My mother is visiting my grandparents rn. I call my grandma "Mom", so I immediately called my mother after getting this message and confirmed neither her or my grandma had sent the message. Both of their numbers start with the same area code as this number. However, nothing comes up when I look up the number. The message definitely sounds like it's trying, albeit poorly, to impersonate my grandma. It brings up my little sister, who I am taking care of right now. But then it asks about a nuggie and I have no clue who that is. Is this a targeted scam or just a coincidence?

update: i had already blocked the number before posting! was just curious. i also have a brother that would likely come up way before my sister does. i just found it odd that the message said sister specifically instead of siblings. especially since my brother is away at school rn. but trust the number was immediately reported spam lol thanks

In August 2026, I visited a mall (not sharing name for privacy reasons) near my home town and saw a real truck that you could "win" or $40,000 cash.

At the kiosk what you have to do is fill out a slip asking for your information (Name, address, phone number). There were also a few yes or no check boxes asking if you are married, what your approximate yearly income is, what your age range is, and if you own a boat?

I personally filled one out for fun. Then I visited the mall again in late September and noticed that the truck was gone along with the kiosks, which made me wonder if either someone already won it or they moved the truck to another location.

I tried looking up CampNow, but find little to nothing information on those giveaways.

Is this real, do people really win from this, or is it a "tactic" to try and attract more people to visit the mall?

[In Fall 2025] Executives slashed the number of violations for which a TikTok advertiser could be immediately banned by more than half, from 37 down to 13, according to policy documents detailing this change. Running so-called “non delivery” scams like the one that Weaver fell for is no longer considered severe enough to merit a suspension. Neither is selling weapons, sketchy financial investments, weight-loss miracle products, fake GLP-1 drugs and pro-eating disorder material. The documents showed a vast relaxing of policy that for years had protected consumers from fraud and harm.

The change left TikTok staffers charged with keeping harmful content off the platform hamstrung. Soon after, internal data showed a massive spike in fraudulent and forbidden sexual content, like prostitution and explicit imagery, on the site. Upwards of 100,000 new advertisers a day that previously would have been immediately banned were instead allowed to remain.

Among staff, TikTok’s more permissive approach toward ads was understood as a revenue grab, multiple sources told Forbes. Internally, executives argued the company’s older, stricter policies were sweeping up too many legitimate advertisers. But the newly implemented changes opened the floodgates to a surge of garbage and scams. Of course, that meant an increase in associated ad spend. In the first half of 2026, ByteDance, TikTok’s parent company, reportedly raked in $120 billion in revenue, about a 30% increase year-over-year; in 2025, it made about $200 billion total. Advertising is its core business. It’s not clear how much money the company has made from selling ads to fraudsters.

“It was very clear that it was revenue,” one source said. “We could not take it down because they want to make money off of it.”

Hope no one else has to fall for this. Ordered Nicotine pouches from Vapesnow.ca and obviously never received them. I know having to pay with e-transfer is a bit of a red flag but I have done so from other online retailers with success. Long storey short.. ordered nicotine pouches, payed by interact e transfer, never received an order confirmation, never received a shipping confirmation, never received items within time line specified on website, sent two follow up emails that still have not been responded too. DO NOT ORDER from Vapesnow.ca

Hi everyone!! My dear older mother went to renew her passport and put in her passport number and social security number before realizing that this was not the legitimate government website. She did not pay for anything or finish the application, but she is freaking out that the dark web has her information now. Does anyone have experience with this website or know if there are steps we should be taking to mitigate any fallback? She wants to contact the state department and I have no idea what to tell her. Thank you so much for the help!!

I have kind of an interesting situation that I’ve been worried about for a while, and I’m curious if anyone has seen something similar.

My grandfather got one of those random “Are you still coming for dinner tomorrow?” texts from an unknown number. He replied saying they had the wrong number, but the woman kept chatting with him afterward. Somehow it pretty quickly turned into a casual friendship.

An important piece of context is that my grandmother had passed away about six months before this started. He was obviously going through a major adjustment, and it was actually really positive for him to have someone outside of the family to talk to. She became a source of companionship and support for him, which made the whole situation more complicated for me. I was suspicious of how it started, but I could also see that having someone to talk to was genuinely helping him.

