SCAM CAN HAPPEN ANYTIME ANYPLACE TO ANYONE

 

“Ma’am, we’re going to close the bank. Are you waiting for someone?”

Being the last client left inside the bank before it closed that day, Lina (not her real name) was the very picture of despair: anxiety etching on her face while crossed hands clutching a pouch close to her chest. Seemingly unmindful of what was going on around her, she was staring through the glass door as if lying in wait for someone to pop up.

“I’m waiting for someone who has the key to this locked pouch. All my money is inside this pouch. She let me use this pouch with a lock so that my money will be safe.”

“She” and Lina met inside the bank that day. In her 70s, Lina withdrew every month the remittance of her daughter working abroad. Like any typical parent, Lina would never miss in boasting that she’s the proud mother of a successful daughter to other clients in the bank. “She” was among the crowd of clients that day getting a load of Lina’s storyline.

“She said she’ll come back at once with the key to open this pouch.”

Flashing on a likely scam, the bank called the police straight away which then ripped open the locked pouch. What they found inside the pouch shocked Lina – bundles of pieces of paper. She shed bitter tears.

SCAMMED RIGHT INSIDE THE BANK

The police investigation revealed that a young female scammer, posing as a bank client, befriended Lina inside the bank that day. The two chatted while waiting in line for their respective transactions. After Lina had withdrawn her money, the scammer offered a locked pouch where Lina could put her money safely. Lina thanked her and put all her money inside the pouch. The scammer locked the pouch and handed Lina, unknown to her, a different identical pouch through a sleight of the scammer’s hands. The scammer kept the key obviously to delay a bit the discovery of the scam-in-progress. Then, she hurriedly left the bank telling Lina she’d get back at once. The scam breezed through in less than an hour.

We may be stunned by that scam. Wait until you go through this cheekier version. Naty (not her real name) met someone outside the bank posing as a roommate of Naty’s daughter working abroad. After withdrawing her money, Naty invited the scammer for a lunch at home. The two got back to the bank in the afternoon. Being a regular client, Naty even introduced to her chummy bank staff the scammer who gave them chocolates from abroad.

To cut this story to the bone, Naty withdrew her whole time deposits and turned them over to the scammer to invest in a project she'd given the nod during lunchtime. Both went out of the bank together in high spirits.  Just right before the bank would close, guess who came to the door in tears -- Naty, who at the end of the day found out that all her retirement money had gone down the drain.

SCAMMERS ARE WINNING

The above close-encounter-of-the-nerd-kind scam we may think of as a so plain-as-the-nose-on-our-face scheme that only softies would be taken for a ride. Not so fast. The following February 2022 headline by the online The Paypers speaks volumes:

“Scammers Are Winning: EUR 41.3 (USD 47.8) Billion Lost in Scams, Up 15%”

“With the Covid-19 pandemic, the scam industry has boomed worldwide. In ScamAdviser’s 3^rd Global State of Scam Report, 42 countries were analyzed on the number of people scammed, the amount of money lost, and how national governments, consumer authorities, and law enforcement are combating scams.”

  Growing massively to 266 million scams in 2020 and breaking new grounds in all places, armies of scammers -- sly, devious, and cunning – have kept on hammering out surprising ways to con people out of their money: by way of investment, pensions, phone, post & email, doorstep, and relationship scams, to name the most common.

Let’s hear it from Jim (not his real name), convicted on charges of conspiracy to commit mail fraud who has worked with the good guys of the Federal Trade Commission as he told Doug Shadel of the AARP The Magazine in his article “Confessions of a Con Artist”:

“You might be thinking, ‘Oh, those get-rich-quick scams are obvious, and I would never fall for one.’ […] But here’s the thing: I didn’t want to talk to stupid people, because stupid people don’t have $50,000 lying around to give me. You would be amazed at how many doctors, lawyers, engineers, and college professors I ripped off. The bottom line is that fraud is a crime that can happen to anyone, given the right con man and a victim with the right set of circumstances.”

SCAMMING THE SENATE PRESIDENT

It happened to Senate President Juan Miguel “Migz” Zubiri. As Philstar reported:

“A 23-year-old and a 46-year-old man have been arrested in connection with the scam try, where they posed as Siquijor Gov. Jake Vincent Villa and Board Member Abner Lomongo and tried to get up to P60,000 from Zubiri. The two were arrested in an entrapment operation.”

