(gentle bright music)
Welcome to "Hadley Presents."
I'm your host, Ricky Enger,
inviting you to sit back, relax,
and enjoy a conversation with the experts.
In this episode,
we discuss tips and tricks for avoiding scams,
and our guest is low vision blogger Veronica Lewis.
Welcome to the show, Veronica.
Thank you so much for having me, Ricky.
I'm so excited to be here.
It is delightful to have you.
I've read your blog.
Sometimes I read it on your website
and sometimes I find the info elsewhere,
so you do get reposted a lot, which is fantastic.
For those who are not familiar,
you have the site Veronica with Four Eyes.
That's your blog.
And we're going to talk about scams today.
But before we do that,
I'm wondering if you could just tell us
a bit about yourself.
Thank you so much for having me again.
Yeah, my name is Veronica Lewis.
I run the Low Vision Assistive Technology website,
Veronica with Four Eyes,
where I help people with visual impairments
learn to thrive both inside and outside of the classroom,
workplace and in their living environments.
I started Veronica with Four Eyes back in 2016
because I noticed there wasn't
a whole lot of resources out there,
specifically targeted at living with visual impairment,
and I wanted to share the things I had learned
with others as well.
My website can be found at V-E-R-O-N-I-I-I-I-C-A.com,
so that's Veronica spelled with four I's.
Love it.
And we will have a link to that in the show notes.
So if you're frantically writing and didn't quite get that,
no worries, we'll have that for you
and it's well worth the read.
So, as I mentioned,
we are going to be talking about scams today.
Certainly not everyone's favorite subject,
but a necessary one.
You know, I think any general info about scams
is a good thing.
So, if you're watching maybe the local news
and there's a segment about scams
or maybe you're reading something in a newsletter,
that info is always great.
But I'm wondering about, for our discussion,
are there things that people with vision loss,
maybe some characteristics that may make us
a little more vulnerable to scams
because of some aspects of our vision loss?
Absolutely.
So, one that comes to mind is that people may have trouble
reading things very carefully or picking up on differences
maybe with formatting or spelling.
So for example, a lot of scam emails
come from what looks like a real company,
but maybe one or two letters have changed
or maybe the font has changed, so the logo looks different,
and these may not be details that people would pick up on.
I know I get a lot of emails in that nature
where it will claim to be from PayPal
or from all of these different
social media sites or websites,
and it'll have the name of the company in it,
can even just have different phrases
and weird things in there.
But if you're looking at something non-visually
or reading through a screen reader,
you may not immediately pick up on these things.
Another thing that also comes to mind is,
I feel like a lot of people will share
a lot of personally identifiable information online,
especially when they're new to living with visual impairment
and are just desperate for resources.
I get messages from people sometimes
where they will include their full name,
the city and state they live in, their diagnosis
and even things like sometimes their phone number,
their address.
And I am always surprised when those come through
because you have no idea where that email's going
or who could actually be receiving it.
So, I think the nature of, again, also oversharing
in an attempt to find resources
can also make people particularly vulnerable to scams
because you can sometimes track down
someone with a visual impairment with as few two pieces
of personally identifiable information.
Even a first name and a diagnosis can sometimes be enough
to find a lot of information about somebody,
and having that information in so many places online
can definitely make people
more vulnerable to scams in that regard.
Yeah, that makes sense,
and it's actually a little bit terrifying
if you think about it.
And it's no wonder that a lot of people,
I hear this all the time, where people say,
"You know, I just wanna avoid all of this.
I'm not going to mess around with any of this online stuff.
It's just too much.
I'm gonna stay safe just with my phone.
Maybe I'll do a little texting or whatever,
but not going online to where the scams are."
But the truth is, the scams are everywhere.
They happen on the phone and text too.
So maybe let's talk about that.
What are some scams that can happen,
maybe by phone or by text?
So, I know one thing that comes to mind
is a lot of text alerts
for fake two-factor authentication codes
for logging into a website
or people may be prompted to give login information
through unencrypted text or things like that.
Another example that came to mind as well
was just spam phone calls.
Right.
You have no idea how many calls I've gotten
from my car's extended warranty,
and I've never operated a motor vehicle.
It's been pretty bananas just to see how many spam calls
and texts people can get in just a single day
and how many of them can look realistic
and, like, something that people need to respond to.
I feel like a lot of these scammers
have become skilled at sending messages or phone calls
that generate anxiety or fear and things like that
and make people feel like they have to reply right away.
So learning to spot those tactics
can help to protect people as well.
You know, that's a really good point.
There is a staff member at Hadley, Lisa,
she tells the story of her dad getting this call,
and the caller on the other end says,
"Devin is in jail," and this is his grandson,
"and we need you to respond immediately.
I'm the police officer.
You do need to pay in order to get him out of jail,"
and all of that.
So it's a huge adrenaline spike, right?
Well, fortunately Devin just happened
to be visiting her dad, so he was right there in the room.
That scam didn't go so far.
But what happens if you don't have your grandson
right in the room and you get a call like this
that is really playing on these
"you have to respond now or else" kind of things?
How do you deal with that?
