Suspicious and questioning people cannot be scammed. There's a reason why Thomas Jefferson said to "question with boldness". Most of society is easily scammed these days. People are afraid to question anything. Fear controls. I watched the whole world fall to the covid scam. Shameful.

Anonymous wrote:All the more reason to get POA or at least add yourself as a second on accounts while the parent is still of sound mind. So you can at least check balances and look for irregularities. Also don't just blindly trust aides or give them a chance to do harm. This is one case where "throwing money at the problem" (hiring a ton of aides in your place) won't work. You have to be there and be involved.

Ideally, yes. The problem is that when some parents are "still of sound mind" they think it (dementia and other memory loss/cognitive decline) will won't happen to them. They don't want their kids "meddling in their business" etc. At least, that's how it was with my parents and with my Dad's parents.

If something sounds too good to be true, it is. If you don't know this, you aren't that smart to begin with.

Anonymous wrote:George Schultz and the Walgreens executives were scammed by Elizabeth Holmes.

Excellent point! In fact research indicates that highly intelligent people are drawn in by cults and conmen because they believe themselves impervious to trickery and guile.

Some elders are just trusting and gullible, but others are calculating and think they are getting in on something ahead of the crowd, or they think they are being invited into something because of their specialness and what they bring to the table.

Confidence men and women know all the psychological buttons to push, and they push them all. Elders don’t reach a certain point and rise above all ego wounds; many elders are still driven and sometimes more so by their wounds and triggers and will double and triple down on obstinacy in the face of confrontation. George Schultz nearly disowned his own grandson over his lust for Elizabeth Holmes - his insistence that he wasn’t taken by her was epic.

Pulling folks out of cults and away from cons is incredibly hard, because people invest so much psychologically into the game and the resistance to accepting own has been conned is massive. When I used to prosecute I saw financial abuse cases where elders and younger folks lost their entire life’s savings doggedly pursuing their Nigerian riches or foreign lottery win or whatever.

This is also why this country faces such an uphill battle to heal from these times we are in.

All the more reason to get POA or at least add yourself as a second on accounts while the parent is still of sound mind. So you can at least check balances and look for irregularities. Also don't just blindly trust aides or give them a chance to do harm. This is one case where "throwing money at the problem" (hiring a ton of aides in your place) won't work. You have to be there and be involved.

Anonymous wrote:The POTUS, the Speaker of the House, the former POTUS, judges on the SCOTUS are all elderly.

Yes, this madness has to end.

Anonymous wrote:Talk to your parents, people.

And emphasize that not all scammers call about an outstanding bill. Seniors are vulnerable in-person too when dealing with technology.

My parents got scammed by Verizon in the store when they upgraded their phones. The salesperson there upsold them for all kinds of extras they didn't need under the guise of them being required (spam blocking service, extra protections, Verizon cloud). They were also upsold on accessories for the phones (super fancy cases, battery packs, etc.). I was irate when my mom was showing me everything and I now accompany them for any phone upgrades.

If my parents had any other mobile service where they live, I would have switched them just for the salesperson at the store being such a trash human.

George Schultz and the Walgreens executives were scammed by Elizabeth Holmes.

The POTUS, the Speaker of the House, the former POTUS, judges on the SCOTUS are all elderly.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Talk to your parents, people.

Perhaps your parents are different. You can't tell seniors with a mind of their own what to do. Even once they have Alzheimers, good luck. The aide can convince them to give all their jewelry and anything that can be found in the home that is worth something. It is very hard to protect vulnerable people. Before you have a diagnosis of cognitive impairment it is so much harder.

Yep. My Dad gave away about $85,000 in political donations in just the first half of this year. He was getting emails and texts from various politicians (he truly believes to this day that he was really direct personal contact with senators and congressmen) asking for money--and he happily obliged. He definitely does NOT have the money to do that! When my brother found out and talked to him about it (probably pretty harshly!) my dad got upset and said he was "still learning" how to manage money (at 75!) and then refused to let my brother look over his finances at all. Some elderly are very reluctant to give up ANY independence and would literally rather be scammed out of millions than allow their adult children any oversight.

Just FYI if you want to look up political contributions by name, you can search here https://www.fec.gov/data/receipts/individual-contributions/?two_year_transaction_period=2022&min_date=01%2F01%2F2021&max_date=12%2F31%2F2022

Anonymous wrote:Talk to your parents, people.

Perhaps your parents are different. You can't tell seniors with a mind of their own what to do. Even once they have Alzheimers, good luck. The aide can convince them to give all their jewelry and anything that can be found in the home that is worth something. It is very hard to protect vulnerable people. Before you have a diagnosis of cognitive impairment it is so much harder.

Talk to your parents, people.

The FBI announced that seniors were scammed to the tune of $1.7B last year. It is a global problem as evidenced from this story from Japan.

https://english.kyodonews.net/news/2022/10/f6ca132ade77-woman-pays-for-russian-astronaut-to-return-to-earth-in-alleged-scam.html

Woman pays for "Russian astronaut" to return to Earth in alleged scam

The suspect then asked the woman for money as expenses for a rocket and its "landing fees" on Earth, said the police.