r/ScamSupport

My friend is 28, and he's been dating a young African woman from Cameroon who is 26 for five months. She's a foreign student and finished her studies a year ago. She had him do a knock-on-the-door ceremony, and he says it's only to meet her family, but Google and everywhere else says it's a very serious sort of pre-engagement party. We find it very strange that four adult men who hardly know my friend would approve of this. We think it's a scam.

Weeks ago I’ve received this mail from a suppossed artist with a medical confition that causes memory loss claiming that I owed her 140$ for three art pieces, she could not figure out what payment method I’ve used, from what page I’ve contacted her to place the order (I usually do it through Twitter DMs) so I just ignored her.
Here’s the mail:

“hope you are doing well.

I’m writing to follow up regarding

the remaining payment for the artwork I completed for you in While reviewing my records recently, I noticed that an outstanding balance of amount is still pending.

I understand that this may have been overlooked over time, so I just wanted to gently bring it to your attention. I would really appreciate it if you could let me know when I may expect the settlement, or if you need any details from my side to proceed.

Thank you very much for your time, and I look forward to your response.”

After a fruitless chat where she could not prove I’ve ever placed such an order I’ve decided to just ignore her.

Now this morning I was meet with this mail from her:

“Hi,
Since I have not received a response regarding the outstanding payment despite my previous attempts to resolve this matter amicably, I have instructed my attorney to proceed with a formal legal notice. The notice will be sent to your residential mailing address.
I would still prefer to resolve this matter without further legal action. If you wish to settle the outstanding balance before the notice is issued, please contact me as soon as possible.

Thank you.”

Has anyone ever dealt with a persistent scammer like this?

UPDATE: apparently they’ve guessed my Twitter handle

Hello everyone,

I'm a student who works as a freelancer on the side.

2 months back, I got a client from instagram, name and shame, it was this guy:

https://www.instagram.com/alpha\\\_khushwant?igsh=MTV4a2R2cnZlczBpeQ==

I was working as a freelancer under an agreement, with 7k payment after a month.

The starting date was 1 May.

The contract clearly mentioned that it was only applicable for a month, but this guy still made up some BS logic that it will be carried on to the next month etc,etc,etc.

On June 5, he himself stopped sending videos to edit. The contract mentioned 60 days waiting period if I quit in between, so, I decided to wait.

Now, after 2 months, he has been blocking off my calls, messages, e-mails, even from different numbers.

What I have tried:

\\\\\\\\- DMCA takedown, 1 video was taken down as I had the master file, rest were rejected

\\\\\\\\- Cybercrime complaint, they said it was a civil matter, they can't do anything

As a student, I don't have the time or money to go through all the legal processes for civil dispute, and as the amount is 7k, which is pretty big for me, I can't just let it go.

Please advise me on what to do next, this has been a major problem for me.

Also, not giving you any ideas, but if you can spare 2 minutes of your time, you already have his account, thanks.

Coming to Reddit universe to see if anyone has experienced something like this?

I live in San Diego and I am a “Jr.” Today my dad calls and tells me that I received a FedEx package in my name that contained a Wi-Fi+Cellular iPad. The return address on the FedEx package is an industrial park in Ft Worth (so multiple businesses) and the senders phone number is showing as just random numbers…so I’ve got no idea who to contact to find out what’s the deal is. (Btw, I’ve got no unusual charges on my CCs.)

Anyone experience something like this or have suggestions on who to contact?

Throwaway account
Location: MA

So this past Saturday I was nearly taken for over 100k by someone posing to be a fraud investigator from the FDIC. It started as a normal fraud alert from my bank and snowballed into this big inside job at my local bank branch where an employee was leaking customers bank info.

Recounting the story back is quite painful the things he managed to pull over on me in the moment. During this whole debacle he had me start a Kraken account and fund it with a digital debit card number that was supposedly mine (it was not). He then had me buy 15K worth of bitcoin (I know, I’m an idiot looking back, it makes me sick) and then tried to send it to a BTC wallet he claimed was now mine.
Shortly after this is when it fell apart and we hung up, called our banks, changed passwords, ordered new cards and locked our credit.

My concern now is that I am in possession of someone else’s $15,000 in that kraken account because after looking over all of our funds, it did not come from us. What do I do here?

I have contacted and filed reports with the FTC, FBI, local law enforcement and reached out to kraken support.

My 71 year old mother doesn’t believe this person claiming to a US citizen stuck in Venezuela is a scammer those he has accepted almost $100,00 of her money and she is preparing to send another $170,000. I have contacted the FBI, the FTC, the senate committee on aging, our state’s AG and senior services, her bank. I’ve been in contact with her financial advisor and doctor and nothing can be done. We just have to watch her give everything she has away waiting for this person to show up.

