Social scams will ‘socially distance’ you from your money

BEC phishing scams take on many different forms, but they all have the same goal—trick their victims into sending money. Many methods rely on either taking over an employee’s email account or creating a fake invoice from a vendor. The email looks legitimate and makes a financial request that seems believable. So, the target may release company funds (or personal funds believing they will be reimbursed by the company) to the scam artist.

Some common scenarios are receiving a fake invoice from a vendor, a caller ID spoofing of executive leadership, a request to purchase gift card rewards for the company, and someone impersonating an assistant over email asking to transfer funds for a project. 

The second scam with the largest amount of money lost was the romance scam inducing a loss worth $600,249,821 with 23,751 victims. That’s a loss of $25,272 per victim on average. Scammers catfish their victims using emails, dating apps, social media platforms, and many other social websites. They use either completely madeup profiles or create fake profiles using images and information from other “real” users. They then form a relationship with their victim to gain their trust. The nature of the relationship could be romantic or simply friendship. Once the victim trusts the romance scammer, they come up with reasons that they need money. They may ask for a small loan at first, which they promptly repay, to test the victim’s willingness to help and reinforce they can be trusted.

Investment scams involve getting victims to send money with the promise of a larger payout. In 2020, these scams claimed 8,788 victims ($38,287 was lost per victim on average). They may guarantee the victim will make double or triple their money back if they transfer funds via Cash App, Venmo, their bank account, or another money transfer app. Other scams involve charging a fee to gain access to money. They may claim to be a law firm responsible for dispersing an inheritance or worse a fraud recovery group that charges a fee to recover your stolen funds.   

Scammers often join social networking groups to gain new victims. They target a specific demographic such as students in the same major, the elderly, a religious organization, or a variety of ethnic groups. They then present an investment opportunity that everyone in the group should take part in.