How Not to Get Caught in One of the Latest Professional Scams
by Cary and Patty ~ My Simply Sage
We’ve all dreamed of finding that perfect way to make a little extra money. Then one morning something comes along and you think maybe—just maybe—you’ve discovered a pretty good avenue.
Well, good morning. Hasn’t been a good one here. Let me tell you about something I got involved in that turned into one big giant boondoggle. Like a lot of people, I look at Facebook in the morning while having my coffee. Every now and then something pops up that catches my attention. This one was along the lines of: “Answer Questions and Make Money Training AI.” It was being promoted using the name, let’s just call it Cary’s Money Machine, for the purposes of this article. And you know what? The idea didn’t sound all that crazy. AI companies really do use people to help evaluate and train artificial intelligence. We certainly hear enough about AI these days. So the idea that somebody might pay me to answer questions and help train AI seemed entirely plausible. Maybe make a little extra money doing something interesting? Why not take a look? Ya, let’s take a look. And that’s exactly what made this thing so good, the look!
Boy, Did It Look Legitimate
The presentation was slick. There were videos, testimonials, and recognizable people. Elon Musk appeared. A fictious Greg Ellison (Just using the Larry Ellison name, one of the co-founders of Oracle), appeared to be involved. Other people talked about the opportunity and how much money could supposedly be made. Except there was one little problem. At least some of what I was seeing wasn’t what it appeared to be. But boy, did they look good. That’s something we all need to understand about today’s scams. Artificial intelligence has changed the game. A video can look real. A voice can sound real. A photograph can look real. A testimonial can sound completely believable. And none of those things, by themselves, prove anything anymore. I consider myself a pretty skeptical person about things on the internet. I’m usually looking for the catch. This one got past me. Not because I believed somebody was going to make me a millionaire by Tuesday. It got past me because the basic story sounded reasonable. That’s a big difference.
The Clues Were There
Looking back, there were warning signs. Big ones. I just didn’t stop long enough to put them together.
Clue #1: Why Am I Paying You?
Eventually the program wanted $147 from me. Think about that for a minute. The whole proposition was that they were going to pay me to answer questions and help train artificial intelligence. Yet before they could pay me…I had to pay them. Should have been my first big warning sign. If somebody is offering you work—answering questions, reviewing information, training AI or completing simple online tasks—why do you have to give them money before they’ll pay you? There may be legitimate businesses that charge for training, memberships or services, so an upfront charge doesn’t automatically prove fraud. But, when the proposition is supposedly “We’ll pay you to work” and the next sentence is “First, give us your credit card,” the bells should start ringing. Mine should have been ringing louder.
Clue #2: You’ve Got Five Minutes!
Then came another huge clue:
Forced urgency.You know the drill. “This offer expires soon.” “Only five minutes remaining.” “Act now.” “Only a few spots left.” There’s a reason for that countdown clock. They don’t want you to stop. Because stopping gives you time to think. And thinking gives you time to investigate. The funny part is that the five minutes they were giving me to make a decision was probably about four minutes longer than I should have needed to start finding reasons not to make it.
Then Came the $147
I paid the $147 using my bank credit card. Almost immediately, the bank threw up a fraud alert. My wife came in and asked: “Did you just make this charge?” I said yes. And believe it or not, that simple question finally triggered something in my mind. Wait a minute. Why is the bank questioning this? Maybe I better go check this thing out a little more carefully. So I did. Not by continuing to watch their videos. Not by reading more of their testimonials. I left their presentation and started independently looking into what I had just bought. And things began looking very different.
And Then They Wanted Another $256
After the $147 came another offer. This time they wanted $256 for an upgrade. By then the little bells in my head were starting to clang. The whole fire department was coming down the street. I tried to complete the $256 transaction. In somewhat of a daze, I wonder what was going on and again the Bank sent a fraud alert. Now there wasn’t much question in my mind. I had a problem. Something is wrong here!
And then Clue #3: I Stopped Listening to Them and Started Looking for Myself
This may be the most important lesson from the entire experience. When you’re considering any online money-making opportunity, leave their website for a few minutes. Open another browser window. Search for the company yourself. Don’t use the links they give you. Search the company name along with words such as scam, fraud, complaints, reviews and legitimate. Find out who actually owns the business. Find out whether the people supposedly endorsing it really do. And when you’re dealing with a name like “Cary’s Money Machine”, there’s another problem. There can be legitimate companies, products and organizations using similar names that have absolutely nothing to do with the advertisement you saw. That can make something questionable look legitimate when it isn’t connected to the legitimate company at all. A few minutes of independent research can tell you an awful lot. And here’s the part I won’t forget: They gave me five minutes to hurry up and buy. I should have used those five minutes to investigate them instead.
Okay, Call the Bank
Simple enough, right? Call the bank, explain what happened, dispute the $147 charge and get on with Sunday. Not quite. I called the number on the back of my credit card—which, by the way, is exactly what you should do especially if you think something fraudulent has happened. Don’t call some customer-service number supplied by the company you’re questioning. Call the number printed on the back of your card. So I called. The wait was something like an hour. An hour on hold? Are you kidding me? Fortunately, they offered to call me back. Great idea. Except I had forgotten one tiny little detail.