ME TOO

            A week ago, it happened to me. My niece got a message from “Me” on her private messenger. “Me” was not me, and the message was not mine. Someone has been using my Facebook public photo and profile. Below is the scammer’s unedited message:

“I’m just wondering if you’ve heard about the International Fund (IMF) COVID-19 financial relief and fund recovery grant program going on around now.

“They are affiliated with the world bank authorized recently to assist us in paying bills, to retired and senior citizen also help start business and for other reasons just after the covid pandemic haven’t you heard about them as well?

“A friend of mine introduced them to me recently, I couldn’t believe until I got the grant delivered to my doorstep too, I got $75,000 after I applied and it doesn’t need to be paid back and everyone is eligible to apply for this opportunity.

“Should I share you this link to the attorney in charge so that you can apply as well?

“I’m enjoying my vacation trip at Singapore.

“I’m just trying to share the blessings that God has done to me.”

All at once, my niece blocked the scammer. Had she pursued and replied because she had believed the message came from me, she would have landed in the following situation similar to the five-year-old case reported in CBS This Morning’s “Facebook Scam Warning: Thieves Use Your Friends’ Identities To Steal Cash.”

THE CASE OF AN IDENTITY THEFT

Like my niece, Shelly Drummond found a profile for a friend from years back named Deborah Boyd who was telling her about a so-called government grant she’d gotten through an agent (attorney in charge in my case) on Facebook. Sure enough, the agent then told Drummond she could get financial assistance from the government. All she had to do was provide some personal information, then send $1,500 in fees to get up to $100,000 in grant money. Drummond wired the fees to Florida, then waited for the delivery driver like the one shown on Facebook to deliver her $100,000 in cash. They never came.

When she tracked down her friend Boyd by phone, she said, “Shelley, it wasn’t me.” It turned out Boyd’s Facebook account had been hacked by scammers who locked her out and then quickly reached out to try to con her family and friends.

Emma Fletcher of Better Business Bureau said, “They’re basically capturing that trust you have in this person and using it for their own gain.”

CBS news team found a network of grants offering from $50K to $1M by agents with stolen FB profiles. One profile was from a real estate agent from Vermont; another, a real MIT professor. One declined to comment on the case; the other was shocked by what she saw.

Computer expert Gary Malevsky set up a way in tracking the scammers and showed the process to the CBS news team.  The results: the scammers were found to be located in Lagos, Nigeria.

Facebook hasn’t solved Boyd’s problem then: The scammers still have a fake profile up with her name and she’s locked out from her FB account.

Delving into my case, Facebook may have made headway in coming to the defense of its netizens today: My FB account is not hacked and I’m not locked out. Though the scammers still have my fake FB profile up, it’s something that they can do to anyone.

Let me wrap up this article by sharing this tip I stumbled upon on the internet before my wife and I set off to the US embassy for our scheduled interview: Keep silent when you’re inside the US Embassy building; an audio device could be set up under your seat. (Real or imagined, it’s nothing-to-lose practical advice.)

In the same fashion, to the likes of Lina and Naty: Keep silent when you’re inside the bank; the next person sitting beside you could be a scammer.

Head still photo courtesy of Tima Miroshnichenko at pexelsdotcom

100

 

Having made it to a year of writing 100 articles in my ATABAY blog, I thought of surfing the internet to figure something out of the number 100.

Well, this may catch your eye due to the pandemic. Did you know that a sneeze expulses air and secretions as forceful as a volcano spewing out lava at 100 miles per hour? A good reminder to always wear a face mask in public.

I’m a senior and fond of watching sprint races in track and field competitions. In 1983, Carl Lewis was the first person to run below 10 seconds in the 100-m dash at low altitude in 9.97 seconds. He was 22 years old.

Did you know that, in 1969, another Lewis (named Larry) ran the 100-yard dash in 17.8 seconds?  What’s so special about it? He set a new world record for runners in the 100-years-or-older class. He was 101 years old.

By the way, the current world record is 9.58 seconds set by Jamaica’s Usain Bolt in 2009.

