PayPal Impostor Scam Steals Priest's Life Savings

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[00:00:01] Bob: This week on The Perfect Scam.

[00:00:03] Fr. Robert Banzin:  I googled it, and I found a phone number for PayPal. They emailed me and they would call me each day to tell me how are things going. Now my money is saved. Don't worry, PayPal took care of everything for you. I said, "Well this other money that I bought the bitcoins, when am I going to get that money back?" They said, "Oh, you'll get it back, don't worry about it."

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[00:00:31] Bob: Welcome back to The Perfect Scam. I'm your host, Bob Sullivan. Father Robert Banzin has devoted his whole life to the service of others. The retired Chicago area priest spent many years as a teacher and even into his 80s he still teaches every Sunday with a carefully crafted homily that he spends all week preparing. That keeps him young, he told me. Okay, so why am I talking about a priest on The Perfect Scam? Well, criminals target anyone and everyone and recently, Father Bob, as former students and parishioners call him, got an alarming email saying his PayPal account had been used for purchase on eBay. It was fraud, he was told, and within weeks pretty much every penny of this humble man's humble life savings had been stolen. But this story has a happy ending because former students Father Bob hadn't heard from in decades came running to the rescue. Let's meet Father Bob.

[00:01:34] Fr. Robert Banzin: Father Robert Banzin, Catholic priest in the Archdiocese of Chicago. I'm retired now but I still work on Sundays. I do Mass on Sundays which I enjoy doing to keep my mind going, you know to prepare a, you know prepare a homily. A homily hopefully that makes sense to the community. So that's what I like doing.

[00:01:54] Bob: One of the things I read about you is that right when you finish Mass on Sunday, you already start thinking about next Sunday's homily.

[00:02:00] Fr. Robert Banzin: Right, right. Yeah, I start on Monday morning, you know, and look at the readings and see how they hit me. I use the old thing I learned in seminary from way, way back is you hold the newspaper in one hand, I should say the internet in one hand today, and the Bible in the other hand and then you see what happens.

[00:02:20] Bob: Father Bob preaches at St. Mary Church in St. Paul VI Parish in Riverside, Illinois, a Chicago suburb. And as you can tell, he doesn't take himself too seriously. I spoke to him right before the Christmas holiday which was going to be his 60th Christmas as a priest.

[00:02:39] Bob: I hope your Christmas season isn't too busy.

[00:02:41] Fr. Robert Banzin: No, it isn't now that I'm retired, but I, I’m still working on my Christmas homily. I said, "God, what could I say, I, this is even my 60th Christmas homily."

[00:02:52] Bob: Oh my gosh.

[00:02:53] Fr. Robert Banzin: What could I say that I haven't said before? And I don't like repeating, Bob, I like to try to find a fresh approach, you know a deep, a different approach, but it's kind of hard for Christmas.

[00:03:05] Bob: (chuckles) You know I'll be that 12th Christmas homily was really good.

[00:03:09] Fr. Robert Banzin: Yes.

[00:03:10] Bob: Good enough to do it again.

[00:03:11] Fr. Robert Banzin: I should have kept them all, but I didn't.

[00:03:13] Bob: (laughs)

[00:03:14] Bob: So I can tell you have a, the heart of a teacher too. So can you just tell me a little bit more about what you were teaching?

[00:03:20] Fr. Robert Banzin: Basically theology and uh, what I would call cultural course of like trying to understand film today in, in those days, you know. The biggest one I used was Cool Hand Luke all the time, (chuckles) if you remember that ancient film.

[00:03:37] Bob: And how were you teaching?

[00:03:38] Fr. Robert Banzin: High school students.

[00:03:40] Bob: High school students, so like kids who are teenager, young teenagers.

[00:03:42] Fr. Robert Banzin: Right, right.

[00:03:44] Bob: Father Bob, the teacher, became Father Bob the student recently when, well it all started with a surprise message he got from PayPal.

[00:03:54] Fr. Robert Banzin: But I did get an email saying that I spent maybe 45 or 50 dollars on PayPal. And I realized I do have PayPal, but I only use it rarely, maybe once or twice. I said, I can't, I don't know what this charge is.

[00:04:12] Bob: Alarmed, Father Bob goes right to his computer to try to figure out what is going on.

[00:04:18] Fr. Robert Banzin: So what I did, I tried to reach PayPal. I didn't know how to find them so I googled it, and I found, and I, and up came a phone number for a PayPal. And so someone answered, "PayPal, can we you help you," so forth and so on." I told them my story, and they said they would check into it, and uh they said they would give me to a supervisor. Now in the background I heard voices, I heard typewriters and everything seemed so legitimate.

