My 18 year old was scammed out of 3K on her first day as intern

[Anonymous]

Teach your kids how to avoid phishing scams. My 20 year old got hit twice in college, through two different scams. Just as naive as he could possibly be.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:School mom is on her way to Gucci to buy a tote bag with OP daughter’s money.

OP’s daughter should definitely file a police report and let school mom and her admin know a police report is incoming.

More likely she's betting big on the ponies or getting high at OP's kid's expense.

My mother and my step-father both -- separately -- fell for phone scams. My stepfather truly believed he was paying the taxes on the big screen TV he won using Visa gift cards. My mother ended up wire transferring $50,000 to some woman in China to "reimburse" Amazon.

Those of you who think this only happens to stupid people do not know how incredibly convincing these scammers can be. I hope you never find out.

I don't know that I would have used the word stupid but there is no way any reasonably savvy person wires 50K to someone in China to reimburse Amazon. Reimburse them for what??? And how does any functioning adult think that anyone pays taxes on anything with gift cards??? Are these older relatives of yours suffering from dementia?

Like I said, until you're in the grip of these scammers, you have no idea how convincing they can be.

This is like the people who say they could never, ever forget their kid is in the back seat. Until they do.

This is just something people tell themselves to make themselves feel better about being so gullible.

+1 yep. Would never and have never fallen for any scam.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My first reaction is how in today's world does anybody fall for the use your own money to buy gift cards scam? There is no legitimate anything that requires you to buy gift cards with your own cash for any reason. If someone, especially someone you don't know and have never spoken to before, is asking you to buy gift cards I'm telling you right now...IT'S A SCAM. Always. Everyone can start by telling their children that and then tell all your adult friends and relatives too.

+1 so obvious

[Anonymous]

Well, my daughter and I talked about it. She said that she regularly receives requests for this sort of stuff on Instagram and other social media teens use and she knows it's a scam. With this one, she is still wondering why her radar wasn't up with this situation. She's dealt with weirdos in her previous retail job and knows when and how to brush them off.
My guess is that it's because this email was coming from ostensibly an authority figure at her first office job during her first hour onboarding and logging onto Outlook. (It was not the most comprehensive onboarding of course). She was in automatic worker mode. Mix that in with a kid who's always done as instructed by teachers, parents, people in authority.
I'm trying to encourage her to talk to her high school about it next spring after all the exams are over. Like I said, no matter how many times I told her about these things happening to people we know, family members too, it didn't compute that she would be entering that adult world of scammers. She thinks problem adults are like the homeless and drug addicts we see on the streets and subway who panhandle her. It didn't occur to her that crooks could infiltrate a white collar mileau. If someone her age had given a presentation about how they were scammed at their first job, this may have registered with her more fully. So if she helps other kids avoid this situation, I think it would give a positive twist to the situation.

[Anonymous]

My dad is the CEO of a company and almost this exact same thing happened to an intern. They of course paid the amount to the intern and then had to overhaul a bunch of stuff internally. Apparently this is a common tactic scammers use, I feel for your kid- they must feel terrible!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Well, my daughter and I talked about it. She said that she regularly receives requests for this sort of stuff on Instagram and other social media teens use and she knows it's a scam. With this one, she is still wondering why her radar wasn't up with this situation. She's dealt with weirdos in her previous retail job and knows when and how to brush them off.
My guess is that it's because this email was coming from ostensibly an authority figure at her first office job during her first hour onboarding and logging onto Outlook. (It was not the most comprehensive onboarding of course). She was in automatic worker mode. Mix that in with a kid who's always done as instructed by teachers, parents, people in authority.
I'm trying to encourage her to talk to her high school about it next spring after all the exams are over. Like I said, no matter how many times I told her about these things happening to people we know, family members too, it didn't compute that she would be entering that adult world of scammers. She thinks problem adults are like the homeless and drug addicts we see on the streets and subway who panhandle her. It didn't occur to her that crooks could infiltrate a white collar mileau. If someone her age had given a presentation about how they were scammed at their first job, this may have registered with her more fully. So if she helps other kids avoid this situation, I think it would give a positive twist to the situation.

OP, I posted earlier about reporting this experience to the FTC: https://consumer.ftc.gov/articles/avoiding-and-reporting-gift-card-scams

Please share this article and process with your daughter. Require her to report this incident and follow the process she's given. She may be able to recoup the money. She will definitely learn.

I am concerned that you are still making excuses for very poor judgment. A person who is mature enough to work remotely should be mature enough to evaluate requests for validity, even one hour into the job. Your daughter does not sound mature enough to be unsupervised in a professional environment and it sounds like she could use to be more assertive with authority figures lest she be taken advantage of by other people in positions of power who are inclined to abuse that power. Her naivete about the suffering in the world and the way that people exploit other people has made her very vulnerable. That is partially on you. If your child believes that only poor people can be criminals, that is because you and her father have not appropriately educated her to protect herself in the adult world. Combine that lack of parenting with blind compliance with perceived authority, and it sounds like your kid's judgment is compromised.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A middle-aged person at my former workplace fell for this same scam. Your kid is not at fault.

Heh, might have been me. Was coming here to say that. The email seemed to be from my boss and she was known for giving amazon gift cards to employees, so I bought $600 worth. Fortunately I figured it out quickly enough and had them frozen on Amazon, so that only I could use them. I'm in my 40s.