Did you know that as you focus on each word in this sentence, your eyes swing back and forth 100 times a second?

Now that I‘ve drawn your attention (hopefully), let me go on.

Eight articles ago, an FB fellow MSUan, Roy, took me by surprise with his early bird going-a-century-mark congratulation. Turning the spotlight on this ATABAY’s 100th article, I thought a refresher of how my ATABAY got off the ground would be an apt theme for this piece. Interestingly, taking off last August 21, 2021, my ATABAY’s launching date coinciding with Ninoy Aquino Day in commemoration of his assassination was purely coincidental.

Rolling out the maiden comment, an ex-NSC fellow employee, Ed, posted: “God be praised for guiding in your new career Bro. Raymond!” I've felt those were the kind of uplifting words I need in my writing journey.

The following personalized endorsement by my daughter, Jan Kristy, has given me a shot in the arm in pursuing my life’s twilight “last hurrah”:

“My dad finally pursued his passion to be a writer. I am truly honest that I am not a book person but when my dad started to share a piece of his writing on our family group page, I can’t stop reading because it is too inspiring and the content is full of enthusiasm as well. My family encouraged him to write more pieces and finally created his blog for him to share with others.”

Below is my natal ATABAY blog article I am reposting as a refresher to regular readers and an icebreaker to those who run into my blog for the first time.

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WHAT’S IN A NAME

“That which we call a rose

By any other name would smell as sweet.” – Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet

To write or not to write, that’s the question I’d been dealing with after I got off from over two decades of blood, sweat, and tears in the corporate world. It’s not as existential a question as Hamlet’s “To be or not to be” since I love writing. But, where would I write? The answer: my blog – I am launching today.

Two days ago, brooding over a banner for my blog, I narrowed my short-list to two names. The first name -- I Write, Therefore I Think (smacks of Descarte’s “I think, therefore I am”) -- will give a clue to a reader that what he or she is going to read is a result of a complex process of Thinking. Just as M. Scott Peck, the author of The Road Less Traveled spelled out that “thinking is difficult …complex… laborious… painstaking process,” so too Donald M. Murray in his book Write to Learn, amplified that “writing is the most disciplined form of thinking.”

The second name -- Spiritual Eyeglasses -- will give a reader, at a glance, an inkling of what he or she is going to read: an article with a tint of spirituality. Surely, secular readers will pose a big challenge for me in creating a “catchy” lead sentence or paragraph for each article, to “catch” their attention, provoke them to read more, and hopefully, inspire them to read the whole article ultimately.

Wavering in choosing between the two names, all of a sudden, I recalled an editorial I had written many years ago in a maiden issue of an old little magazine I have kept in my file. This editorial is serendipitous, being a Sunday, today.

             Knock! Knock! Knock!

             Rubbing my eyes, I got off the bed and looked at the clock. It’s 4:45 in the morning. When I opened the door, I found my five-year-old boy standing still and soaked wet. I put him in fresh pajamas and laid him down to sleep.

             I tried to get back to sleep, but I couldn’t. I just couldn’t shake off Art’s idea about a proposed novel name that would unfurl the banner of our new magazine.

“How about Bidlisiw [Beam]?” Lilius suggested on one occasion.

“I saw a magazine with that name,” Lee mentioned, and added, “Why not Dan-ag [Glimmer]?”

             In a moment, I was thinking about its hyphen as a potential problem.

             I looked at the clock again. It’s 5:00 a.m. sharp. I opened my Cebuano Bible and was lead the way to Juan 4:6 and read:

“Atua didto ang atabay ni Jacob, ug milingkod si Jesus tapad sa atabay sanglit gikapoy man siya sa panaw. Hapit na kadto maudto.”

(Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.)

             Praise the Lord! That’s it! ATABAY! That’s the name! The Jacob’s well. In this well, Jesus said to a Samaritan woman:

“Whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up in eternal life.”

             ATABAY. What an inspired name! What a beautiful promise! I phoned Art that morning and told him about my inspired reading. We collected our thoughts on the word ATABAY and pondered on its meaning.