[00:04:48] Bob: So after a few moments, a new person gets on the phone and says he's a PayPal supervisor.

[00:04:54] Fr. Robert Banzin: I was told that my bank account has been compromised and they will help me get, get the compromise settled. And so what I would have to do is I take money out, out of my bank account and then place it, and uh, send it to them and they would put it in another bank temporarily, and then a few days when it settled, they'll send the money back to me.

[00:05:23] Bob: His bank account is compromised. In order to protect his cash, Father Bob will have to follow their instructions carefully, and that includes using wire transfers to move money into a new bank account.

[00:05:36] Fr. Robert Banzin: There were two people talking with me. The main man and supervisor. They were very friendly, very nice, very cordial like you felt they, they're doing their job. And they became almost like, set up like a friendship with you. You know they, they're going to help me, don't worry, so forth and so on. These were my life savings, and uh, I was worried about it because someone hacked into my bank account and they're going to take, they could take all the money out.

[00:06:03] Bob: Oh I see. So a criminal already has access to your money.

[00:06:05] Fr. Robert Banzin: Right.

[00:06:06] Bob: So we're moving your money to keep it safe.

[00:06:07] Fr. Robert Banzin: We're taking your money to keep it safe.

[00:06:09] Bob: Got it, yeah.

[00:06:11] Bob: At first, the supervisor tells Father Bob to put a modest sum into this new account. It'll only have to be there for a short time, and then will be returned to him. And that's exactly what happens.

[00:06:23] Fr. Robert Banzin: I did check out the bank and so forth. There was a bank, I can't remember, I think it was in Delaware or somewhere. But there was a bank that had my money. And then it came back to me. So you had the trust factor going there. You know, I got it back. Then it started again.

[00:06:41] Bob: It starts again. They call him and say he'll have to move essentially all his money into that new account. Since things worked the first time, Father Bob trusts them, so he sends a couple more wire transfers following their instructions and then they make a much larger request. This time they tell him to move $25,000 or roughly half of Father Bob's entire life savings, and this time they require him to make the transfer in a new way.

[00:07:10] Fr. Robert Banzin: What they told me, if you do it differently this time to, to buy bitcoins in a machine, and they told me exactly what store in Chicago has that type of a machine to do it. And that's what I did.

[00:07:25] Bob: It takes a long time to put $25,000 into a bitcoin machine, right?

[00:07:28] Fr. Robert Banzin: Yes. It does. It was like crazy. But I felt...

[00:07:32] Bob: I mean your heart must be racing when you're standing in front of this machine, right?

[00:07:36] Fr. Robert Banzin: Yes. Yes. Uh...

[00:07:39] Bob: Did, did anyone talk to you or, or you know like interrupt or anything while you were doing it because that...

[00:07:43] Fr. Robert Banzin: No.

[00:07:43] Bob: ...that probably took a half an hour, right/

[00:07:45] Fr. Robert Banzin: Yes, at least that.

[00:07:47] Bob: During the next few days, Father Bob gets several more calls from the folks who say they're from PayPal reassuring him that everything is going according to plan.

[00:07:57] Fr. Robert Banzin: They emailed me and they would call me each day to tell me how are things going. They gave me their phone number so I could call them. So it was now my money is saved, that there's nothing to worry about. So don't worry, PayPal took care of everything for you.

[00:08:13] Bob: And they have to make a few more wire transfers, so in the end, all of Father Bob's $60,000 has been protected by this set of transfers. But while the retired priest waits for the money to be returned to him, well they call and ask for more.

[00:08:30] Fr. Robert Banzin: They kept calling me every day practically, or I could call them, and I, you know, they were getting friendly and I, well one said he lived in California, and uh, he has a house, he told me had a home and a wife and kids and all this stuff, and blah, blah, and don't worry about my money, and all that. Then they were asking, then they finally got, do I have any more accounts anywhere? And I was a little nervous at that and I said, "No, I don't." And they said, "Well you're sure about that because we could help you with investments." And then I said, "No, not really."

[00:09:07] Bob: And that kind of talk, well that doesn't sit too well with Father Bob, so he starts asking questions.

[00:09:14] Fr. Robert Banzin: And I, and I said, "Well this other money that I bought the bitcoins, when am I going to get that money back?" They said, "Oh, you'll get it back, don't worry about it."

[00:09:22] Bob: And within a few more days, he's downright suspicious.