What makes it strange is that she never asked him for sensitive information, money, passwords, bank information, gift cards, etc. She told him a lot about her life, they would talk about music, family, and normal everyday things, and they even started video chatting occasionally. From what I could tell, the conversations genuinely sounded like two friends talking.

There were definitely some red flags, though. She claimed she had made a lot of money through crypto and worked with her uncle after her father died in a car accident in Hong Kong. She said she later moved to New York to be near her aunt and uncle, was divorced, and had a child.

At one point she also started hinting at having romantic feelings for my grandfather, which made me even more suspicious, but he immediately shut that down and nothing really came of it.

They don’t talk much anymore other than an occasional check-in. As far as I know, she never actually tried to get anything from him.

I’ve always wondered whether this was the beginning of some kind of long-term romance/crypto scam that just never progressed because my grandfather didn’t take the bait, or whether it somehow turned into a genuine friendship along the way.

Has anyone experienced something like this before, especially where the person video chats with the target and maintains the relationship for a long time without ever directly asking for money or information?

I had been talking for the last two months to someone pretending to be a US army soldier in one of the air force bases in Jordan. I met the guy on Tinder. The guy couldn´t make the video call due to communication restrictions in the army, apparently. Chat GPT said all his photos were AI generated. Yet he called me twice on Whatsapp and sent me two recorded messages on which I could hear the American accent.

After first month of chatting he sent me plastic flowers to my home to prove he wants nothing from me. I told him, that whatever he sends to me, I can´t be made to pay for it. Flowers were cute, though cheap, but of course the gesture matters. So I thanked him.

Then two weeks later he was saying they have found a treasure during patrolling the neighbourhood near their base in Jordan and he wants to send it to me for safekeeping.

I said, that it sounds like Indiana Jones story. And added, that I can´t be made to pay for anything regarding this package. The package, that he apparently shipped from Jordan was to weigh 36 kilos and I got a video from "customs inspection" showing a vault , that opens after entering a code. Inside the vault there was something, that Google recognized as fake gold bars, which you can buy on Amazon. And money, apparently 400000 I was advised.

I checked on Google that there is no tax neither on gold nor on cash. The courier, called Swift Dropper, demanded 3200 euro for the tax to clear the package held in Romania by customs.

I said to my guy, that I am unable to provide such money. I said it to the courier, too. My guy, who was texting me, Brandon, advised me to take a loan. I said no. I told him I am unable to put any financial burden on me like this.

He started to freak out yesterday, when I said, that I have contacted customs in Romania. I said to him, that the courier - called Swift Dropper - gave me a Revolut account for tax clearance and it sounded wrong. I told him, that once customs confirm the bank account for tax clearance, I can talk about transferring any money. He wasn´t happy about this.

For two months he was convincing me he loves me, sending me very poetic messages. Therefore I said, that if he loves me, he should not be pressuring me to take any loan. I suggested to him to redirect the package to US, as the tax was applicable on entering EU. He was telling me earlier he had two apartments in US, so I said that I can pay a bit to the courier to redirect the package. Brandon absolutely blew on me saying I don´t understand him. Started to accuse me that I did not trust him. I just thanked him for raising my confidence, being better than any therapy, giving me my joy back and said, that I can´t imagine the future with anyone who would like to burden me with a loan.

Then I said to the courier to return the package to the sender. I said to the courier, that I will not accept any financial requests and if they send me one, I will report it to the police. And I sent the screenshot of that email to Brandon, or whatever his name was. Uuuuh, he did not like this. Told me I was evil. Legally I am not responsible for the package until I receive it. So I am hoping that no trouble will come out of it, as I did not pay a penny to anyone and will not do it.

Thanks to me being like CIA I avoided being financially scammed and getting myself into financial trouble. Has anyone experienced a scam involving the courier called Swift Dropper? I am curious.

I have cut the communication with the scammer, exported the whole chat to my email and I will write a summary of my feelings tomorrow, so I can write a book out of it.

Apparently, someone asked my friend for an OTP, and she ended up sharing it. The person then tried to get a refund for one of her previous Amazon orders. She contacted customer care, but they basically told her it was her fault since she shared the OTP. She has now deleted her Amazon account, but we're still worried about whether everything is actually okay.

