This morning I recieved a phone call about a lottery winning of £50,000. I was randomly selected among millions of people in four countries: Dubai, Saudia, UK and Ireland. In UK the lot is selected among the telephone numbers from BT, Virgin, Talk-Talk etc.
The person on the other end, congratulated me and was happy that I am Muslim, and gave me the following details about the lottery:
Lottery File Number: 00 84 3961 75
Lottery : 88 45 36 79 15
personal Advisor in Dubai: Muhammad Ramzan
Cheque Number: he did not give one (read below)
He told me to take these details and cheque number to any nearsest Barclys Bank and collect £50,000. The emphasis was, not to share it with any media. In order to release the fund, I was told to go to the nearest Post Office or Western Union and make payable amount £350 to Mr Muhammad Ramzan in Dubai, I was waiting for this moment and outbursted and he hanged up.
Scam is a fraud or dishonest scheme where the person gain your confidence and build rapport during conversation. These people are specially trained and learn about other people: emotional attachements, needs, necessities and eagerness. Fraudulent is an art and game to decieve people mind by giving emotional messages or two opposite messages at the same time. Human brain is a very complicated machine, but, it haults for sometimes within these messages called as state of confusion. The deciever gains you confidence by taking you out of that state and stream you the way they want. The game is normally played at the minimum by two decievers (one elevating you to the confusion state and the other streaming you out), or single person with double role. You might be thinking where did they get your number from. They buy these numbers , addresses and other details, afterall it is a business and investment and therefore expect minimum return of £350 per customer.
Beware of these scam. The working rules are the same not matter if it is lottery scam, product selling, money transfer, charity and donations etc. They build a positive rapport, gain your confidence, transmit an emotional message to elevate your brain to state of confusion ( happiness or sadness are state of minds where a person is vulnerable, so I will call them also state of confusion) and stream it the way they want it. if these things happens to you first ask yourself the following.
1. Did I ever enter into such lottery or businesses like these (if not then it is fraud)
2. Did I know this person dealing with me
3. How to respond in these situation
If you are unaware and dont know what to do at that moment, put the person (deciever) on hold for a few minutes, call your family memeber or close friend and explain the situation or give yourself a message processing time of more than a minute or extreem to tell them call tomorrow or later. Remember their first and utmost strategy is "less time to think". In Marketing this strategy is used to give customer less time to think, that is why you see buy one get one free or xmas sales, new year sales and other offers for limited time period and tagged with a word HURRY" or "Till stock finishes"and "Closing down"