[00:09:26] Fr. Robert Banzin: And so I said, I told them, I said, "I suspect that this is not real, that you're, you're ripping me off." And they said, "No, no-no-no-no-no. You're, we're your friend, we're going to guide you, don't worry. We're part of PayPal," and so forth and so on.

[00:09:42] Bob: But the protests start to feel fake, and after a couple more confrontational calls...

[00:09:49] Fr. Robert Banzin: I called their personal number, and there was no more, they said, "disconnected, disconnected."

[00:09:54] Bob: Oh wow.

[00:09:55] Fr. Robert Banzin: So I just got cut off from them, and there was no possible way of reaching them.

[00:10:00] Bob: So Father Bob calls the police hoping they can do something to help.

[00:10:05] Fr. Robert Banzin: So what I did, I called a, a friend of mine who was a lawyer and then he said, "Why don't you report this to the police," which I did. And then I reported it to the FBI, the state's attorney in Illinois, telling about this whole situation. And then the Chicago police were absolutely, you know they get such a bad rap, but they were su--, wonderful to me. They actually came over to the house, two police officers, who were experts in that field of fraud, and they spend at least an hour with me in the home, my house. And then they sent another expert over the following day to go through my computer system to find out all these contacts that I was having with these guys. And so the police were very helpful. And they said they, they handle this every day, and I kept beating myself up, and they kept saying, no, you're a victim, you're a victim, you're a victim.

[00:11:01] Bob: You're a victim. But a victim without much recourse. It's very likely he'll never see any of the money again, the police tell him.

[00:11:10] Bob: Well what was that like when they told you you probably would, couldn't get your money back. What was that like?

[00:11:14] Fr. Robert Banzin: Horrible feeling. Horrible. No, I just, I think that was my life savings, you know.

[00:11:21] Bob: His entire life savings, $60,000 is gone.

[00:11:26] Bob: People might not understand what it means to be a retired Catholic priest, if they're not familiar, so I might just ask you to explain that a little b it.

[00:11:33] Fr. Robert Banzin: Sure.

[00:11:33] Bob: But you, you don't live in a rectory, you're the, you have to basically pay your own rent, buy your own food, right?

[00:11:38] Fr. Robert Banzin: Right.

[00:11:39] Bob: But, but you, you had $60,000 after a lifetime of work, and you needed that to make sure your, your 2003 Mercury Cougar was operating, right?

[00:11:48] Fr. Robert Banzin: Right. It's still going. Hah.

[00:11:50] Bob: Had to get some new tires or something like that?

[00:11:52] Fr. Robert Banzin: Yeah, I had to do that, but it's still going. I always run a car till it ends. I, I always said, I, I didn't spend my money on cars or clothes. I used to travel on my days off because I loved learning stuff, you know, from other parts of the world, traveling and learning and so forth.

[00:12:10] Bob: I mean I just want people to understand how serious an issue this was for you and for many other victims I speak to.

[00:12:14] Robert Banzin: Oh yeah.

[00:12:15] Bob: What, when, when your $60,000 was stolen, I mean you had nothing, right?

[00:12:19] Robert Banzin: Right. Just about nothing, yes.

[00:12:21] Bob: And so if your car broke down or when the taxes came due, you weren't going to be able to pay them, right?

[00:12:26] Robert Banzin: Nope, not right away.

[00:12:28] Bob: Father Bob is now despondent, and while he keeps his troubles to himself, he can't really hide this.

[00:12:35] Fr. Robert Banzin: What happened was a, a deacon from the parish where I was going, I, I really didn't tell anyone about this except one or two friends, and I told a deacon friend of mine from the parish where I was, where I go on Sundays.

[00:12:50] Bob: The deacon and his wife want to start an online fundraiser to help Father Bob, but he's pretty uncomfortable with that.

[00:12:57] Fr. Robert Banzin: And I says, "No, I, I'm just so embarrassed." And she says, "No, let's do it, let's do it and see what happens." Itt was, I mean a miracle.

[00:13:06] Bob: Within a few days, word of Father Bob's struggles spreads far and wide. Donations start to pour in.

[00:13:14] Fr. Robert Banzin: Within a week I got money back. And I, and I had to uh, stop the fund because it was going over what I lost, and I didn't want to, so I shouldn't take that money from people. And so I, I got people I knew, most of the, most of the funds came from ex-students of mine that I had in school. I remember one, I couldn’t believe it. There were a lot of them that came in that were totally, totally uh, unknown. I got one letter from a lady in California saying she's very sorry, with a $5 bill in it. I said, "Oh my God." You know I; I was crying, you know I couldn't believe that. It, it showed how wonderful people are at the same time you're, you feel like crap, but you, you still realize there are so many good people out there to help.