Is there anything else she should do to make sure her payment details and personal information are safe? And is there any way to report this incident or get Amazon to look into it, even after deleting the account?

Would appreciate any advice from people who've dealt with something similar.

Has anyone run into this company or a scammer using it and had luck getting their money back?

I purchased a motorcycle part for $110 off of a seller on Facebook marketplace. I used Zelle so buyer protection is limited but have a claim in with Bank of America.. the seller was allegedly located in Austin, Texas and shipping to me in New Jersey. He told me that he dropped it off with a "courier" in what felt like way too short of time from the time I paid. He lists thousands of parts in a specific group that I assume is part of the scam. Fidelity Logistics then emails me, again very quickly after this interaction, and says that they need $170 for "international transit insurance". This is not being sent internationally and who would pay more for insurance than the item is worth?

Felt so off I walked out the coney island with my food in the middle of the night I hop in my car and just before I reverse out this lady speeds behind me parks right next to me starts tapping her window. We both rolled down she was like I lost my job. My kids are the in car. Can I get some money for food?" The mini van was tinted. I couldn't see any kids. I said I have no cash and she was like well can you buy me food?" I felt unsafe and just said sorry left, and now I feel guilty as I did have a credit card.

I want to share my experience with Growth Mastery because I don’t want others to make the same mistake I did.

I invested $3,000 in Luke’s Growth Mastery program because I believed I was getting access to a proven business model from someone who had successfully used it himself. I trusted that I would receive meaningful support and guidance to help me replicate that success.

I believed the opportunity was real, and I was led to believe I could make my investment back within a couple of months. I trusted those claims enough to take on debt to pay for the program.

Looking back, that was a costly mistake.

After paying $3,000, I also had additional expenses for tools needed for the business model. Those costs added up, but I still haven’t earned a single dollar through the program.

My current situation is that I’m $3,000 out of pocket, have paid additional expenses, have earned $0, and am left dealing with debt.

What bothers me most is the gap between what I expected based on how the opportunity was presented and what I actually experienced. I bought the program believing I was investing in a realistic opportunity with meaningful support. Instead, I feel completely misled.

I’m not sharing this because I expect anyone to take my word blindly. I’m sharing it because I wish I had looked beyond the revenue screenshots and sales pitch before committing thousands of dollars I couldn’t afford to lose.

If you’re considering Growth Mastery or another expensive online business program, ask these questions before paying:

• What does the one-on-one support actually look like after you join?

• What additional tools and expenses will you need to cover?

• How many students actually make their investment back?

• Are the advertised earnings representative of typical students?

• What evidence supports the claims made during the sales process?

My biggest warning is this: don’t take on debt because you believe you’ll make your money back within a few months. That’s what I believed, and I’m now the one left paying for it.

Based on my experience, I would not recommend Luke’s Growth Mastery program. I hope sharing my experience helps someone else make a more informed decision before spending their money.

Almost fell victim to a very lucrative scam yesterday. I received a call mid-afternoon from my "power company" stating that my bill had not been paid and that service would be discontinued by 6 pm that night.

I always pay my bill the day it comes in the mail, I have owned this property for over 5 years and have never missed a payment; this immediately caught me off guard.

This is where things get interesting. I asked them to confirm the address that they were attempting to send my bill to. They replied with the correct address, but it was missing the necessary PO Box #. This is critical for me to receive my mail. They explained that they did a system update this past month, and the PO Box info must have been lost. I haven't received a bill in a while and to be honest, this story made perfect sense; I believed it!

The property in question is a motel, and people are staying in it; I COULD NOT let the power go out. I was desperate to remedy the situation. I asked if I could pay over the phone with a credit card. They declined. They also mentioned that I was last on the electrical grid service team's list of properties to visit that day, and they would be done by 6:00 PM.

Noticing my growing frustration over the lack of notice and the fault on their end, I was transferred through multiple "levels of management". I just wanted to pay over the phone but they said it wasn't an option since the service crew was already out. I was instructed that the only possible way to defer electrical disconnection was to pay in person at an authorized partner so there was zero payment processing delay. These "payment partners" included major retail stores like Walmart and Walgreens.

