scams / Scammer Awareness Megathread
- Thread starter bnew
- Start date
Almost got scammed selling some stuff online.
Had a person send me their number as an interested buyer and told me to text them. I did (first mistake), and we arranged a meetup time. Then they asked if, for their safety, they could send me a six digit code (some of you already know where this is going) that I could repeat back to them to verify myself.
I said, "absolutely!" And sure enough, I got a Google Voice verification number. lol
If you're not familiar with the scam, shady people will take your phone number and try to create a Google Voice account with it. If you provide them with the 6-digit code that Google sends you, they can "verify" that they are you, and then basically use your phone number to run scams, commit fraud, etc. It's nasty business.
I called them out, blocked them, then reported them to the marketplace website and to the FTC--though, almost certainly, they were using the phone number of another poor soul to carry this out.
I used to work as a social engineer, running phishing campaigns (ethically, with consent lol), against Fortune 1000 companies to assess their level of vulnerability. Luckily for me, I was super familiar with this, but most of the people I told about it have said, "Oh, I probably would have fallen for that...", and even I set myself up for it.
So that is why I'm posting this. Please be aware of sketchy shyt like this. If someone is asking you for a verification code over SMS or email, tread with EXTREME caution. Also, it's usually pretty shady if a stranger you're already chatting with wants to move to a new platform. Not always, but if someone emails or messages you on Facebook to ask you to text them, that's a little weird. I'd had legitimate buyers/sellers do that, so it's not unheard of, but it should put you on guard.
If you buy/sell/trade online frequently, it's a good idea to use a dedicated MySudo number, VOIP number, and/or a burner phone for that.
Stay safe out there, kids.
This one goes for anyone who is involved in academic/scientific work or has their name on a book/article somewhere.
Once your name gets into the system, predatory publishers are going to show up in your inbox on a regular basis. They are going to tell you how great your work is and how much they want to publish it themselves. Ignore ALL of them.
"Predatory publishers" are publishers who are willing to put out absolutely anything, regardless of the quality, because they don't actually care about distribution numbers. Where they make their money is by charging fees to the authors. They're gassing you up and telling you how great you are, but down the line they're going to ask you for $150 or $250 or $500 for the privilege of publishing your work. They might add extra options like promotion or hardcopies or shyt and charge you even more. They don't care about making money on sales, because they ain't going to preprint jack shyt and they ain't going to put forward any costs on quality control. They're just going to list whatever manuscript you send them in their online archive and take your money. They ain't going to check your work, edit your work, promote your work, or anything. Someone could purchase it if they want to, but few will.
They basically make their money off of two group of people - new authors who don't know any better and get caught by the scam, and shytty authors who need to build their resume and have no other way of getting something into print. Everyone who matters knows this, and so getting your name in those journals/publishing houses is basically worthless. It's like paying for a mail-in degree, everyone knows its fake.
Just ignore every publisher who drops into your inbox uninvited. Legitimate outlets have other ways of procuring material (usually by waiting for authors to approach them unless there's some big bidding war going on) and aren't going to be begging to print material that someone else has already printed.
But if you really aren't sure, and want to check, then just google the journal/publisher name along with the word "predatory" and read the hits. You'll be able to figure out pretty quickly whether they're considered a predatory journal/publisher or not. If they are, tag the email as spam immediately.
Once your name gets into the system, predatory publishers are going to show up in your inbox on a regular basis. They are going to tell you how great your work is and how much they want to publish it themselves. Ignore ALL of them.
"Predatory publishers" are publishers who are willing to put out absolutely anything, regardless of the quality, because they don't actually care about distribution numbers. Where they make their money is by charging fees to the authors. They're gassing you up and telling you how great you are, but down the line they're going to ask you for $150 or $250 or $500 for the privilege of publishing your work. They might add extra options like promotion or hardcopies or shyt and charge you even more. They don't care about making money on sales, because they ain't going to preprint jack shyt and they ain't going to put forward any costs on quality control. They're just going to list whatever manuscript you send them in their online archive and take your money. They ain't going to check your work, edit your work, promote your work, or anything. Someone could purchase it if they want to, but few will.
They basically make their money off of two group of people - new authors who don't know any better and get caught by the scam, and shytty authors who need to build their resume and have no other way of getting something into print. Everyone who matters knows this, and so getting your name in those journals/publishing houses is basically worthless. It's like paying for a mail-in degree, everyone knows its fake.
Just ignore every publisher who drops into your inbox uninvited. Legitimate outlets have other ways of procuring material (usually by waiting for authors to approach them unless there's some big bidding war going on) and aren't going to be begging to print material that someone else has already printed.
But if you really aren't sure, and want to check, then just google the journal/publisher name along with the word "predatory" and read the hits. You'll be able to figure out pretty quickly whether they're considered a predatory journal/publisher or not. If they are, tag the email as spam immediately.