[00:14:06] Bob: Within a week they have to shut down the fundraiser as every last dollar that had been stolen from Father Bob had been replaced by a donation. So many from former students.

[00:14:18] Bob: What an amazing experience to have all these former students...

[00:14:21] Fr. Robert Banzin: Yes, oh yeah, definitely, definitely. I couldn't believe it. I mean some of the guys I haven't heard from in years and years. You know I'm in; I'm still in touch with a number of them that I've known all, all the time, but some came out of the woodwork as it were, and wow.

[00:14:37] Bob: Well I, it's amazing when something terrible happens and then something wonderful happens at the same time, right?

[00:14:41] Fr. Robert Banzin: Yes, yes. That's, so it makes you want to believe more in the goodness of people, you know.

[00:14:49] Bob: At the same time, it's important to know these scam criminals really will steal from anyone.

[00:14:57] Fr. Robert Banzin: At the very end I did mention to them, I said to one of them, I said, "You're, you're taking over my entire savings and I'm a Catholic priest, and that's all I have left for my retirement." And they, that sort of didn't hit them at, at all.

[00:15:12] Bob: It's just another thing about the story that can't help but strike you that these criminals are so brazen.

[00:15:17] Fr. Robert Banzin: Right.

[00:15:17] Bob: They'll take every last dollar from a Catholic priest.

[00:15:21] Bob: The whole experience left Father Bob with some important questions. The biggest of all...

[00:15:27] Fr. Robert Banzin: But the big question that which we couldn't understand is, how did I, I got a phone number for PayPal on Google, and it was their number.

[00:15:37] Bob: Hmm. That is a good question.

[00:15:39] Robert Banzin: Yeah, PayPal then contacted me also and, and put out a statement that this is all fraud, it's not them and so forth and so on.

[00:15:47] Bob: Right. Yeah.

[00:15:48] Robert Banzin: So PayPal found out about it too. And then I think they found out through the state's attorney in Chi--, in Ill-, in Chicago that all this was going on. And probably from the police. The FBI was included. I, I just called everybody.

[00:16:02] Bob: And even though he was embarrassed, Father Bob decided it was okay to talk with local television and with us at The Perfect Scam about what happened to him.

[00:16:12] Fr. Robert Banzin: And I said I'll only do for, on one reason to, to help people not to get caught up in this. I said...

[00:16:19] Bob: What do you want them to learn from your situation?

[00:16:21] Fr. Robert Banzin: I think the key is uh, when someone calls regarding your money or finances is let that be a red light and just stop and just say, you know I'll, you know I'll call my bank, I'll call my lawyer, I'll call a friend before I do anything with you. You know unless-, unless you just, you got to just take precautions. Don't accept it like I did, you know. Or if you see it in, in uh, print and, and in an email or something, just don't open those things up if you're not familiar with it. And even if you're not familiar with it, do not open and do not respond with a phone call or with giving them any information of who you are. That's my key right now. And I, I just still try not to think about it myself of how I got caught up in that. I don't think I'm stupid. But how did I get caught up in that? That's what I'm trying to, I keep thinking about. How did I do, let myself let that happen to me, you know? It still blows my mind.

[00:17:22] Bob: Well one thing for sure, a big theme of our podcast is you, you've expressed it 10 times in this conversation; you feel dumb, you feel embarrassed, ashamed. You don't want people to know about it. And that works to the advantage of the criminals. So...

[00:17:35] Fr. Robert Banzin: Yes.

[00:17:36] Bob: ... this is a very humbling experience.

[00:17:38] Fr. Robert Banzin: Yes, definitely. I mean and it's, it's a reality. It's a fact of life for me. It's a reality, so I, I can't escape reality. I, here's the picture, here is what happened, don't let it happen to you.

[00:17:50] Bob: Yeah, but, but also there's no reason to be, you shouldn't be ashamed, what, the people who should be ashamed are the people who stole every last dollar from a Catholic priest.

[00:17:56] Robert Banzin: Sure, sure. Well I don't think they even care who it is.

[00:18:00] Bob: Did this experience shake your faith at all?

[00:18:02] Fr. Robert Banzin: Not really. I mean I, I think it made it stronger in the sense that uh, I had something to pray about and think about and ask help for. And the help came through the police and the FBI and maybe that was the answer. I don't know. I don't think God works that way, but maybe God does, who knows? You know.