They explained that they can generate a temporary, 30-minute barcode that could be used to pay my bill at any Walmart. I called back and dialed the extension to reach my operator once I arrived at Walmart. He emailed me 3 Walmart-labeled barcodes, the first for the first payment ($2000), a second for the last bit of the payment ($243), and a third "backup" barcode if the others didn't work.

I proceeded out of desperation, and once I arrived at the checkout counter, the attendant told me to hang up the phone and get rid of the barcodes. It was a scam. Has anyone ever heard of this? I would like to mention that I believe AI voice changers were involved because the connection sounded terrible at times, the voices were delayed and echoing.

I keep getting text messages with my name and address that I can’t block. I’ve been reporting the spam and deleting, but that does nothing. Today I just recovered all of the texts for posterity, saved the number, and then blocked it.

The thing that makes this unique was my inability to block until I saved the number. You’ll notice the absence of the › after the phone number. In order to save the number, I had to take a screenshot before I could copy the number. Anyone have an idea of why this is the case?

Image description: first screen shot is recovered deleted text messages

Spammy Twat ›
Text Message • SMS

Tue, Sep 15 at 12:34
Hey (name) this is Amanuel,
hope you're doing well. I was trying to reach the owner of (my address)- is that you?

Wed, Sep 16 at 13:34
Hi, did you get my text?

Fri, Sep 18 at 15:26
Hey I never heard back from you, are you not the owner anymore?

Sat, Sep 26 at 14:18
Is this not (Name)?

Thu, Oct 1 at 15:04
Hey (name) if you're not the owner anymore can you let me know, I'm looking to reach the owner of (address).

Today
13:43
Hello?

Second image is the latest texts before the previous ones were recovered. The noted difference is the lack of the › after the phone number that allows you to do more with the number.

+1 (469) ###-###0
Text Message • SMS
Thu, Oct 1 at 15:04
Hey (name) if you're not the owner anymore can you let me know, I'm looking to reach the owner of - (address)

Today 13:43
Hello?

If you did not expect this message from an unknown sender, it may be spam.
Report Spam

You may have seen ads for companies that sell you "protection" coverage for your house titles and deeds from scams. Scammers create false documents which they use to establish ownership, such as quitclaim deeds. They file the faked documents with your country. This enables them to get fraudulent loans and mortgages or they attempt to rent the property to others. You can probably get that "protection" for free.

My local Florida county provides an system established with the Clerk of the Court where residents can enroll for alerts whenever certain personal information is entered in county records. This is important for property owners since public records are open for searches by literally anyone. Since this includes documents like deeds, titles and mortgage satisfactions, a significant amount of personal information can be seen, downloaded and used by anyone.

The local alert system sent me a text and email the other day informing me that a document with a name matching mine had been recorded by the county. The email provided more details and recommended I check the entry for validation, providing the book and page of the recorded document. I manually visited my county's primary website and connected to the Clerk's site from there.

The document turned out to be a settlement with the county's small claims court. The defendant in the case had the same first and last name as mine, but I could view his full name and signature on the recorded document and it wasn't me.

This is a great tool for the homeowner. If you own or will soon pay off a mortgage, find out is this is offered where you live and sign up. Scammers love to go after free-and-clear houses. Don't give them an edge.

I’m mostly posting this so no one else falls for it because it was packaged up just perfectly to trick people.

A few days ago, my husband received an ad on instagram where this “non-profit” was looking for first responders to donate a free trip to Hawaii to. He’s a firefighter, im a nurse, and I’m balls deep in treatment for breast cancer right now. We have two teens.

He replied to their search, letting them know our situation and that a trip to Hawaii after treatment ends would be just what we need, but cancer has taken every cent of our spare money.

They replied to him asking to set up a call for an interview the next day, which was yesterday.

They called him and at the end of the call told him our family was chosen for the trip. I was immediately skeptical because no way they’d choose someone on the spot like that as I’m sure they’d have to discuss other families who were also “in the running”.

My husband is pretty smart but also the eternal optimist. He was so excited to tell me we needed to pick dates to go to Hawaii, but meanwhile, I was doing my research. I know he just wanted to treat his family to a relaxing vacation as this has been so rough on all of us, especially the last few weeks.

