UNVEILING THE SCAM || My Experience With Fraud

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Hello,

I'm glad to have you here.

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We now live in a time where the difference between authentic and fake is so vague. A time where conniving people have now gotten really good at contriving illusions to make you want to do their bidding disguised as "doing good". And most of the time, their bidding is for their own good, but dangerously at our own detriment. I am talking about scammers and their devious acts.

Dear reader, you could agree that, as death is inevitable, evolution is inevitable. As we learn every day, we create every day. That is how technology keeps developing. And as technology develops, more solutions to existing problems are provided, but new problems are created.

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For about two decades now, it has been taken that it is the elderly that fall into these money scams. But as technology has advanced and humans have grown smarter day by day, and it now happens that anyone can fall victim to scammers. And if you have not had some experience with any of these scammers (which I highly doubt), then you should be familiar with some of these sentences:

• "Let your money work for you."

• "Mr./Mrs./Miss (the victim's name), you have a $200 dividend unclaimed." "Please call Mr. Mike (scammer) before 24 hours to avoid loss."

• "This is your account manager, Amanda, from Zenith Bank plc." Your account has been compromised. Provide PIN and bank details for verification to proceed with account protection. "

• "You have been selected by Elon Musk and have won a Tesla plaid." "Click on the link to claim."

• "You have been a buzzy bee today." "Click link" (provides phishing link) to claim 5 HIVE.

I can go on and on about the many types of messages these con artists use to get their victims and the list would just never end. And they usually look so harmless and quite tempting, in fact, like a once-in-a-lifetime jackpot. It's like the universe finally shines its spotlight on you. Haha, if only the universe were that generous.

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Too good to be true...

Let me share with you my experience with scammers. It was the season of "planting your money" and then watching it grow whilst you go on to binge-watch Mr. Beast for 17 hours.

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The forex market was booming like it was Christmas every day. And the most popular statement was "let your money work for you." And it was the statement of the year. You can practically not go about social media without seeing it 100 times in a day.

Surely, I was skeptical at first; I mean, anyone would should. It was something contrary to the rule of life we all knew, "no food for a lazy man." And here was the golden opportunity to be lazy and still get food.

My mother had warned me. She even talked about some of her friends' mistake with "MMM" at the time it was the talk of the country: they had been duped before. But I was "wise" and could not fall into such a trap. I assured her that the person running it was a close friend who would never deceive me; oh, the irony of life.

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I played the smart game, risking a little money in the hopes of proving my dear mother wrong; if only I had listened to that spiritual woman. And guess what? I did get the 25% return-on-investment with initial capital (those sweet words) at the end of 30 days. I showed her and said, "I told you it was legit." She kept quiet, and she never objected any further.

I was adding more money and even reinvesting all the profit (I wanted maximum profit). I continued that way for a long time. Then the day of judgement came.

"I'd like to withdraw it all till further notice," I said. "Oh okay, let me get back to you," she said. Three days later, "Hello, I am yet to receive payment on my request," I called in again. "Have I ever been late with your payment before?" she rhetorically asked.

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Fast forward to months later, after a series of communications with excuses, it dawned on me that I was never getting my $700 USD back. I had been duped!

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Lesson to be learned...

Yes, I was blatantly foolish on my path, but it clearly was a scam, a subtle one.

For others, their stories may be quite different. Some of it could be through a phishing link to a site that could look like some HIVE frontend and would request your keys. For others, it could be some magic wire transfer just by helping an innocent-looking individual with a cash withdrawal from an ATM. But at the end of the day, a scam is a scam.

So before we come to a conclusion, let me share with you a few things that I have learned in uncovering a scam:

• Request for private credentials; they are called "private" for a reason.

• There are usually inconsistencies in between. Something like "For your engagement in this community in the last six hours..." When I had been asleep all day? Nahhh...

• They always have unusual usernames, or email addresses, or some strange phone number. I am sure if acidyo wanted to tip me for my engagement in OCD, he could straight up send me liquid HIVE and not ask me to click some dark link.

• And lastly, they always sound too good to be true. Of course, some things sound too good to be true and are actually true, but in most cases, they are never true.

Finally, mi amigo...

There will always be scammers everywhere, but they really can not do anything without your consent. All they need is that "go ahead" from you. And to you, you're trying to hit a bonus, but rather you are going head-on to hug a minus (damn, I could be the next Eminem).

You may have had an experience and feel that you can never fall victim again, but we really can not be too certain. So, we always have to keep our guards up. I surely have learned, but that does not give me an "immunity badge". Rather, I have only become wiser.

W̳̿͟͞h̳̿͟͞o̳̿͟͞ ̳̿͟͞i̳̿͟͞s̳̿͟͞ ̳̿͟͞O̳̿͟͞l̳̿͟͞u̳̿͟͞j̳̿͟͞a̳̿͟͞y̳̿͟͞?̳̿͟͞

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_{Olujay is a Nigerian musician (guitarist and singer) based in Nigeria. He is currently in his final year studying mechatronics engineering at the Federal University of Agriculture, Abeokuta.}

_{He strongly believes that everyone has the ability to affect change in some manner, and that we all have the capability to influence others.}

_{One of his many goals is to become the best version of himself that he can attain. And, in doing so, maintain balance in order to do everything well.}

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ᴜɴʟᴇss ɪɴᴅɪᴄᴀᴛᴇᴅ ᴏᴛʜᴇʀᴡɪsᴇ, ᴀʟʟ ɪᴍᴀɢᴇs ᴀʀᴇ ᴍɪɴᴇ.

𝕀𝕗 𝕪𝕠𝕦 𝕖𝕟𝕛𝕠𝕪𝕖𝕕 𝕥𝕙𝕚𝕤 𝕡𝕠𝕤𝕥, 𝕜𝕚𝕟𝕕𝕝𝕪 𝕝𝕖𝕒𝕧𝕖 𝕒 𝕔𝕠𝕞𝕞𝕖𝕟𝕥, 𝕣𝕖𝕓𝕝𝕠𝕘, 𝕠𝕣 𝕦𝕡𝕧𝕠𝕥𝕖. 𝕀𝕥 𝕨𝕚𝕝𝕝 𝕓𝕖 𝕘𝕣𝕖𝕒𝕥𝕝𝕪 𝕒𝕡𝕡𝕣𝕖𝕔𝕚𝕒𝕥𝕖𝕕.

T͜͡H͜͡A͜͡N͜͡K͜͡ ͜͡Y͜͡O͜͡U͜͡ ͜͡F͜͡O͜͡R͜͡ ͜͡S͜͡T͜͡O͜͡P͜͡P͜͡I͜͡N͜͡G͜͡ ͜͜͜͜͡͡͡͡B͜͡Y͜͡