My iPhone Was Protecting Me
I have unknown callers blocked on my iPhone 15 Pro. It’s a great feature. MOST of the time. Not today. The bank tried calling me back from a number my phone didn’t recognize. And my wonderful little electronic protector did exactly what I had told it to do. Sent them straight to voicemail. So now I’m trying to reach the bank to straighten out a fraudulent charge, the bank is trying to reach me, and my phone is standing in the middle saying:
“Nope. Don’t know you.
“Eventually I got through again. A very nice lady named Shirley came on the line. She explained that she needed to verify things about me and said she would call me right back at this number. The cellphone I was currently talking to her on. “Okay,” I said.
We hung up. Guess what? Call blocking was still on. Straight to voicemail. At this point the whole Sunday morning was starting to resemble a Laurel and Hardy movie.
I did finally manage to get in contact with the bank, but…
Another Lesson I Didn’t Expect
When my wife received the original fraud alert and asked whether I had made the $147 transaction, I said yes. Because I had. At that moment I believed it was legitimate. That complicated things. The charge couldn’t simply be treated as somebody stealing my card and using it without my knowledge. I had authorized the original transaction. So I had to wait until the $147 charge actually posted to my account and then dispute it. In my case, I apparently didn’t receive what I was supposed to receive, so the charge may be reversed. But don’t assume that’s always going to happen. Sometimes you may end up eating the charge and considering it tuition for a class you really didn’t want to take. And there may be another consequence. If your credit-card information has been compromised, you may need a replacement card. So, the old card gets canceled and a new card number is issued. A new number Geeze…Now you get the pleasure of changing your card number everywhere the old card was being used, subscriptions, automatic payments, online accounts and whatever else you’ve forgotten about. Sure ruins the better part of a Sunday. And probably some of Monday too.
So What Did I Learn?
After finally getting all of this straightened out, I came away with a few things worth remembering and passing on.
There Really, REALLY Isn’t Easy Money
There are legitimate ways to make money on the internet. People make money from websites. Videos. Freelancing. Online businesses. Teaching. Consulting. And yes, there are legitimate opportunities involving artificial intelligence. But making meaningful money generally requires time, effort and learning. If somebody promises a large amount of money quickly for very little effort, stop. Especially if they want your money first.
Professional Doesn’t Mean Legitimate
This is probably the biggest change we all need to understand. The scam I encountered didn’t look stupid. It looked good, really good. That’s why it worked. We’re entering a world where seeing and hearing someone on a screen is no longer enough to prove that person actually said what you’re watching. So don’t use the quality of the presentation as evidence that the business behind it is legitimate.
When Your Bank Says “Are You Sure?”—STOP, THINK
My bank’s fraud alert may have saved me from losing considerably more money. When your bank suddenly questions a transaction, don’t automatically click ‘Yes’ just because you recognize the purchase. Stop for a minute. Ask yourself: Why is my bank suspicious? Then do a little investigating before going any further. And for goodness sake… Know What Your Phone Is Doing. And here’s one I certainly won’t forget. If you’re dealing with your bank, credit-card company, doctor’s office, insurance company or anybody else who needs to call you back—and your phones current settings blocks or silences unknown callers—temporarily turn that feature off. Finish your business with whoever. Then turn it back on. Simple. That little piece of knowledge would have saved me a couple hours of frustration.
And what am I’m taking away from this experience?
STOP. SEARCH, AND THEN SPEND YOUR MONEY IF YOU FEEL CONFIDENT ENOUGH.
BUT, Before giving an unfamiliar online company your money: STOP. Don’t let their countdown clock make your decision for you. SEARCH. Leave their website and investigate them independently. If everything checks out, fine. But if they’re telling you that you don’t have enough time to investigate before the opportunity disappears, you may have just discovered the best reason not to give them your money.
And Today’s Simply Sage Tip
Our newer cellphones and computers have an amazing number of useful features. The problem is that a feature designed to make life easier can occasionally make life more complicated if we don’t understand what it’s doing. So every now and then, learn one more thing your phone can do. Not twenty things. Just One. Learn how to turn unknown-caller blocking on and off or learn how to enlarge the text. Just one simple thing at a time. There’s plenty of information out there.
P.S. One Last Thought
I’m writing about this because I got caught. That’s actually the point.
I’m normally pretty skeptical about this stuff. Yet this one looked professional enough and sounded plausible enough that I went along with it—at least for a while. The people running these schemes are getting better. The technology they’re using is getting better. So maybe we have to get a little better too. Don’t be embarrassed if something fools you. Stop it as soon as you realize what’s happening.Contact your bank. Protect your accounts. Figure out what went wrong. Then pass along what you learned.
And if my lousy Sunday morning keeps somebody else from losing $147—or considerably more—at least something useful came out of the whole boondoggle.