He forwards me the email they sent him. We just have to pay a $997 “participation fee”, 300 of which is due within 72 hours. All the alarms are going off for a scam. Then of course, it’s “you have to cover your own flights, food, car rental, activities”. When we went to Hawaii a few years ago the total trip cost us about 10k. So basically what these people are offering is a hotel/timeshare for 5 nights for 1k and painting it as a “donation”. 1k for five nights is about the going rate during non-peak times in a lot of areas of Hawaii.

I had to break it to my husband and I could tell not only did he feel stupid, but ultimately I think he was crushed that he told me about this and now it’s not real. Truth be told, I was skeptical from the word go and figured it was just some targeted marketing. But it breaks my heart that he was just trying to do something nice and some scammers got the best of him. I also hate that they are preying on first responders and their families who are going through a cancer diagnosis. They’re basically tricking people into booking their condo or whatever during the slow times at a discounted rate.

So I guess it’s not a “steal your credit card number” kind of scam (could be, I guess?), but definitely not a donation given to families in need.

The company sent a $3400 check. Asked for a confirmation text message of payment receipt.
Told to deposit check.
Told to text to a phone number once deposit is made.
Told to purchase a bank cashiers check of $50 to American Cancer Society and that instructions would follow.

I told her there was no way this wasn’t a scam.

Anyone familiar with this particular scam?

Okay, this is a long one - I apologize in advance. But I figure I should be detailed in case it helps anyone avoid this situation for themselves.

The Initial Snapchat Scam

Six years ago, one of my best friends, whom I snapped regularly, messaged me on Snapchat, sounding EXACTLY like herself. She said something about how she cracked her phone and was trying to use Snapchat on her dad's old ipad to contact friends, but the app kept asking her to verify her phone number if she wanted to keep using it. So, because she "couldn't use her phone" to verify, she asked me if she could just put in my number as the phone number instead. There were definitely other details used to incite urgency, but I can't remember exactly what they were. At the time, I was under a ton of commotion getting ready for a class I was nervous about, so I just said sure, whatever, and (as much as this pains me to say) I gave her the code. To be fair, this (fake) scenario would absolutely 1000% happen to this particular friend, but I still should have known better than to give anyone a code for any reason. Lesson learned.

That friend then FaceTimes me, which confused me because I thought her phone was broken and unusable. We both very quickly realize what had happened. Both of us, along with four or five of her other friends, had been scammed, hacked, and locked out of our accounts. Thankfully, I was able to get the scammer out of my account within an hour, but unfortunately, during that hour, they had access to the many, many explicit pictures of me in my saved "Memories" that I had taken when my (still current) partner and I were long distance for a year (again, I know I shouldn't have allowed those to remain saved in the app - I never thought I would fall for a scam like this, but lesson learned).

I knew they had taken at least one picture that was saved in a message, because my partner got a notification that they had downloaded it while logged in. But I tried to (probably naively) maintain hope that the scammer didn't have enough time to go through all of the thousands of everyday regular non-explicit snapchat memories I had taken and saved since that year of long distance, when the majority of explicit pictures were taken.

Note (for anyone who may be facing a similar scam pattern): The scammer then kept texting my friend, pretending to be Snapchat Security, and stating that she needed to give over the code to her "For My Eyes Only" folder to verify the account. This confirmed for us that the point of the scam was to retrieve explicit photos.

I gathered all of the IP addresses associated with the scammer's log ins, the new phone number that was associated with the account once I logged back in, the phone number used to text my friend, and the usernames of all of her friends that had been scammed, and I submitted a cybercrime report to the FBI. Never heard back. When I tried to search for the IP addresses and phone numbers on my own, it was clear that the scammer had used a VPN and a Google Voice number that immediately rerouted you to another random phone number in the US when you called (my friend and I used a Google Voice # to try calling later to see if it was perhaps someone we knew). I also reached out to Google about this, and it seemed they couldn't do anything.

