1."My cousin stole my social security card and stole thousands of dollars from my bank account. He and his girlfriend have used it to access my debit card and credit cards. FBI is involved but it’s taking so long."
2."In February of 2022, I received a message on Instagram from a soldier who stated that he was stationed in Yemen. We messaged back and forth on Instagram, and then he asked if we can chat on Google Chat. I thought nothing of it, so I continued the conversations. He started asking for money, saying that he was on a special diet and he needed money to buy food, so I started sending him money."
3."Well...I didn't lose any money in the deal, but my Netflix account got hacked several years back. I hadn't used it in quite a while, and when I couldn't log in, I assumed it was some kind of bug on their end at first, which was stupid of me, in hindsight. But I finally realized that wasn't the case and ended up having to call Netflix customer service and give them my credit card info and stuff."
4."Someone hacked my bank account when I was in high school and tried, like, 50 times to buy different things (from pizza to their insurance), but they never ended up getting anything because I never had more than 60 cents on my card at a time."
5."I was the victim of identity theft last year. They somehow got access to my tax account and the way I access my government benefits. I found out when I checked my bank account on a day I should have been paid and realized that I hadn’t been."
6."I woke up at 5 a.m. after getting several phone calls from an unknown number and text messages asking for my Snapchat 'my eyes only' password. I tried to get on my Snapchat, but I was logged out and had to redo my password TWICE. When I finally got in, I saw that they saved several photos from the messages with my partner. I wish I had known to delete all the evidence sooner because knowing someone out there has provocative pictures of me makes me extremely uncomfortable. Make sure to delete what's in the chat!!!"
7."My aunt lived in Rhode Island in the late 1980s to the early 2000s. Someone somehow got ahold of her social security number and then bought a car and put her as the co-signer. As luck has it, all the payments fell back on her. THOUSANDS of dollars. It ruined her credit score for years and she is still working on getting it higher up."
8."I was seeing a guy in undergrad and exchanged nudes. I got a call from my cousin back home – I went to school out of state – telling me there was a naked picture of me on Facebook. Not only did I find out he was seeing another girl, but she also stole my pictures out of his phone, uploaded them as my profile picture, then locked me out of my Facebook account. It took several hours to contact Facebook to have the picture removed."
9."I was texted by my 'CEO.' I didn't think it was too odd because I had met her within the past week at a photo shoot, and my phone number was on the call sheet she would have gotten. The scammer knew my full name, her full name, and obviously where I worked. It was even less weird to me because the company was very small and I probably would've been the person to ask to do something like this. She texted me and asked if I could do her a favor and get gift cards for employees as a 'thank you' because we had been doing well recently (also something that was happening at the time by coincidence)."
10."Not me, but my mom's friend. She decided to purchase a riding mower from eBay. Normally I wouldn't consider eBay a scam. But my mom's friend seemed to ignore every warning and purchased a riding mower using gift cards the seller had requested. The scammers then requested she pay with a large amount in gift cards for shipping. So they got her twice. She was out a few thousand dollars and still couldn't admit she shouldn't have sent them prepaid gift cards instead of using PayPal or any other approved method."
11."I was friends briefly with this engineer from Lyft. One day when he was over at our house, he hacked into my personal computer. I freaked out because my clients' computers were on the same network. Apple and my employer told me to go to the police. I just told his girlfriend he was a pervy creep instead."
12."My identity was stolen through Adobe. I signed up for Acrobat Pro for work and personal, so I used my own information. They hacked Adobe and somehow gained access to my social, DL, and other personal information. Loans, credit cards, and taxes were being filed under my social! It has been hell trying to fight all these fraudulent accounts, as well as applying for homes and loans that are legitimate. All Adobe could offer me was free Experian dark web monitoring."
13."Someone hacked the company that did the background check I was required to do for my job, which I got laid off from after about a year. It wasn't until two months after that when I got the notice, and it was another six months after that until I found out three credit cards were taken out (and maxed out) in my name during that year."
14."I’ve had my card number used twice and social security number used twice to file fraudulent tax returns."
Have you ever fallen for a scam or know someone who has? Let me know in the comments.
