The Truman Show scam

Hi, Kim Commando here. Well, first up, we have your digital life hack.

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And after that, I'm going to play.

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A call for my weekend national radio show. Do you remember the Truman Show? Jim Carrey's living his whole life on camera and has no idea. Well, there's a scam that works the same way. I'm Kim Commando for netsuite. AI is here, and companies using it are getting ahead. Download the free guide demystifying AI@netsuite.com Kim here's how it starts. You get a random text with a hot stock tip and a link to a Telegram or WhatsApp group. You click and suddenly you're in your own Truman Show. Investment experts post daily tips. Other members brag about big wins. Everyone's supportive and excited. Here's the twist. They're all bots. Every single one. They spend weeks gaining your trust until you're convinced to send money. Then gone. All of it. The whole production was designed for one purpose, to make you feel comfortable enough to hand over your cash. Real investment opportunities don't arrive by random texts, and they don't happen on WhatsApp. If you don't know what's happening with AI, you will be left tech behind. That's just the way life is. Get my free newsletter@getkim.com Next up, a call for my weekend show, the Kim Commando Show. Enjoy. Ever heard of the audience effect? It's when we change our behavior when we think we're being watched. While online, we're always being watched. Your Internet provider tracks everything you do. It's even in private mode. That's why I use ExpressVPN. It's the tool I trust to keep my Internet connection protected. With one click, it hides everything I do online and sends it through a secure connection so no one can see or track my online activity. Here's the best part. ExpressVPN works across all your devices. Your phone, laptop, tablet, even your smart tv. One subscription protects up to eight devices so your whole family stays secure. Don't wait. Protect your family's Internet connection today with ExpressVPN. Right now, you can get my special offer of four extra months with ExpressVPN. Just go to ExpressVPN.com Kim that's ExpressVPN.com Kim for four extra months of privacy protection. Don't wait. Check it out right now@expressvpn.com Kim Debra in Eugene, Oregon.

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Hi there, Deborah.

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Hi there. So, I am so thrilled to be on the show. You are not only fun to listen to, but also perform a great service, and I just thank you for that. So I'm a faith community nurse, and our team got a small grant to put a nurse in a senior apartment complex a few hours a month and bring in some different kinds of services. Like tonight, we've got some medical students that are going to cook with them and such. And I am hearing stories, and I know they're getting the calls because I'm getting them where they're clicking on. They're clicking on things they shouldn't click on, like in texts. And they are getting these AI calls where people are posing as Medicare or Social Security.

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You know, it's horrible. It's horrible.

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Even. Even phone calls pretending to be their grandchildren.

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Yes. Yes. And we want to bring somebody in to talk to them about it. Somebody that's very knowledgeable. And the FBI came some years back and did a class for our entire community for kids, But I don't think they're doing that anymore because they haven't been responding to my request. And I'm just wondering where we might find someone who could come in as a speaker to speak with these senior citizens.

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Well, it's, you know, it's a great thing that you're doing because I've been getting so many phone calls, so many emails from people that are just getting scammed primarily. You know why?

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Because they're lonely.

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Yeah.

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And trusting. Yes. And somebody reaches out to them on Facebook to say, oh, you know, you look like such a nice person. And then they strike up a conversation, and then all of a sudden, they're sliding into their DMs with something else and saying, let's go into WhatsApp. And then there's the romance scams. I have a woman who I'm trying to get a hold of who thinks that she's gonna be marrying Elon Musk, and she has given this fake Elon Musk $400,000.

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Oh, no.

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I mean, this is real. We're talking about big money. I have another guy. Another guy who has lost, I think, $160,000, and he firmly believes. He firmly believes that Reese Witherspoon's mother picked him out on Facebook because she thought that he would be a good husband for Reese Witherspoon.

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Oh, my word.

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And has given money to Reese Witherspoon for surgeries. I'm like, oh. And then, you know, and then here's.

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The crazy part, is that he sent.

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Me the deep fake videos, and. Oh, and it's Wreath's Witherspoon deep faked saying Yes, I love you, but I need the money. Yes, I love you, but I need the money.

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Oh, it's so sad.

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It's so sad. It's so sad. And it just seems to be rampant and out of control. So what you're doing is really fabulous. Maybe the state or local police department has somebody in public affairs, like a.

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Public affairs officer who could come over.

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Community relations. The state attorney general's office may have somebody because they typically have a consumer protection division.

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Oh, I never thought about them.

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So that might be something. AARP has fraud watch events. I don't know if there's one that's happening near you.

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They have this bulletin that comes out periodically and the last one actually was all about these scams.

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Good.

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And I did reach out to them, but I haven't heard back from them yet.

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The public library may have somebody, too.

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Oh, I never thought about that either.

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So that would be really great. Now, I haven't updated in a while, but you might want to take a look at this. I have a campaign that is Stop and think. Don't click that link. And if. I'll put the link in our newsletters to this. But you can Google it. Stop and think. Don't click that link. And that's the name of the website. Okay, but there are downloadable materials like you could put in the. Yes, you put it around just to remind people to stop and think. Just stop and think. Don't click the link. Just stop. But I think if we can get the word out there, and I'm really glad that you're doing this, if we can get the word out there and anybody who's listening, if you have a group of older adults, you need to be doing this. You need to be teaching them to stop. Stop giving these phony baloney people, the scammers, the hackers, the organized crime, their retirement money. It's not going to happen that you're going to marry Reese Witherspoon or Elon Musk if you're 70, 80, 90 years old or even if you're 40 or 50 years old.

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Okay.

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Reese is worth $300 million. She doesn't need your money to pay for surgery.

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Oh, my gosh. Hey, want to stay in the tech now without wasting your time? Join nearly a million folks who get my free newsletter, the Current, where you see the latest in tech in just five minutes every single day. You're just going to love it.

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It has a five out of five.

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Star rating over on Trustpilot. Sign up right now@getkim.com that's getkim.com.

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