He hasn’t written to me anymore, but recently I thought about his profession. I read about a 65-year-old from Heiligenberg who had fallen victim to telephone fraud. Unknown people had written to the man and pretended to be his son. This supposed son had dropped his cell phone in the toilet and now urgently needed his father’s support, they said. The 65-year-old was supposed to transfer several thousand euros to an account as soon as possible – and he did so. The fraud was only exposed days later when the 65-year-old met his real son.
“Hello dad, how are you?”
Unfortunately, this scam is very clever. Because you can’t rule out the possibility that people will drop their cell phones in the toilet and have to make an important transfer for a corner sofa that has just been delivered. You also can’t rule out the possibility that helpful parents will help their (fake) children in such a case. So I thought again about this professional group; one of them had written to me on WhatsApp several months ago.
“Hello Dad, how are you? I have a new number,” was the message from an unknown number with a German area code. Due to my job, it was clear to me that a telephone scammer had probably cast his line here.
Radio silence for a year
But why not just write back and see what happens? There would be lots of questions: Where did he get my number from? Why did he do this job? Didn’t he have a guilty conscience? And wouldn’t he have been able to do another job? I would have informed the police before handing over any money or transferring it. In the best case scenario, it would have even resulted in an article.
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So I tried to express myself like a caring father and ended the message with “Lg paps”. After three days he didn’t reply and I wrote again – no reply, I gave up. After about a year of radio silence I read about the Heiligenberg case and wrote again. But there is still radio silence between us. You could say: He ghosted me.
This is not something to be taken lightly
He may have found other victims. I may not have written like an older WhatsApp user, but like a 31-year-old who wants to pretend to be a boomer. Looking at the chat history, it now seems as if I am seriously harassing him. I would have liked to chat with him, but I don’t regret it. He probably had a way of ripping me off himself.
Dear readers, if you receive such a WhatsApp message, do not respond to it. Heed the police’s regular advice on this matter. Because: Telephone fraud is not something to be taken lightly.
