I've read that the "Nigerian Prince scam" letter didn't bother to correct it's spelling and language errors - it served as a sort of filter to ensure they attracted the uneducated and unsophisticated. Same here?
I wonder if this is true -- I think that a lot of the pig-butchering scams target recent Chinese immigrants in the U.S. and America, either relying on the victim's non-native English to hide their own errors, or switching to Chinese if it's appropriate to the scam. But that's just sort of a guess based on who I understand many of the victims are.
Really? I have wondered about this for decades. When I was a teenager I dreamed of being a freelance copy editor for scammers. Surely investing a few cyber-dollars on editing would increase your successes and pay for itself?
But maybe the human trafficking bosses aren’t looking for any advantage, Bain-like, to increase their returns.
It really is a striking comment about the state of the world economy that this much human labor gets devoted to scams like this. Markets can't find anything better for people to do? At least the three card monte setup was a game!
I feel like you've slowly been circling this question with some of these posts, so I'll come out and ask it directly: What happens when AI "gets there" for this kind of thing? We've gotta be close, at least for this level of scam, right? No more scraping profile pics, no more foreign language speakers running the sockpuppets, zero marginal cost... do we all get targeted a thousand times more often? What can you even do to fight it? (Maybe scammers end up strangling any service with loose registration policies? Maybe we have to finally kill the legacy telephone system?) Do you have any concrete predictions for what that world looks like? (Nuclear war over countries failing to crack down on scamming our elderly? Haha but seriously?)
I genuinely don't know! Every time I write or read about these scams, though, I'm sort of shocked that there still are so many humans involved -- like this chat I'm in certainly doesn't need "dozens" of real people to run 30 or 40 accounts engaged in what sure seems to be pre-written banter.
When the level of spam rises above a certain amount, communication will suddenly become extremely expensive. And watermarked. Even if the media is synthetic you will be able to identify who sent it to you and so will the law.
Happy weekend. I am a novice. I buy and sell stocks by feeling, and I often lose more and make less profit. Thanks so much for taking the time to share with us over the weekend. I think I'll try to learn.
I've read that the "Nigerian Prince scam" letter didn't bother to correct it's spelling and language errors - it served as a sort of filter to ensure they attracted the uneducated and unsophisticated. Same here?
I wonder if this is true -- I think that a lot of the pig-butchering scams target recent Chinese immigrants in the U.S. and America, either relying on the victim's non-native English to hide their own errors, or switching to Chinese if it's appropriate to the scam. But that's just sort of a guess based on who I understand many of the victims are.
Really? I have wondered about this for decades. When I was a teenager I dreamed of being a freelance copy editor for scammers. Surely investing a few cyber-dollars on editing would increase your successes and pay for itself?
But maybe the human trafficking bosses aren’t looking for any advantage, Bain-like, to increase their returns.
It really is a striking comment about the state of the world economy that this much human labor gets devoted to scams like this. Markets can't find anything better for people to do? At least the three card monte setup was a game!
I feel like you've slowly been circling this question with some of these posts, so I'll come out and ask it directly: What happens when AI "gets there" for this kind of thing? We've gotta be close, at least for this level of scam, right? No more scraping profile pics, no more foreign language speakers running the sockpuppets, zero marginal cost... do we all get targeted a thousand times more often? What can you even do to fight it? (Maybe scammers end up strangling any service with loose registration policies? Maybe we have to finally kill the legacy telephone system?) Do you have any concrete predictions for what that world looks like? (Nuclear war over countries failing to crack down on scamming our elderly? Haha but seriously?)
I genuinely don't know! Every time I write or read about these scams, though, I'm sort of shocked that there still are so many humans involved -- like this chat I'm in certainly doesn't need "dozens" of real people to run 30 or 40 accounts engaged in what sure seems to be pre-written banter.
When the level of spam rises above a certain amount, communication will suddenly become extremely expensive. And watermarked. Even if the media is synthetic you will be able to identify who sent it to you and so will the law.
Anything less is madness
Happy weekend. I am a novice. I buy and sell stocks by feeling, and I often lose more and make less profit. Thanks so much for taking the time to share with us over the weekend. I think I'll try to learn.
Now I want my profession to precede my first name.
Welcome, Commenter Mark!
I have leveled up from Rando Mark, this is encouraging.
Thank you for going down this rabbit hole. I’ve been tempted a few times to do it, but I lose patience really quickly. And now I don’t have to.
Pushin' it to the Max. Going back to the Roman example, isn't it amazing how much of our lives play out in our phones these days?
I hope Mort is doing okay.