Offbeat Fridays – The thread where offbeat headlines become front page news

The Day I Put $50,000 in a Shoebox and Handed it to a Stranger

The Cut's financial advice columnist fell for a (very elaborate) scam and handed over $50,000 in cash, thinking her identity had been stolen and that the CIA was investigating. It starts with what seems to be a call from Amazon confirming "suspicious activity" on an account in her name, and quickly spins to this:

He told me that 22 bank accounts, nine vehicles, and four properties were registered to my name. The bank accounts had wired more than $3 million overseas, mostly to Jamaica and Iraq. Did I know anything about this? “No,” I said. Did I know someone named Stella Suk-Yee Kwong? “I don’t think so,” I said. He texted me a photo of her ID, which he claimed had been found in a car rented under my name that was abandoned on the southern border of Texas with blood and drugs in the trunk. A home in New Mexico affiliated with the car rental had subsequently been raided, he added, and authorities found more drugs, cash, and bank statements registered to my name and Social Security number. He texted me a drug-bust photo of bags of pills and money stacked on a table. He told me that there were warrants out for my arrest in Maryland and Texas and that I was being charged with cybercrimes, money laundering, and drug trafficking.

From here, the "CIA" gets involved.

I stayed up late reading this last night and I'm still thinking about it. On the one hand, as a neutral observer, everything she details so obviously screams scam to me that I don't understand why she didn't hang up and call the cops. (She does reflect on this, somewhat, in the essay.) On the other, if you're not entirely familiar with the concept of phone number spoofing, or are unaware of how much personal/identifying information is easily available—and for sale—online, then I could maybe see how someone gets panicked enough to fall for this.

The biggest question for me is why, even when she was fairly certain that she was being scammed—telling the person that she knew she was being scammed—why she handed over the money. This is the biggest leap in logic in the whole thing, and I wonder how many times the scammers get this far before getting cut off. She's told by the man who says he's from the CIA that all of her accounts are being frozen and her SSN is being deactivated. Thus, she needs to withdraw a large amount of cash, enough to survive on for two years, and hand it over to an undercover agent, who will deliver her a treasury check the next day which she can then cash.

“Tonight, we will close down your Social Security number, and you will lose access to your bank accounts,” he explained. “Tomorrow, you’ll need to go to the Social Security office and get a new Social Security number. We’ll secure this money for you in a government locker and hand-deliver a Treasury check for the same amount. You can cash the check and use it for your expenses until the investigation is over.”

“Why can’t I just use this cash?” I asked. “Why do you have to take it and give me a check?”

“Because all of your assets under your current identity are part of the investigation,” he said. “You are being charged with money laundering. If we secure this cash and then issue you a government check under your new Social Security number, that will be considered clean money.”

It's just hard for me to get to a point where this logic sounds reasonable, I guess.

Intel: Hamster müssen für Ansiedlung weichen (2022)

From Google's translation:

Intel: Hamsters have to move for settlement

The chip manufacturer Intel wants to start building a chip factory near Magdeburg next year. Before the excavators could begin, the animal inhabitants of the building site had to be relocated. Now the presumably last two field hamsters have been recovered from the Bördeacker.

...

The seven hamsters recovered from Eulenberg were immediately taken to the Leipzig Zoo , where veterinarians examined them for their DNA and gender. When they wake up from their hibernation, they should make their contribution to the preservation of the species with field hamsters from Thuringia and Saxony. In order to return with the prospect of reproduction, 15-20 animals must be bred before they can be released into the wild.

Why San Francisco homes sometimes have a random toilet in the basement or garage