             To rural folks, ATABAY nourishes life. It’s a spot where we come together to draw water for our daily needs. To some, ATABAY refreshes hopes. It’s a refuge, where a mother whispers a prayer or two for the next meal of her seven children; or where a small child throws a mickey-mouse coin in the well and wishes for a new toy. To others, ATABAY measures love. It overflows when we love and serve the Lord. Otherwise, it will run dry.

[My editorial concluded with a promise that ATABAY would quench the spiritual thirst of anyone who reads the magazine. It was its first and last issue; that’s another story.]

After reading the editorial, I uttered the same exclamation: Praise the Lord! That’s it -- ATABAY -- that’s my blog’s name. The suffix ATBP (and many more) I added to the name to mean that, now and then, before I write, I will take off my “spiritual eyeglasses” to see things from a secular point of view.

I look forward to charm, not a “fast reader” who can’t put down a good book, but a “slow reader,” who after reading a line, or a paragraph, or a page, puts down a great book and reflect.

I’m not naïve. In this day and age of hi-tech social media crazes like TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram, what does an old-fashioned writer, like me, have to compete for viewer/reader attention? The answer is embedded in the lyrics of a Bee Gees’ song:

“It’s only words and words are all I have to take your heart away.”

Dear Reader, I promise you, like my above editorial, my words in my ATABAY blog will nourish your soul, refresh your hopes, and overflow you with love.

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Thank you for reading, and thus taking part in marking this one-year-old ATABAY blog’s 100^th article.

Head still photo courtesy of Romario Roges of pexelsdotcom

PANDEMIC'S JEKYLL AND HYDE EFFECTS ON EDUCATION

 

“Someone who is sometimes good and pleasant and sometimes very rude or bad” is how Britannica Dictionary defines “Jekyll and Hyde.” The term was taken from “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde,” a Robert Louis Stevenson’s story where Dr. Jekyll, a good scientist, created a liquid and after drinking it would turn him into the evil Mr. Hyde.

“Wow! You’re going to graduate a magna cum laude.”

We exclaimed when our daughter Dionne, a graduating college student, told us recently about her grades. I am an academic honor-conscious father because of my early education background: a first honor graduate in elementary and a valedictorian in high school. When I got to college, the pursuit of honors – summa, magna, or cum laude – was the “holy grail” for me, most likely as well, among fellow full scholar freshmen long ago at Mindanao State University (MSU). Such a pursuit was known then on the university campus as a tough nut to crack and one must be tough as nails in pursuing Latin honors, especially in the Engineering department.

LATIN HONORS

It is noteworthy that MSU conferred a summa cum laude honor on the first ever Muslim student in 2013 -- more than five decades after the university was created in 1961. That speaks volumes on the daunting pursuit of Latin honors as easier said than done

To cut this story short, when I got a girlfriend in my sophomore year, I decided to drop my “holy grail” quest for honor like a hot potato. After having called it quits from such elite pursuit, I was still looking on the bright side of my college education, hanging on to this safety net: holding to a not-so-tough weighted average grade of 2.5 thereby maintaining my National State Scholarship until graduation – a fairly dignified feat in college. In the end, in my batch of engineering graduates, only two got Latin honors: a magna and a cum laude respectively.

I’ve held in high esteem those who earnestly had sought after such Latin honors and ultimately came through with flying colors. After college, I was hired by National Steel Corporation together with more than two-dozen batch of Industrial Engineers headhunted from various premier universities in Visayas and Mindanao. At that time, only four school names rang a bell in the corporate job-hunting market: UP, Ateneo, La Salle, and “Others” – the first three being known then as the Philippines’ “Ivy League” schools.

A summa, a magna, and a handful of cum laude graduates made up a slice of that batch dominated by University of San Carlos recruits. Amid the glitz of Latin honors, my fellow MSU graduate cracked a joke: “Would the company recognize my ‘Most Behaved Graduate’ award?” What happened next that year would leave me open-mouthed: the magna cum laude recruit topped the engineering board exam; the summa cum laude recruit, placed second.

Most fresh recruits with Latin honors don’t stay long in their first jobs which shows off the weight of their hotshot attribute -- their Latin honor qualifications. They are in high demand in the competitive labor market like finance, management consulting, or engineering which pays well at entry level with a swarm of applicants for each wanted job. Employers use Latin honors and school transcript of records in shortlisting job applicants. High grades mean intelligence, discipline, and work ethics.

