Here at shortwave space camp, we escape our everyday lives to explore the mysteries and quirks of the universe.
We find weird, fun, interesting stories that explain how the cosmos is partying all around us, from stars to dwarf planets to black holes and beyond.
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Listen now to the shortwave podcast from NPrdem.
A heads up before we start.
Today's episode includes a few swear words in the second half and full disclosure.
We reference Citibank, Apple, and Amazon in the story.
They're all NPR sponsors.
This is planet money from NPR.
When you talk to Frances about how she got lured into the scam that's taken over her life for the last year, she says the exact details are a bit of a blur.
It starts with a voicemail, but I was also really sick around that week, so I don't think I.
It just gets fuzzy on how I, like, got into it.
Frances is a white collar worker in her forties, lives in New York, and we're only going to use her first name to protect her professional reputation.
Now, she says, what is clear is that last May, she got this voicemail claiming to be from Citibank flagging this suspicious outgoing wire for $50,000.
Shortly thereafter, I get a text saying, oh, this is David from the security department.
And I'm like the security department for city because of the wire.
Once she gets this guy, David Smith, on the phone, he explains that the suspicious wire, it might be part of a bigger attack on her whole network of accounts.
He asks her to check her Apple account, for example.
And I do see these extraneous, like, these extra charges that are hidden charges on the Apple account.
Pretty soon she's actually getting locked out of her accounts.