[00:18:24] Bob: Many things went wrong in Father Bob's situation, but as he said, it all began when he went online to find a customer support number for PayPal and was instead directed into the waiting arms of criminals. That's not a unique situation. How can this happen and how can you protect yourself? Here to help with that is Teresa Murray, Director of the Consumer Watchdog Program at the US Public Interest Research Group.

[00:18:48] Teresa Murray: I mean unfortunately I have heard variations of this story a bunch of different times where somebody gets sucked into some kind of scam just trying to do the right thing and what we see a lot of times is the bad guys, I mean the bad guys are smarter than what we are because this is their full-time job. Whereas you and I may only take a few minutes a week trying to protect ourselves. So it's perfectly understandable that this gentleman, you know he was, he saw something about a PayPal security alert or activity alert, and he knew it was bad, so you know he does what he thinks he's supposed to do which is look up the number for PayPal so he can put a stop to it.

[00:19:27] Bob: But criminals have discovered a way to essentially insert their rogue phone numbers into search engine results. Well, actually they've been doing that for years.

[00:19:37] Teresa Murray: A lot of con artists have set up fake websites and Google numbers that are aimed at being able to show up at the top of search engine results. So you know the FTC has done work on this, the Social Security Administration, but it's not uncommon to see that a, a bad guy someplace, they may not even been in this country, but that a bad guy will set up a phone number and make it look like it's the Internal Revenue Service customer service number, or Delta Airlines, or Amazon. And so unfortunately, this gentleman stumbled across what obviously was a fraudulent phone number, and followed their instructions, had probably no reason to think that anything was amiss because again, these con artists are smooth talkers, and you know here that this gentleman lost his life savings, it's just heartbreaking.

[00:20:23] Bob: I'm going to ask what seems like a simple question, but may, may not be a simple answer, but how is it that I can google PayPal customers service and be presented with a criminal's phone number?

[00:20:36] Teresa Murray: Well if said criminal has done what they need to do to create a website or create a, a listing and get that listing to rank high on the search engines, then that's how it happens. I mean it, that in and of itself is not illegal, and I mean it happens all the time. Again, with the, the kinds of entities that I have talked about, I mean you see it a lot with the US Postal Service, with the IRS, with the Social Security Administration, probably all the major companies in this country, certainly PayPal, Amazon, you know a lot of the major banks and even some of the airlines, they are able to just set up a website or setup a, a listing so that when somebody types in PayPal customer service or IRS customer service, they will see that phone number pretty high up on the listings, on the search engine results. And it's super sad, it's very unfortunate. Yes, some of the powers that be try to take, you know try to get these d-listed, get these down, but um, it's like playing whack-a-mole, you know they get rid of five listings and 10 more appear the next day.

[00:21:44] Bob: In fact, Teresa says, one industry is hit a bit harder than others with this scam.

[00:21:49] Teresa Murray: The ones that we see more of in recent years are the ones that are really trying to capitalize on a particular issue. So, for example, back in 2023, there was, it was the fall of 2023 and there was a huge storm that was really disrupting a lot of flights in the New York/New Jersey area. And lots of cancellations, lots of delays. And so a lot of people would get to the airport, they'd find out, oh gosh, my flight has been delayed or cancelled. So they would look on a search engine and google their, their airline. And there were cases where people would contact somebody that they found online and, and the people are pros, and in this case, it was Delta. So somebody would say, you know, "Delta Airlines, may I help you." And they would say, "Yeah, my flight just got cancelled and I need to rebook this." And it's like, "Okay, Mr. Whoever," um, you know, "Yes, we show you on this flight and by the name--, by the way my name is Maxine and I could help you with this and we can get you rebooked and I just need your credit card number." And I mean they're just super smooth and this was a thing that was a real thing that, that lots of people got caught up in again back in late 2023. What we see a lot during tax season, I guarantee you since the tax filing season has already started, there are fraudulent phone numbers out there that you or I could find. And we see a lot of it during the holidays with the, the proverbial FedEx, UPS, USPS fraudulent numbers where you're afraid that your gift for Aunt Betty isn't going to get to your house, and so the bad guys capitalize on that.

[00:23:15] Bob: You know the airline example is a really good example to talk about because it always happens when people are under pressure, right, and like, oh my God, my flight's been cancelled, I've got to do something immediately to get home, and so, you know, you make a quick search, you make a quick phone call and, and boom, that's exactly the circumstance that criminals can take advantage of, right?