GRADE INFLATION

Randy David in his PD Inquirer column wrote about the recent soaring high grades, “It’s called ‘grade inflation,’ and it is seen as the culprit behind the explosion in the number of students who are graduating with the so-called Latin honors: cum laude, magna cum laude, and summa cum laude.” UP Diliman this year, he narrated, conferred 147 summa cum laude, 652 magna cum laude, and 634 cum laude honors (or 38%) of its total 3,796 graduates who completed their bachelor’s degrees in various disciplines.

By the way, MSU-IIT conferred 52 summa cum laude, 689 magna cum laude, and 818 cum laude Latin honors (or 80%) of its 1,937 graduates this year. Interestingly, in 2001, Harvard University awarded 91% of its total graduates an honors degree.

A study of five universities in Turkey analyzes the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on grade inflation in higher education. It involved grades of 152,352 students who attended 2,841 courses conducted by 903 instructors before the pandemic; as well as 149,936 students; on 2,841 courses; by 847 instructors during the pandemic. The results: pandemic inflated grades in higher education. Explanation: The instructors, accustomed to face-to-face settings, after switching to the online method inflated grades to compensate for the unforeseen negative circumstances.

The study revealed that “student performance is “inflated” [through grades] without any improvement […] the pandemic may have seriously increased the grades since the instructors cannot devote time for assessments. It can be said that seniors are discriminated against positively because of their closing graduation if the pandemic affected their situation somehow. Of course, the first and the most plausible explanation for this increase in the grades given is the instructors’ incompetence related to [online] education […] it will not be fair to expect a perfect transition of teaching in virtual and digital environments.”

No doubt, the pandemic is a “blessing in disguise” for students particularly the graduating seniors – a “Jekyll effect” on their graduation.

On the flip side, what is the pandemic’s “Hyde effect” on education? A McKinsey & Company article “Covid-19 and education: The lingering effects of unfinished learning” has disclosed this analysis: leaving K-12 students learning on average five months behind in mathematics and four months behind in reading by the end of the school year. Also on the broader health and well-being of students: more than 35% of parents are very concerned about their children’s mental health.

DEPED CORRUPTION

On the local front, the pandemic’s monstrous “Hyde effect” on education is corruption. Excerpts of the Rappler report “Why COA flagged DepEd for P2.4 billion worth of ‘outdated’ laptops’”:

“The Department of Education (DepEd) is under scrutiny after the Commission on Audit (COA) flagged it for buying P2.4 billion worth of ‘pricey’ and ‘outdated’ laptops for teachers. The DepEd bought almost 39,600 laptops with Intel Celeron processors – among the cheapest in the market, the ones used in budget computers – for P58,300 each. The DepEd’s Intel Celeron laptops ended up more expensive than the MacBook Air with the advanced M1 chip, whose price starts at P57,990. Prices of Intel Celeron laptops range only from P15,000 To P20,000.”

This DepEd corruption treads on the heels of the Pharmally scandal template. Just as Pharmally cornered the P10 billion in pandemic deals despite its being a small, newly created firm that lacked funds, track record, and credibility, so too, SCDC cornered the P2.4 billion in computer sales during the pandemic despite its being a construction company.

Both Pharmally and SCDC have thrown a monkey wrench in the pre-qualification screening by the bidding committee.

“The secret to a happiness is a small ego. And a big wallet. Good wine helps, too. But that’s not really a secret, is it?” (Robert Louis Stevenson, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde)

Head still photo courtesy of Mikhail Nilov of pexelsdotcom

"DAD, I WANT TO BE A PRIEST."

 

What would you say to your son if he decides to become a priest?

Quite many parents answered such a thought-provoking question posed on the internet website Quora which I excerpted & edited for brevity some samples below:

“Well, son, I’m a bit surprised by your career plan, given that you’ve been raised in an atheist household. However, I will support you as I’ve supported your siblings. This support will cease if you try to convert any of us.”

“Wow, you have really surprised me! I’m not sure whether I should congratulate you or cry. Can you tell me all about this? I really want to understand it from your point of view.”

“My beloved son, I am happy that you were born from my womb. If I heard you lived and died for Jesus, then you fulfilled your duty to your mother. But son never is a reason anyone stumbles because of you. If you do so, your mother is dead for you.”