This is a lesson that she will never forget. I know it's a rough one. I'm sorry. But please don't be too hard on her. The loss of $3,000 is consequence enough.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well, my daughter and I talked about it. She said that she regularly receives requests for this sort of stuff on Instagram and other social media teens use and she knows it's a scam. With this one, she is still wondering why her radar wasn't up with this situation. She's dealt with weirdos in her previous retail job and knows when and how to brush them off.
My guess is that it's because this email was coming from ostensibly an authority figure at her first office job during her first hour onboarding and logging onto Outlook. (It was not the most comprehensive onboarding of course). She was in automatic worker mode. Mix that in with a kid who's always done as instructed by teachers, parents, people in authority.
I'm trying to encourage her to talk to her high school about it next spring after all the exams are over. Like I said, no matter how many times I told her about these things happening to people we know, family members too, it didn't compute that she would be entering that adult world of scammers. She thinks problem adults are like the homeless and drug addicts we see on the streets and subway who panhandle her. It didn't occur to her that crooks could infiltrate a white collar mileau. If someone her age had given a presentation about how they were scammed at their first job, this may have registered with her more fully. So if she helps other kids avoid this situation, I think it would give a positive twist to the situation.

OP, I posted earlier about reporting this experience to the FTC: https://consumer.ftc.gov/articles/avoiding-and-reporting-gift-card-scams

Please share this article and process with your daughter. Require her to report this incident and follow the process she's given. She may be able to recoup the money. She will definitely learn.

I am concerned that you are still making excuses for very poor judgment. A person who is mature enough to work remotely should be mature enough to evaluate requests for validity, even one hour into the job. Your daughter does not sound mature enough to be unsupervised in a professional environment and it sounds like she could use to be more assertive with authority figures lest she be taken advantage of by other people in positions of power who are inclined to abuse that power. Her naivete about the suffering in the world and the way that people exploit other people has made her very vulnerable. That is partially on you. If your child believes that only poor people can be criminals, that is because you and her father have not appropriately educated her to protect herself in the adult world. Combine that lack of parenting with blind compliance with perceived authority, and it sounds like your kid's judgment is compromised.

New poster here. Stop this right now. People fall for these scams ALL THE TIME. Full grown adults, not elderly. You have no idea.

And, no, I haven't yet myself so I'm not defending my own "honor." It is unlikely that OP's DD will fall for another any time soon. But, if OP's DD isn't mature enough to be in a professional environment, as you state, then that would also take out a huge chunk of the population with it. I met a woman two weeks ago who was scammed out of 23k. These scammers are good at what they do.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My dad is the CEO of a company and almost this exact same thing happened to an intern. They of course paid the amount to the intern and then had to overhaul a bunch of stuff internally. Apparently this is a common tactic scammers use, I feel for your kid- they must feel terrible!

This is the right thing to do and I'm astonished that OP hasn't updated that the company has made it right for her DD.

[Anonymous]

I just don’t understand how anyone would spend $3,000 of their own money on gift cards. I would never do that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My dad is the CEO of a company and almost this exact same thing happened to an intern. They of course paid the amount to the intern and then had to overhaul a bunch of stuff internally. Apparently this is a common tactic scammers use, I feel for your kid- they must feel terrible!

This is the right thing to do and I'm astonished that OP hasn't updated that the company has made it right for her DD.

I understand OP's concern for privacy I'm leaving out details, but OP as described a very sketchy company. Companies (and other orgs) tend to have a few problems that they fix, or a lot of problems that are indicative of the overall culture. OP has the latter case, there isn't even any detail that would distinguish the whole company from a complete scam setup for a standard gift card scam.

[Anonymous]

If it makes you feel better, my husband - who is actually a genius, no joke - was scammed out of a few thousand dollars, too.

I think these scammers catch someone on a vulnerable day, with a story that seems just plausible enough. It's scary, and it suuuucks - and I hope we're all humble enough to recognize that it could happen to us, too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Umm are you sure this is a real internship?

This

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t understand why the majority of people have concluded that the company is fake. The OP stated that when she looked at the actual email address that the request came from, it was not a company email address. This is a common scam — outlook generally shows just the name so the scammer looks up the name of the company President and then makes an email in the name of Bill Gates. When you look at the actual email address, however, it will say something like [e-mail].

This is a super common scam and I’m concerned that 90% of the people responding appear unfarmiliar with it. They ask for cash cards because there is no protection—you send them the codes for the cash cards and they immediately convert them. They are not in the US so there is nothing that law enforcement can do about it. If OP has umbrella liability insurance it might cover her. Or the company cyber insurance, assuming it’s a real company.

We are all plenty familiar with these scams. We just ALSO thought the internship itself was a scam given all the things she told us about it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
We’re emphasizing the other red flags OP seems to be overlooking— namely the “use your own computer” thing and the lack of security protocols that would normally be covered in onboarding. None of what OP describes is normal or a best practice for a legitimate company.

To be fair, my O-6 husband's entire command has had their issued laptops taken away over the past few years. They're now supposed to use personal computers for work at home. Silly, but it's becoming more common, so I don't think it's a red flag on its own.