[00:23:32] Teresa Murray: Oh yes, absolutely. The con artists are, they are banking on you not being in the exact right frame of mind. They are banking on you wanting to do something quickly and being a little freaked out, and they take advantage of that. So whether we're calling, we're talking about in this case, an airline flight that, that got cancelled, and it legitimately got cancelled, and you're just trying to rebook it. Or if we're talking about a call that you get in your home that, you know your grandchild has been kidnapped or your Social Security deposit has been hacked or whatever, people, like it just trips something emotionally in us and we think, oh gosh. And a lot of times people don't take a couple of seconds to take a breath and think it through and say, well wait a minute, you know, I should verify this. They have no reason to suspect that they're dealing with a bad guy who has been, who spends 40 hours a week or more trying to scam people.

[00:24:25] Bob: But you know I want to go back to the, the main proposition here which is, I go to Google, and you know and I'm, here I think and, and it's not Google, right, I go to a search engine and they have spent billions of dollars making their search engine good, but somehow a, a criminal in a boiler room can essentially hijack those results and and rate even higher than, than a gigantic company's phone number, like Amazon. That just, honestly that seems like something's really broken to me.

[00:24:50] Teresa Murray: Yes, I mean it's astounding, right? You would think that these search engines would be able to deal with that a little bit better, and I don't have an answer about why they, they can't. I mean even in some cases where you know a little bit easier; say a bad guy created a fraudulent web site that mimicked the callers and the logos and the everything of a major bank or whoever; Amazon, Pay Pal. I mean a lot of times even though you can go onto the website and see that this is a fraudulent website then a lot of times the search engines, it takes them a while to even get those things knocked down. And with the phone numbers, you know the, the bad guys, they may only have those phone numbers operating and have those results able to be seen perhaps for a few hours or for a few days, so by the time that somebody files a complaint with whoever, and then they look into it, they're already gone. So I mean clearly something in the system is broken because people's lives are being devastated.

[00:25:45] Bob: Okay, so what is it that people can do in this situation, and I think thing one here is to acknowledge that search results can be wrong, right?

[00:25:55] Teresa Murray: Oh, absolutely. I mean we would never recommend that people do an online search for any kind of customer service number or, or anything. You know you should go to the source. So if you're calling a bank, you call the number that's on the back of your ATM card or that was on your statement. You're calling a utility, same kind of thing. Look on your last bill. Um, a lot of these cases you can actually log into the account. So in this case perhaps if this gentleman could have logged into his PayPal account or you know maybe some people have an app. You can log into your Amazon account. And so we recommend that people go and, you know, they go to the priority source. And you know that's the same way if you get a voice mail that from somebody you weren't expecting. It's like, oh hey, you know, this is Margie from Case, from Chase Bank calling. You know don't call back the phone number that's on the voicemail unless you were expecting that phone call. So we really want to instill in people, don't trust what you see. Don't make random searches, don't respond to numbers left on voicemails or in text messages. And that's like, that's thing one that you need to do to protect yourself. And then, you know, I mean we, a lot of us do do online searches for various things, and if you do that, just make sure of the website that you're actually going to, and so make sure that it's, you know, Chase.com or IRS.gov. And that requires a little bit, a little bit extra on our part, but that's what you need to do.

[00:27:20] Bob: So flat out, just don't trust search engines when looking for customer service numbers.

[00:27:25] Teresa Murray: Without backstopping it in some way, yes. I mean you shouldn't trust search engine results, and then even said it another way, it's like we all get emails that claim to be from XYZ company or whatever government office, and then if you actually hover over the, the email address, it shows it's coming from something else completely different that's like 30 letters long and so people, unfortunately, need to take extra steps to protect themselves because there's just, there's a lot of opportunities out there to be scammed.

[00:27:55] Bob: And Teresa has one piece of really solid advice about how to avoid these kinds of scams, well any scam really, and that centers around the word "unexpected."

[00:28:06] Teresa Murray: We certainly should talk about this with our loved ones and our, our friends that you know whether they're younger, whether they're older, and, and I, the one thing that we really, really try and stress to people is, 'cause I, I have people who will say, well how do I know if this phone call is a scam? How do I know if this text is legitimate? You know, how can I tell if this website that I'm going to is the real thing? Like, you know what, you can't. You can't. Because the bad guys are better with this than you and I are. What we really just beg people, remember one word: Unexpected. If a phone call is unexpected like this gentleman, while he had initiated the phone call, but then the request to transfer money was unexpected, and you know to, to transfer a whole bunch. So any time that any of us encounter something that's unexpected, we really need to have muscle memory that we hit the pause button and just stop a minute. And how, whatever that looks like. So is it like, oh hey, I'll call you back. Or is it, you know, and then you look up the phone number that you're really supposed to be calling by logging into your account or whatever. Or you call a, a trusted relative or you talk to a coworker and you say, look, here's what happened. Does this sound right? And what we find a lot of times is that when somebody says it out loud, then they automatically like it's, you can just see like the look on their face. They're like, oh, snap. I don't think this is a good thing. And we just want people to hit pause when it's unexpected.