Some back story, my little brother is still youngish and autistic. He joined a server called Whale exchange. They promised him it was this btc exchange to a less wealthy country therefore the price of btc was worth more than usd. They had this middleman promise. Where a middleman held the funds until the exchange was made. Turns out once he sent the btc they blocked him, kicked him from the server with countless “vouches” and the Reddit account that had sent him the invite in the first place deleted their account. The exchange rate was like $35 for 150, $70 for 400 etc. the person running the server is named “Team Treasure” with a blue diamond. The server has been seemingly around for 2 years. Once the scam was finished they nuked everything leaving only his messages. At the end of the day he lost the $300 he had saved up for a switch 2 (unrelated) but he thought would be returned of $8,000 or something like that. Feel free to AMA.

Edit: some more context my little brother is 13 and suffers from mild autism and has been basically sheltered his whole life where my family has done everything for him.

Hi - I want to help the local animal shelter in my community fight a scam YouTube account. The account is Faithful Paws Project, and it's sharing AI-generated content of shelter dogs to get donations. It lists my local shelter's physical address as its location. How do I help them get the account taken down? I've reported it a few times with no luck. Faitful Paws Project and Zamora Animal Rescue are scams.

OK, so for context I am a 17 and I mowed my neighbors property Tim for 70 bucks in hindsight should have asked for 300 bucks and every time I go over to his property to collect the money he use either not answering the door or just ignoring me. All I want is my money for mowing his lawn after I cannot weep back it down because it was 6 feet tall and I ran a strange Weedwhacker. so I’m out it all down for context on his property he has a bunch of metal and PVC pipes are laying around there and then he also has a massive dirt mound and a random ditch for no reason and I was also stung by three very nice hornets after I found a nest there and accidentally disturbed them and also has this random files metal everywhere and it was 6 foot high field field grass and field grass for context is very annoying to mow down because it is very thick and strong and I was doing this with a push mower that was with no acceleration and that constantly overheated and then I ran string for weed watcher and I almost accidentally burned the motor to death by accidentally overheating it so read it. I just need your help to figure out what I should do. And for context, I do not wanna be arrested or do anything illegal

so basically i was trying to buy a cs go cheat to play on cs go hvh servers, and i fell for this scam... He deleted all the messages and i lost my money. im under 18 and i worked for that money. help would be rreally appreciated!

https://preview.redd.it/k95rumt6z5kh1.png?width=557&format=png&auto=webp&s=5f47babd5d94197dfa4813a101688bc4b6d2e1eb

https://preview.redd.it/ts6udew7z5kh1.png?width=831&format=png&auto=webp&s=90c66c88db7cdf8a6400d9e786cb670fe4e1646e

(I'm I tried to post this on four different Reddit pages, and it won't let me post it anywhere. Please. Just someone help me! I can't think. I can't figure this out on my own. I don't have anyone to go to.)

sorry if this sounds a little rambling and confusing. I'm using the voice-to-text, and there is a lot to go through. Please don't tell me how stupid I am in the comments. I already know. I already feel horrible

I turned 18, and two days later, I decided I was going to sign up for FF (Feet finder) so I could make some money, and I wouldn't have to beg everybody for money, rides, and stuff.

That way, I would be earning something so I could help myself and contribute. But it went wrong, and I'm confused on what to do.

After I made the account, I went through looking for ways to advertise, looking at things, looking at what sells, what doesn't sell, and what other people are doing. I was watching a bunch of videos, doing a bunch of research, and just looking into everything.

Two guys texted me separately, and I sent them over to my Telegram where we started talking. Guy A asked, "Does 300 dollars twice a week sound good?"

I said, "Yes, it does."

He replied, "Okay, I'm gonna send you 1,000 dollars, and then you go get your nails done. And we'll st the allowance"

I was a little skeptical, but I said okay, and he sent over a digital check that I scanned on my phone, and it. Went through, I guess. (it's still pending, ) After he sent the money and I told him it was pending—and that I was gonna wait until I actually got it before I sent anything—he was like, "Well, with your own money that you have now, can you send a hundred dollars to this woman?" He didn't tell me her name, and I told him multiple times that I was really uncomfortable with sending him money for someone else when he had money.

We went back and forth for a good twenty minutes of me telling him that I wasn't sending a stranger money, and he was like, "She's sick. She needs surgery. She has a baby. You can't just spare a hundred dollars?" I kept telling him no, and he was like, "Can you spare fifty?"