“Son, I was not aware you were into little boys. You will fit right in with The Catholic Church. Go with god and sin some more.”

“God bless you. I’ll pray for you, and ask you to pray for your mother and me.”

As for me, after picking up my son James at the airport, I was driving him home for his break after a year of residency as an oncologist in St Luke’s Medical Center when, all of a sudden, amid our lively conversation, he cut in: “Dad, I want to be a priest.” His jaw-dropping breaking news kicked off a knee-jerk reaction which I narrated in my past article, “The Road Less Traveled”:

“The scenery of the tree-lined highway through our car windshield was as pretty as a picture of the rosy future I envisioned for him earlier in our conversation. After I heard the breaking news he had carried, for sure, as “excess baggage” in his flight home, the scenery before me turned into what it was – a highway made of concrete – hard, cold, and gray.”

That was three years ago. Last August 2, 2022, as parents, my wife and I attended James’ “profession of first vows” (poverty, chastity, and obedience) ceremony in the Society of Jesus novitiate together with another Filipino and two Chinese novices.

After dinner, we met a number of his mentors-priests expressing these same words of gratitude: “Thank you for giving us, James.” One priest spelled out such gratefulness by pointing out that James had applied for novitiate at the height of the pandemic. Together with John, another Filipino cardiologist novice, both acted as medical front liners during the pandemic carrying out the Covid-19 protocols as well as serving as “family physicians” undertaking medical diagnosis and treatment of not so few patients-priests in the Jesuit house. The duo was manna from heaven then, so to speak, to the Society of Jesus during that critical time.

Another mentor-priest showed his appreciation to us for giving our blessing to James in entering into the Jesuit novitiate. He shared with us his experience a long time ago when he broke the news to his parents of his wanting to be a priest. His mother was displeased with the idea. He recalled how his religious mother after he had broken the news prayed every day to nip his priesthood dream in the bud. She even tried to rekindle his relationship with his past girlfriend. The mentor-priest could put himself in the shoes of most novices particularly on how the parents felt about letting go of their sons to become a priest.

I came into contact with this “priesthood calling” right after I graduated from elementary school. One day, a white-skinned priest driving a white land cruiser showed up on our school campus inviting interested male graduates for a weekend outing at his beach house. More than a dozen of us joined the “party” – swimming, games, eating, singing, and lots of fun.

A few days later, I was taken by surprise when the same priest driving a white land cruiser turned up in our house’s front yard. Taking a peek at the priest, suddenly, I just felt weak-kneed as if I was frightened of my own shadow. I told my mother to talk to the priest while I hid in my room. When the priest was gone, I didn’t even ask my mother what they talked about – I knew full well he was wooing me to become a priest.

A week later, the same priest driving a white land cruiser turned up again in our front yard. That particular time, interestingly, he wore a plain polo shirt instead of his usual soutane. Had he sensed that the sight of him in soutane scared me stiff during his visit? Or could he be off his priestly duty that day for an out-of-town trip and just dropped by to bid me goodbye? I don’t know.

Again, my mother talked to him while I hid in my room. Later, as he drove away slowly, I tried to catch a glimpse of the back of his white land cruiser until it went out of my sight. That was the last time I saw him. I got then mixed feelings: a spur-of-the-moment relief from the intense pressure of the priest’s prompting, and a heart-wrenching sadness for not having said a word of thanks to the gentle and loving priest for our enjoyable time together during that wonderful weekend outing in his cozy beach house.

Sad to say, neither could I conjure up an image of his face now nor even remember his first name. That eventful weekend outing and my subsequent hide-and-seek episodes I discarded from my memory a long time ago. Only when James broke the news of his wanting to be a priest did the vivid memory of that particular weekend outing flash again in my mind.

My wife and I are not deeply affected by James’ priesthood calling since we have been members of The Couples for Christ community where we have tried our best in living with the words of Joshua 24:15 – “But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.”

Above all, here’s the heart of the matter. When James broke the news to me of his wanting to be a priest, instead of reacting to him, I quietly said to Him, “Yes, Lord, I’ve owed You one.”

Head still photo courtesy of Mart Production @ pexelsdotcom