- From credit theft and Internet fraud to fake charities and get-rich-quick schemes, we lose millions of rand to scams every year.
- Phishing, skimmed credit, pyramid schemes and Bogus modelling recruitment are among the popular scams to look out for.
- The sad thing is con artists don’t just take away our money but take away our empathy too.
When the tsunamis hit South Asia and Japan, every soul worldwide was shocked out of their slumber and into a frenzy of charity. Newspapers, TV and radio stations opened special funds for readers and viewers to contribute to.
Never in the history of humankind has there been such a show of public generosity, as dollars, pounds and rands poured in from around the world to help the survivors devastated by the disasters.
Unfortunately, there was a lot of insincerity going around as well. Besides companies that insisted on receiving media attention in exchange for their contributions, there were keen-minded entrepreneurs who saw the unprecedented generosity as a golden opportunity to make a quick buck.
They duped volunteers who believed they were serving the cause into making door-to-door collections and pocketed thousands from the generous and unsuspecting. It’s not the first time people got a warm, fuzzy feeling out of being conned. Con men have been making rounds in the name of religious schools, the destitute and the poor for decades, relieving people of millions every year.
They usually go undetected, too, because few people have…