Then I was like, "No, I can't. I don't want to send a woman I don't know money." This is the first part of the problem.

He gets really mad, and he's like, "I'm gonna report your account. I'm gonna report you. I am so over this. You have a problem. If that baby dies, it's your fault."

He starts wishing horrible things on me, and because I'm freshly eighteen, I'm shaking in my boots. I'm upset and mad. I block him, and my mom says this is fake. After taking some time to calm down, I agree.

But his attorney texts me, and he's like, "I'm so and so's attorney. You stole his money." What's going on?

I end up having a really bad panic attack in the bathroom for maybe 30 or 40 minutes. My mom calls me right as soon as it starts.

And instead of trying to comfort me, she's like scolding me already, and I'm like crying and sobbing. I'm like, I'm sorry. I didn't know what I was doing. What is gonna happen? Am I gonna go to jail? And I'm just so scared. But while this is happening, Guy B is texting me, and he's like, "I'm gonna send you a thousand dollars. You send me back five hundred, and then I'll send you two thousand." As a test of loyalty. I tell him over and over again that I don't have $500, and that maybe when the check comes, I can send him the $500 from that.

He's like, You can't just send me the money that you already have in your account, and I was like, I only really have a hundred dollars on my account. Is that okay? And he's like, Yeah, that's okay. You can send me that. And so I'm like, oh my God, how am I supposed to do that? And he's like, Do you have Zell? I was like, No, I don't have Zelle I told him, "No, I have PayPal," and he said, "I don't have PayPal. Do you have Cash App?" I said, "Yeah, but my bank isn't hooked up to my Cash App."

He started getting irritated, pressing me to send him the money. I did a bunch of stuff and sent the money to my Cash App, and then I had to transfer it into crypto for some weird reason. I sent him $97 in crypto.

Then he said, "Well, now you have to send me $200 more. I got it, but I said $500. That's what we agreed on." I kept telling him that I didn't agree on $500, and that wasn't enough, so he got really irritated.

The whole lawyer thing started happening, and I was trying to figure out what to do with both of them on two different phones. How am I supposed to Figure out what's happening with two different people at the same time, and I take a good long minute to break the conversation with Guy B to figure out what's going on with Guy A. Like I said, I had a panic attack in the bathroom. And guy B is just texting me. He's like, "You're just ignoring me. What is wrong with you? Are you talking to someone else? Can you text me back? Send me the money." And he is so mad, and I was like, "Oh my God!" I texted back. I was like, "I'm doing something really important. I'm so sorry. I can see what I can do. Once it hits my account, I'll just send it all back to you. Can we just stop doing this?" And he doesn't respond.

I go into the room after I calm down, and I decide I'm gonna go to sleep. I just can't do this right now, so I turn on Do Not Disturb on the other phone and on this phone, but I make sure that it lets my mom call me.

Ten minutes into me being a little more calm, my mom calls me, and for 15 minutes she scolds me about how stupid that decision was and how I could be so lonely. She asks what my problem is and how this could have happened if I prayed to God, saying that I just can't do all this secret stuff because look at where it's gotten me. She tells me that I need to pray, just making me feel bad. I already felt bad, but now I'm feeling worse.

And in my opinion, yes, you're supposed to make me feel bad for this. But also, you could have waited to make me feel bad when after you helped me. Because I didn't really mention it in the other paragraph, but she didn't help me when I was having a panic attack. She just sort of told me to calm down and that it was stupid, and she was like, "Why? Why would you do something like that? That was so wrong of you." She's like, "I'm gonna call you when you calm down," and she just hangs up; I have to deal with the entire swing of the panic attack by myself.

I slept it off, and in the morning I checked my phone, but Guy A's attorney didn't text me. He hasn't texted me at all.

Guy B texted me He said, "I hope you're not ignoring me. Just so you know." That's the last thing he said to me.

I'm ignoring him for multiple reasons. I get in trouble, I don't know what I'm doing, and I'm really scared. I really need money, and I'm trying to make it to get out of the situation that I'm in so I can:

1. Get myself into driving school

2. Get a car

3. Get a job

4. Get an apartment

I'm trying to do all that, but it starts with money, and it's taking me forever to find an actual place to work so I don't have to constantly beg my mom or my sister to take me places—I guess it's their job as my family, but also... Every chance my sister gets, she complains about having to take me places, about me not living with her and living with my grandma, and making it harder for her. Every chance she gets, and when I did stay with her, all she did was yell and complain and. Make you feel bad for everything, even as something as simple as I didn't do the dishes yet Was an argument with her, because she was just so controlling and irritated all the time. She was never happy, and she still isn't.

