Instagram Finstas

A Finsta is a shortened term for Fake Instagram, which is an Instagram account used by teens and young adults to make more genuine posts than is usual.

The problem is that many people like to show their best side on Instagram – to create an image of a perfect life, holidays, relationships, home etc.

But that hides the reality. So, some young people create these fake Instagram accounts for the ‘real’ posts i.e. inside jokes, very personal stuff, ‘just woke up’ selfies, pics that are not posed etc.

Strangely that means the ‘fake’ account are more realistic than the original accounts.

So, a person’s normal Instagram account might have dozens, hundreds or more followers but the Finsta one may just have a handful of trusted followers and a name that means people cannot guess the owner of the account.

Perhaps these ‘fake’ accounts are an outlet for the honesty missing from so many Instagram accounts.

How to Make a Finsta

  1. Open your Instagram account and click the three-line icon in the top right.
  2. Go to settings on the menu and select Add Account
  3. Make sure to create a username that is sufficiently different from your normal account, input your phone number etc. for verification.
  4. Only tell a select group of close friends about the new account and warn them not to tell anyone else
  5. Start posting the real stuff

If you have any experiences with these scams do let me know, by email.

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Office Supplies Scams

Office supplies is big business and virtually every business needs to buy such supplies, so a lot of scammers target this.  The most common such scams are:

  1. Fake Invoices

You might get an invoice that appears genuine and is for a modest amount of money but is entirely fake. The scammer relies on people being too busy to check thoroughly to ensure every invoice is correct.

Or you get a genuine invoice, but the costs have been inflated – extra items charged that weren’t delivered or just higher prices for some items.

To make the invoice look genuine, these scammers often phone the company and ask who deals with invoices then use that name on the fake invoice.

Sometimes, the scammers send the merchandise and then the fake invoice weeks later so the company has to go to the trouble of trying to return the goods and prove they didn’t order them and it’s possible the company will have started using the supplies so is unable to return them in good condition.

2. Fake Rep

A scammer checks who your regular suppliers are (a simple fake sales call will usually get that information) and then calls pretending to be a new representative of one of those suppliers. This leads in time to fake invoices and potentially direct payments before the company realise they are not dealing with the correct company.

If a specific price is asked for, the scammer will give a quote that sounds reasonable for the entire quantity being ordered but is actually the price for a single unit of that supply. The difference only becomes apparent after the order has been delivered and the invoice received.

They may claim  that they are sending you a promotional catalogue, but they’re really trying to get personal information to bill you for unnecessary services and supplies.

3. The False Gift

The office worker receives what appear to be a free gift – generally low value items such as pens, calendars, coffee mugs etc. Some time later invoices at very inflated prices arrive and specify the deliveries. This causes problems as the company has received the items but never authorised purchases and may end up paying to get rid of the problem.

If you have any experiences with these scams do let me know, by email.

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Stupidest Spam of the Week Mad Scientist

Many scammers offer magical remedies for dementia, Alzheimer’s and similar long term afflictions.

This latest scammer is greedy as she offers cures for dementia, Alzheimer’s, tinnitus, hearing loss and all other brain problems in one.

She claims that a mad scientist is being sued by Big Pharma for curing Alzheimer’s.

If someone genuinely had such a cure why would you call them mad? Plus, court cases create publicity which presumably she thinks the pharmaceuticals companies don’t want.

She says that over 7,000 people have had their brain diseases eradicated and there’s a video to click to see the proof.

As usual (with these scam stories), lawyers are trying to get this information blocked so you have to view it soon.

It is sad that people could possibly believe such rubbish, but criminals will continue to peddle this drivel until they are caught.

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The Scam Survivors Website

https://scamsurvivors.com

The website says it exists because: Scammers will take your money with no cares about the lives it ruins.  People are nothing but a money amount to them – a living, breathing ATM machine.

The site is run by volunteers and has three goals:

  1. To make scammers’ lives harder by exposing their details and scripts to search engines.
  2. Educating the public, thus removing scammers’ sources of income as scams will continue as long as there are victims.
  3. Helping people to see that, even after being scammed, they CAN move forward and things DO get better.

They cover a wide range of scams including:- 419, fund transfer, tax refund, beneficiary/inheritance/next of kin, hitman, parcel, gold/diamond, charity, love/romance/catfish, dying widow/widower, military, lottery, secret shopper/work from home, business/investment/supply invitation, loan, ATM card, tax refund, recovery/compensation, conference, Craigslist, webcam blackmail, phishing, grandchild/friend in distress and car wrap.

The Scam Survivors staff say they offer non-judgmental help and advice for those scammed online.

For many people who have been scammed, the psychological effects are worse than the monetary loss.

There is an active forum with nearly 200,000  posts.

Do click on the Facebook or Twitter icons on top right to follow Fight Back Ninja.

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Bitcoin Scams

Bitcoin attracts a huge number of scammers offering guaranteed returns, fake accounts, Bitcoin machines, AI based investments etc. As with many scams, they try to tap into people’s greed.

Common Bitcoin Scams

  1. Social Media

Scammers create fake social media accounts and use them to entice people to fall for various scams or sometimes they buy stolen social media accounts and invite everyone on the real owners contact list to click a link to something supposedly wonderful or funny etc. but it links to a scam site.

This is most commonly on Twitter but also occurs on the other social media networks.

2. Fake Currency Exchanges

The scammers offer membership of a supposed cybercurrency exchange where you can buy and sell Bitcoins and other cyber currencies at low margins.

Never sign up for an account without being sure it is real. Some of these scammers setup what appears to be an exchange but it’s not.

3. Fake Currency Wallets

You can store your cyber currency in digital wallets and some scammers have created fake wallets. Some have even created USB keys branded to look like a digital wallet but loaded with malware to steal yaccess top your cyber currency which the criminals can then steal.

4. Fake APPS

Scammers have created all sorts of fake APPS related to cyber currencies and some even managed to get them available on the Google and APPLE stores.

5. Celebrity Giveaways

The scammers impersonate a celebrity and announce that they’re giving away a lot of cryptocurrency for free, as long as you send them some cryptocurrency first.

The scammers will often promise to send back double what you send them. Although especially prominent on Twitter, this scam has also appeared on platforms including YouTube, where scammers will impersonate a celebrity in a video or livestream.

6. Fake Initial Coin Offerings (ICO)

These are the cyber currency equivalent of new company offerings of shares. What better than convince people there is a new cyber currency coming to market and they must get a share of the no doubt enormous gains to be made as happened in the early days of Bitcoin. Many of these fake offerings are made to sound very similar to Bitcoin.

7. Bitcoin Mining

The process of creating new Bitcoins is called Bitcoin mining and it’s a process that requires vast amounts of computing power. Some scammers offer to let you on a deal with Bitcoin mining setups. These are always a bad idea as most mining nowadays is carried out by criminals.

If you have any experiences with these scams do let me know, by email.