[00:29:34] Bob: I, I really like that, having a, the word “unexpected” in your mind all the time is really handy.

[00:29:40] Teresa Murray: Yes. I mean we; we've talked about different things, you know and a lot of consumer advocates, I mean they've, there's been amazing work that's done putting like warning placards at checkout counters for people who go and buy thousands of dollars’ worth of iTunes gift cards or Amazon gift cards. And you know I had thought at one time it would be great if people would put like a, a magnet on the refrigerator, or even just put something on their phone. And but it, it's just that's the one word that we really need to instill in people's brains. Unexpected. Just take a breath, because you know back to what you said earlier, a lot of times people think they need to act with urgency, but if they don't do this right this second then their grandchild is not going to get out of jail, or that somebody's going to show up on their doorstep, you know, from the IRS. Or that they're not going to be able to book that flight. And any time that people are, are asked to react right now, then a lot of times that's trouble.

[00:30:33] Bob: And another piece of critical advice, always talk with someone else about any kind of financial crisis or unexpected email or phone call. In fact, it's important to prepare for situations like this before they come up.

[00:30:48] Bob: You know I interviewed um, an expert in veterans affairs not too long ago, um, specifically about scams targeting veterans. And he talked about the concept that comes from military service of having a battle buddy. And you know the other thing I thought you said that's really important is, is have someone that you can talk to because...

[00:31:06] Teresa Murray: Yes.

[00:31:07] Bob: ...it does seem like when the words come out of your mouth you, you feel differently about it. And of course, also, bouncing anything like this off a second person is always a good idea.

[00:31:16] Teresa Murray: Yes. Yes, battle buddy, I like that. But somebody who's your trusted go-to person, you know, some people have like at church you might have an accountability partner or something like that. So whatever you want to call it, accountability partner, a battle buddy, but somebody that you can turn to if you, if you want to bounce something off of them and you don't want to be judged.

[00:31:36] Bob: Well what more could you, could you and I do to help people we care about with this problem?

[00:31:41] Teresa Murray: One of the two options I would explore for people is you know if you have a bank account, especially one with a lot of money in it, you may want to consider having a second person on that account, not to oh watch over your shoulder and see what you're doing, but that if a transaction above a certain amount, you know, above $1000, above $5000 or whatever, that it would require authorization from a second person. So they could, you know, a trusted, if you don't have a partner, it could be a child or a cousin or somebody that you have a close relationship that would have to authorize any transaction that, that would go through that would exceed the amount that you have preset. Now, you know, some people may not feel comfortable with that and, and I, I understand that.

[00:32:27] Bob: Also Teresa said, don't be afraid to talk with your bank about fraud before it happens.

[00:32:33] Teresa Murray: I would recommend that everybody who has a bank account really regardless of how much money you have in it, but especially if you have a lot or if you have an investment account, I would recommend that people initiate a conversation with this bank, with this financial institution, with this investment firm, and say, hey, you know, I know there's a lot of scams going on out there. What can I do to protect myself? And maybe that's putting limits on transactions, you know, only so much per day. Or if a new payee is added, then maybe there's a waiting period, you know, something like that where there would be a flag. And, and you would hope that that would actually stop any of, any of the scams to go through, but the good thing is even if for some reason if a scam did go through and, and someone lost a huge amount of money, that you know they didn't follow the rules, then at least you would have recourse and be like, okay, I have this signed agreement, I signed up for these services back in 2022, and now look what happened. So it would give people more ammunition to fight back against the banks because the banks just don't, they don't care. And then a couple other things is, I do think that we all need to do more to protect our loved ones, to protect our friends.

[00:33:49] Bob: Is there anything that financial institutions could do better?