She's always in a bad mood and always on the phone. You can't get a good moment to really talk to her

.

I'm trying to figure out how to do things on my own, so I don't have to go through listening to and being around as many negative people. What I just said is going to contradict what happened late last night.

My sister called me early in the morning. She said, "I'm gonna pick you and my kids up, and then we're gonna talk."

When she got there at 10 at night, she had me come to the car by myself. We talked for a minute while we went to get my grandma's cigarettes. For one of the first times, she just talked to me; she didn't yell, and she didn't try to make me feel bad. She just talked to me, told me other solutions, and told me how she's been in that situation before and how it wasn't good.

She said, "Well, doing stuff for me and your brother benefits you. Watching our kids, watching our houses, staying around us benefits you"

But now I'm super confused on what to do. Do I just delete all my accounts and all the pictures and everything, or do I just Hold on to it because my mom said to delete it all, but my sister said, "Why would you do that? Just hold on to it because we're gonna need that." And everyone's like, "Well, don't go talking to them," but my brother is like, "Don't tell them you got the money but keep talking to them." I feel so lost and confused, and I don't know what to do or who to talk to. It just feels like it's only me.

Because this whole problem wouldn't happen if I wasn't on the internet, and I wouldn't be on the internet if I knew I could actually talk to the people who are supposed to take care of me?

This isn't a major part of what happened over the last two days, but it is important for background.

Growing up, my mom wasn't really around, so I had a tablet; that was it. I didn't talk to people for real and I got bullied in school. I found out about Discord, and it all started out pretty good, but then I would get bullied in Discord servers, just bullied in my DMs.

People hated me when I was little, and I didn't know why, and I still don't know why. I was just so detached from everything that the only place I could go for comfort was the internet—and that's the same place that made everything worse

My mom worked from Five days a week, from 3 AM to 7 pm I grew up just being around my sister and my brother; my sister had school and a daughter, and my brother had school. Everybody had their own problems, so it just felt like I was in a bubble.

I kept running back to the same place that kept hurting me because it's all I could do. I didn't have any friends; I didn't have anybody to talk to. That goes to say that I didn't grow up in a good way, so I don't blame them. I blame myself for this. But I don't know what to do. I don't know how I'm supposed to help myself. I don't know if I should keep talking to the people, not talk to them. The money has been pending for two days now, and it's still pending, and I don't know what to do, and my sister's like, "You're gonna have to get a new card. They're gonna freeze your account and take everything."

I know that's a lot. Thanks to anybody who actually has something to say, and thanks to the people who just read it.

I ordered a Macbook Pro off a website called techable yesterday and my card was charged without any fraud warnings.

Today I received an email saying:

https://preview.redd.it/5zl6lvxbyyjh1.png?width=853&format=png&auto=webp&s=71e5335e7b79e5cbc0fde1292b20d0cff4d9acb9

I did not receive a temporary authorization charge/code on my card/bank statement so I emailed back saying I did not receive one and if there was another way to verify.

They sent me this next:

https://preview.redd.it/tyukpqvdyyjh1.png?width=1511&format=png&auto=webp&s=12eecbb0a225100ea6f4abda36993af122f1a132

I did an AI Google search to see whether it was safe to send this type of screenshot, since I have never been asked to provide one after purchasing something before. Gemini told me that the request appeared to be a scam.

The email address they contacted me from is the same email address listed on the website. I also called the phone number listed on the website because I wanted to speak with someone directly. I had to leave a voicemail, but they did call me back. During the call, they told me that if I wasn't comfortable sending a screenshot of my bank account/charge or providing the confirmation code, they could instead add me on LinkedIn to verify that I am who I say I am.

I asked Gemini about the LinkedIn option as well, and it said that this could also be a continuation of the scam intended to obtain additional personal information.

My order on Shop. com currently shows "Confirmed – We are preparing these items for shipping," with an expected delivery date of 8/19. However, the email I received from Techable says they cannot ship my order until I provide the requested confirmation information or add them on LinkedIn.

I'm trying to determine whether this is a legitimate security precaution that Techable uses to protect themselves against chargebacks and fraudulent purchases, or whether someone is actually attempting to scam me.

I have already locked my card as a precaution.

Any information about this website, Techable, or whether this type of order verification is a legitimate practice would be greatly appreciated. I'd especially like to know whether anyone else has experienced being asked to provide a bank/transaction screenshot or connect with the company on LinkedIn before an order would be shipped.