Dateline 5-4-2016

This morning I woke up to quite a scare. It only took me a couple minutes to figure out what was going on but it was the closest I've ever come to falling for a scam. Keep in mind, when I say that I came close to falling for this scam I mean more that I had bit of fear and thought maybe I should investigate further. I probably wouldn't have moved on to the next step in the process even if the message I received was legit.

Here's what happened.

First off, it was the first thing in the morning and I was still in the process of waking up. I had prepared my breakfast beverages and was in the process of cooking up some eggs when I looked down at my phone to see that there was a new voicemail.

It was so early in my day I had yet to turn my ringer from silent to vibrate but that doesn't really matter much because I wouldn't have answered my phone if I heard it going off. I check the message to see it was from a number I was unfamiliar with which would have solidified my choice not to answer.

The message was transcribed and read that it was from the IRS and they were preparing a lawsuit against me. Now, I don't have any real reason to fear a lawsuit from the IRS. I've done nothing wrong that I'm aware of but in the age of identity left I had a brief moment of "what if" thoughts running through my head.

I checked the actual voicemail only to hear that it was a robot delivering the message. This seemed strange to me and the fact that anything would escalate to the point of a lawsuit without so much as a letter in the mail lead me to feel it was a wrong number or some sort of scam.

Looking back now, they never even said my name in the message which I now see as a major clue. I was just going to go with the fact that it was a scam and go about my day but it was still bothering the back of my mind.

I did a quick search of the number and it was verified that I was right and this number was noted to be from a scammer. I felt even more relieved but I could also see how someone would fall for this.

I've seen friends answer the phone without even checking to see who it is only to end up in some weird dance with whoever was on the other line. I also know many people who, rather than do any research, will just return the call to get to the bottom of the "confusion." Granted, I've never seen any of my friends move on to the "next" next step and actually get scammed, I can see how it works.

Lucky for me, my anxiety leads me to not want to have anything to do with the talking feature of my phone both income and outgoing because I really did feel like talking to a broken English speaking scammer about how I couldn't afford their scam even if I thought they were for real.

Now that this part of my morning is over, it's time to get to work on my classes.

Talk to you tomorrow,

- The Wicker Breaker