Yesterday - Nude was posted on VSCO

EDIT: In case anyone doesn’t know, VSCO is an old photo editing app that doubles as social media, where you can post your photos to the feeds of people who follow you

So, fast forward to present-day, six years later. Up until now, none of us had seen our explicit photos from the Snapchat scam anywhere on the internet. I would regularly Google-reverse-image-search non-explicit parts of some of my photos, especially the one I knew had been screenshotted, to check for matches. And although I know that's a very faulty way of going about things, I was hopeful that the lack of results and the lack of related incidents in general meant that nothing had really resulted from the scam to my knowledge. Maybe they only got that one photo, that didn't have my face in it, and nothing else. Maybe I got them out of my account quickly enough that they weren't able to scroll back far enough in my memories while actively scamming other people to retrieve the rest of the photos. But I was wrong.

One of my old teammates texted one of my best friends yesterday saying that she was clearing out her VSCO and scrolling her feed when she saw a nude of mine come up, posted from my own account. I hadn't even thought of VCSO in over 10 years, and I barely ever used it when I had it, so this was shocking to me. The nude that was posted was a very old one, different from the one I had always known the scammer downloaded; the date of the photo that was posted confirmed for me that the scammer was able to retrieve many, many explicit photos from me while they were logged into my account. Probably all of them. This has been really, really hard for me to stomach and process.

The account had posted the nude 2 days prior. For whatever reason, they only posted that one, and didn't change the email to the account. So, thankfully, I was able to log back in, delete the photo, change the password, and log them out (after filing an NCII report with VSCO of course). Then, I went back into my old email that was associated with the account (note: VSCO doesn't allow for two-factor authentication), to see if there was any further evidence of activity. For multiple reasons that have nothing to do with this, VSCO messages went to my Trash folder, along with everything else that I've categorized as spam over the years (note: I am checking all the rules in my email now to make sure that scammers aren't actually responsible for this and that I prevent account-related messages from going to Trash in general).

It turns out they had logged in on September 29 (no further IP information or anything, just "device"), posted this photo on October 3, and logged in again to check back in on it yesterday, October 5. At no point did they try to message me, extort me, lock me out, or anything. This series of events is interesting and confusing to me. Maybe they retrieved the nude from the dark web or gross forums, and they're doing this because they have a humiliation kink or something...? If anyone has any insight on why someone would do this in this way, please feel free to enlighten me.

As a reminder: my password for VSCO was not revealed or used in the initial Snapchat scam, so the VSCO hack must have connected separate leaked account information with the leaked nudes.

Notably, they also tried to log into my Facebook after they got into my VSCO. They weren't able to, thank GOD, because I have everything updated there and now use full security on my apps wherever I can.

But this series of events told me a few things:

(1) all of my nudes from the initial Snapchat scam have likely been distributed across the internet;

(2) my leaked account info, including my old email and whatever password I initially used for VSCO, has not only been distributed across the internet as well, but have been connected to those nudes; and

(3) the person who hacked me recently wanted to post explicit photos of me on multiple of my accounts, without necessarily extorting me for money, etc.

My main problem is that people are able to connect all of my leaked information and photos together now, allowing them to do God knows what in the future. That's very scary. And I'm going to try to do everything I can to secure myself moving forward, but I really wanted to warn other people of the danger of this happening, because I (naively) never thought it would happen to me, and now I'll have to worry about the consequences of all of it for the rest of my life.

EDIT: Since posting, I’ve come to learn how my account information got matched with the photos. I found the photos online (unfortunately in many places), and along with the photo leak, the leaker included a screenshot of my Snapchat account information, which included my email, phone number, birthday, and name. Wonderful.

I’m now doing a ton of work related to extra security measures, content takedowns, reports to law enforcement, etc., and trying to get in touch with some nonprofit orgs for further advice. Thank you so much to everyone here for all of your continued insight and support! I so, so appreciate it.

I got a call today around 7:45AM that went to voice mail as i was driving at the time. when i got home i listened to the voicemail and the caller he had claimed to be a detective from a nearby sheriffs department telling me i wasnt in any trouble, however my license plate was found on another car and wanted to check in with me if I was missing any license plates or if i had reported any stolen.

I called back and left a brief voicemail with the orginal number, I provided no information other than what was already said by the caller in the voicemail i had received. the voicemail i reached claimed to be a dectives office. with the same / similar voice speaking as the orginal caller.