[00:33:53] Teresa Murray: So what we would very much like to see is, I mean this is a, a multi-pronged problem, and it needs lots of different kinds of solutions. In the case of this gentleman, if he had had more backstops through his bank, you know, this wouldn't have happened. I don't know whether he routinely wire transferred anything or not, but we hear in a lot of these cases where somebody has never done a wire transfer in their whole life, or they have never used Zelle in their entire life, and then all of a sudden you have this big bazillion dollar transaction that has gone through. So we really would like to see the banks step up and, and allow people to do more to protect themselves, because I mean we've all done online shopping with a credit card or even in person in some cases, and sometimes the transactions will get flagged by the credit card company, you know they may block it, they may call you and say, hey, is this you? And, and they do it in other ways. Like if you have a paper check that's forged, then you know you can get your money back for that, but they're just, banks are not doing enough to protect us from these bad guys whether it's a transaction that you've never initiated before in your life, or somehow allowing somebody to get into your bank account. There are lots of ways that banks can do better.

[00:35:04] Bob: The Public Interest Research Group where Teresa works, would like to see legislators act to protect consumers too.

[00:35:11] Teresa Murray: and then we would also like to see um, Congress take action particularly against these instant P2P payment systems like Zelle, like PayPal, like Venmo, but especially Zelle because the banks tout this that it's instant payments and in our minds, instant payments means instant fraud. And consumers oftentimes have no recourse. Once the money's gone, it's gone. Now I realize that this didn't involve Zelle, but any of these, you know instant payments are just problems, and certainly, I mean we've had fraud in this country, you know going back decades and decades, but it's only been really in the last 15 to 20 years with technology that it's so much easier to get scammed, and we want to see Congress take action.

[00:35:56] Bob: But, Teresa says, all of us could do more.

[00:36:00] Teresa Murray: And we as a society need to reduce the stigma of getting scammed because I think you know even, even in recent years you hear about someone like, like this gentleman or some young person, or you know, some whoever, you hear about these scams all the time. And it's real easy for you and I to sit here and say, well gosh, you know, I'm too smart for that. I would have never let that happen. How did that person allow that thing to happen? And, and that's just not the right, the right approach. As we have seen, even in the last year, you had a lot of really smart, highly educated people who have gotten sucked into scams. So I point to about a year ago Andy Cohen had got, was a victim of a scam, went on The Today Show to talk about it, so good for him, you know, not good that he got scammed, but he went on and talked about it and talked about how it happened. And then there was this, a case that came out with Mark Cuban having got kind of sucked into believing that the person who contacted him was from Google Security, and so he gave a bad guy access to his Gmail account. Now he never said whether he lost any money or anything like that, but then we need to sit back and realize, it's like gosh, all these people, these kinds of people and hundreds and thousands of more people like them who are super smart, super savvy, this happens to them. So as a society, we need to reduce the stigma of falling for a scam so that we talk about it more and we get it out in front. We need to encourage our loved ones to reach out for help and not feel like, oh gosh, I did something wrong. You know we need to; we need to reverse it here. And I mean and the other thing too is that I recommend that we do is you know maybe it's family gatherings, maybe it's when you see your parents or your grandparents and in the course of talking about the weather and the kids and life and this and that, you know you bring up it's like, you know what, I heard about this really weird scam the other day, it was in the news, and it's like, here's how it worked. And it involved Medicare or it involved PayPal or whatever. And so just to bring these things up to people and let them know that this is going on, and you would kind of hope that if they end up coming across this, that maybe something would trip in their mind and it's like, oh, wait a minute. Yeah, I remember. She said something about, you know, scams with health insurance and Medicare and or you know there was this PayPal scam going around. Wait a minute. Maybe I should just stop and take a breath. So we really hope by, by elevating the conversation that we can all be more aware and we can all do more to protect ourselves and our loved ones.

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[00:38:30] Bob: Anything we can do to make us all more aware so we can protect ourselves and our loved ones. For The Perfect Scam, I'm Bob Sullivan.

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[00:38:46] Bob: If you have been targeted by a scam or fraud, you are not alone. Call the AARP Fraud Watch Network Helpline at 877-908-3360. Their trained fraud specialists can provide you with free support and guidance on what to do next. Our email address at The Perfect Scam is: theperfectscampodcast@aarp.org, and we want to hear from you. If you've been the victim of a scam or you know someone who has, and you'd like us to tell their story, write to us. That address again is: theperfectscampodcast@aarp.org. Thank you to our team of scambusters; Associate Producer, Annalea Embree; Researcher, Becky Dodson; Executive Producer, Julie Getz; and our Audio Engineer and Sound Designer, Julio Gonzalez. Be sure to find us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. For AARP's The Perfect Scam, I'm Bob Sullivan.

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