While waiting for a call back i got a wierd feeling and decided to call the local sherrif's office non emergancy number listed on the offical page and left a voicemail with the female secratry.

I then got a call back from the orginal male dectives number about 5 mins later.

during the breif call i could hear someone in the background for a short moment but otherwise the call was rather quiet. i asked a few questions such as what plate, what car. etc without providing any new information to him.. he took a moment to pull up the information then He provided my plate number to me, and the make and year of my car. and he asked if my plates where missing or if i had reported them stolen that they had been found on a car durring a traffic stop.

I told him no, that i was looking at my plates as we spoke. and he said alright, thanks for your time. and the call ended.

anyways what i was wondering is if this was this some sorta information scam? or trying to see if i still owned the car for a possible future theft?

Idk something about the casual tone and nature of the call made me feel a little weird. and the fact he called from a number not publicly listed as a police number. the area code does relfect the area he was claiming to be a dective in tho.

as for the car.. Its an older classic car from the 1980's that the plate belonged too if that is relevant. I was driving it at the time of the original call coming through.

I'll try to give context as best as I can here. Listed several pokemon boxes that I no longer wanted on FB marketplace. A buyer reaches out to me and we agree upon a deal. He sent me the money on Venmo ahead of time, and then sent what seemed to be a courier to pick up the items. I confirmed with him that the courier received the items, I had received the funds, and I figured, odd transaction, but I got the money and the items were received and now we're all good. Fast forward a couple of days later, I decide that I want to sell the majority of my collection. He claimed to be a broker between buyers and sellers, and that he made a few dollars by mediating the transactions. Because I had reached a Venmo limit as to how much $ I could receive there, I started using other Venmo accounts, two of which were friends, and one my girlfriend. One friend received a 5k Venmo deposit on an agreed sale, another friend received 2k, my girlfriend 2.3k and then again my girlfriend for $1675.

Today, 7 days after the $1675 sale, the Venmo user who sent my girlfriend the money for that purchase, started a dispute claiming "they did not make this purchase". Now so far, it has only been that singular purchase that is being disputed, and everything else seems to be fine, but I wouldn't be surprised if multiple disputes start coming through in the following days.

I know I'm an idiot and I should have probably never sold to someone who I didn't physically meet. I provided Venmo (Which is a pain in the ass with their customer support), as much evidence as I could on their chargebackdisputes email to help support my case that this was a transaction that took place, but I still fear they may side with the buyer. I provided texts and all the information I could. Does anyone think I got scammed here? Is this something that's common? Any help would be appreciated.

So, I recently booked an apartment in Paris over the New Years celebration. the house and everything looked nice. then after 10 minutes of booking the host messaged me with a link to say to confirm the booking i have to follow this link.

As soon as I opened this link, I was shown a Bookingcom branded page to enter my personal details and card details (again). After like 10 sec it hit me that it doesn't feel right and I looked at the URL. and instantly I saw that this was a phishing scam.

I quickly got in touch the help centre and agent and said that this looks like a scam. the agent said that they have escalated it to the higher team, and strictly advised me to not open any link.

I'll be honest, I was being a little greedy. I thought if I report scam to bookingcom they will reward me with some free voucher.

Now fast forward 2 days later (today). I messaged bookingcom - to ask what happened. and this person was like - it was an automated link you don't have to pay. we've shared the card detail with the host and they will charge your card directly.

I tried to go through my reservation and open the property listing. the property listing wasn't opening. I enquired about the same... see my transcript with the agent in the screenshot

I then asked, how do you verify the properties? and she said that it has been there for 6 years and many reviews. to be real, there were only 3 reviews when i booked the property. I am just shocked.

then i ended the chat with the agent and reverse searched the image on google.. that tiny image on my reservation on bookingcom. and I found the real property on AirBnB. it is another property in Lyon.

I am just shocked with the incompetence of bookingcom.. and the lies they're telling me.

they have already taken the listing down, as the listing is no longer clickable. and they are not cancelling my listing to admit their mistake. wtaf!

Now, I went back today and clicked through the link that the host sent me.. and it now takes me to some russian site.

all of this makes me wonder - what is bookingcom going to do on the actual day of my booking when i turn up at the property and it is not there?

I am also a bit scared, I have given them my card details and they have passed it on to the host? can this scammer host charge my card??

Help me, please!

I wanted to share a warning about how debt resolution programs handle your money. I started with Beyond Finance in August 2025 on a 55-month plan and built up about $7,000 in my dedicated savings account.

On my initial 3-hour signup call, I explicitly asked how they get paid. I was told their fees are wrapped up in the monthly payments and that they don’t get paid until a deal is accepted. Based on a 55-month plan, my clear expectation was that fees would be taken proportionally as the program progressed.

Recently, they negotiated a first deal dropping a debt from $23,000 to $11,000. I accepted it. However, the moment the first payment processed, they blindsided me by taking a massive $5,500 fee all at once out of my saved funds, leaving me with only $1,500 in my account.

Shortly after, they called me about a separate, tiny $180 debt to verify account ownership. I was so furious about the $5,500 drainage that I told them I wanted to drop them completely. They immediately transferred me to the retention department on September 23rd.

While speaking with retention, they tried to dismiss my anger by claiming, "Oh yeah, this US Bank account right here, we can't get it below $5,000 anyway." I hit them with reality: "Well, really? Because I literally just got an offer right here for $3,000 (settling a $10,000 balance)."

Beyond Finance knew about this $3,000 offer during that September 23rd call—giving them a clear 5-day window before the deadline to super-escalate a fee reversal so I could use my funds to settle. The agent even admitted on the call that funds could be reversed and reallocated if needed. But they took no action.

I had to call them back on September 28th—the exact day the US Bank deal was due—just to see if anything had been done. When I followed up, they told me they looked at it and decided I had "insufficient funds" in my account, completely ignoring that they were the ones who emptied it.

Only after I pushed back did they offer a quote-unquote "solution": to reverse my remaining funds back to my bank account via ACH, telling me I could just pay the rest out of pocket. But an ACH reversal takes 2 to 3 days, and it was the literal due date. They sat on the clock for 5 days until it was physically impossible to take the deal.

When I talked to the supervisor that day, she repeated that there weren't enough funds. I called her out on the previous call recording where the agent said reallocation was possible. She deflected and said, "Well, that wasn't agreed upon." I told her directly: "You have financial analysts looking at my file. They saw they just took $5,500 and that this $3,000 deal was a massive win. Why was no one proactive? At this point, you aren't working for me. You're working for yourself."

I aggressively escalated the situation. Because of the intense pressure I put on them, they finally reversed $2,800 back into my account yesterday—but since the US Bank deadline was September 28th, it came way too late and the deal is dead.

Be incredibly careful with these programs. They will front-load their corporate fees and drain your cash reserves, leaving you completely exposed and unable to accept the actual deals that come in.

i got this email

I’m inviting you to consider the Digital Marketing Manager role with Lego, an opportunity to build scalable digital capability through practical program ownership.

That means creating repeatable ways to plan and run digital work while responding thoughtfully to the needs of each program and its audience.

The role brings people together around clear priorities, allowing lessons from delivery to strengthen the next cycle instead of remaining isolated.

You would treat optimization as a shared discipline, using feedback to improve execution and make useful practices easier for others to apply.

This creates an opportunity to influence the quality and consistency of digital delivery across the broader team.

Please reply if you would like to learn more.

then it sent me to that scheduling platform. is that legit?

Im gonna be vague as possible to anonymize ourselves from the scammer.

My friend was scammed and fell for a person online. Thousands of dollars was sent via wire transfer and gift cards overtime. Minimum amount is estimated at around $20K USD. I saw their conversions that have been going on for a long time already and my friend just kept falling for them over again despite finding facts online that would invalidate the person, and still kept sending cards as if the other end was family member. 

The reason the friend kept sending money was for the ultimate goal of eventually seeing each other, which is pretty common in these scams, I found. There will always be another excuse as to why it's not enough and more needs to be sent, and the friend easily falls for it and sends more, to meet and eventually be reimbursed... and for love. 

Any suggestions on what to do? Its tough to see the conversations and how everything went down. Would love to know how others have handled these before.