I think it helps to know how these processes actually work
and know that there will never be a situation
where you'll have to wire money over the phone
to get somebody out of jail.
Like, that's not a thing that happens.
Another thing that stood out from that story though
is how did they know her grandson's name, Devin?
Yeah.
Where did that information come from?
So it can also be if you have Facebook,
kind of just locking down privacy settings,
so not anybody can just find out that information
or find out all of these other names as well.
One of the things that can help
with the adrenaline rush situations
is also knowing how to contact, say, the real business
or the real agency that gave you a call to begin with.
Like, let's say if it's the grandson's in jail,
know that you can hang up with this person
and then call back the jail and talk to somebody else.
In that real situation,
they'll understand that you want to verify things
and make sure things are the way that you say they are.
I think it's also important,
with some of these scams to know that they will say,
"Hey, I can call you back and you'll see on my caller ID
that I really am with this agency,"
but the thing is, is that they can spoof the caller ID,
they could spoof a phone number.
It's no grand accomplishment
that they were able to call you back with the phone number
that they say on the other organization's website.
It's important to take the time
to make those calls for yourself
and just make sure you're doing your research
that this organization is who they say they are.
Yeah, and it sounds like really what you're talking about,
this are some great tips.
The overall feeling is to take that step back
and let the logic come into play.
So don't respond immediately.
Have that time to do the research, to make the call back.
Don't react to what's happening.
Take that step back
so that you're absolutely sure about what's happening.
I'm wondering also about, if you're planning ahead,
are there things like talking with family members
and having maybe a code word in place
or something that if you needed to verify,
it was definitely your family member?
You've talked about it over beforehand
about what to do in this situation.
Have you heard of people doing this?
Absolutely, and it's something I have with my family
and my friends as well.
Everybody has their own special word where I can verify it.
And another thing too is I've made it a word that,
or an interest or something that
that we don't talk about on social media
or on public platforms.
So somebody else wouldn't be able to say like,
"Oh, I'm pretending to be this friend.
I saw your post at one point
about how much maybe you love this certain activity,
so I'm going to say
a word that's associated with that activity,
so you know it's maybe associated with this person."
So I think that's really valuable,
just keeping that information safe
and making sure that no one else would be able to guess
what the word is.
I think another thing too was,
I know some people answer a question
that I think only this other person could figure out,
but again, with all the publicly
identifiable information online,
you have to really make sure it's a strong question
and not something like a security question
about who's my favorite teacher,
where did I go to high school?
Because I'm sure people could go back and find that.
Yes, indeed.
These are some good plans to have in place
if something like this should happen.
Are there any tools for stopping these phone or text scams
before they happen,
like maybe a tool from your phone provider
or talking caller ID, things like that that people might use
just to be aware of what's happening
before they even pick up the phone or look at that text?
Absolutely.
A lot of companies like Apple and Google
have also created their own tools
for iOS and Android respectively for screening scam calls
and numbers that might be scams as well
and having them just go straight to voicemail or disconnect.
The block tool is a really great thing to have.
There are also tools that will let you block
for an entire area code
if you're repeatedly getting spam calls
from a specific area code
that maybe doesn't even exist in the United States.
Another thing that came to mind as well
is there's a spam and blocked option
for messaging apps a lot of times.
They'll filter through messages that seem to be a scam
or associated with scam numbers,
and those tools seem to work really well.
There's also third-party apps as well
that can provide more enhanced caller ID
and protection features as well,
and they also may provide more options for blocking as well.
That makes sense.
So, we've talked about some offline scams,
and sadly there are a lot of them.
For people who do choose to go online,
whether it's for shopping or social media or email,
all of these things are wonderful, wonderful tools,
but they also leave us vulnerable to scams.
So what are some of these common scams
that people might find online?
Oh, a lot of scams come to mind, unfortunately.
Yeah, no doubt.
I've seen a few things for fake job listings,
fake products that are being offered
through Medicare or Medicaid,
especially, like, assistive technology products.
I've seen a lot of times,
if you're online shopping, sometimes.
This is kind of funny actually.
I get receipts from fake companies
for things I did not order.
One of the examples I share on my website actually
is I had gotten a fake order invoice that said,
"We charged this to your PayPal."
This receipt has your name and an address on it,
but it's for...
I think it was for a 15-foot-tall
inflatable water slide for the backyard.
And they said, "If you didn't order this,
please call us with your PayPal number."
And it's like, "No, I'm not doing that."
And besides, I knew that the address they had shared,
the email and all these other things were definitely fake.
Another scam also that comes to mind,
which isn't necessarily the traditional thing you think of
when it comes to a scam,
but it's related to sharing images and things online is,
I've seen some accounts on social media
will put in fake or misleading alt text for images
to get people to tweet them or reshare them
or whatever on their profile.
So they'll think they're sharing a picture of one thing,
but it's actually something much different.
Oh, yes, right.
This is a good one.
So if you have enough vision
where you're able to discern images pretty clearly,
this is probably not going to apply to you.
But if you're having the text on your screen read aloud,
so if you're using a screen reader,
this is definitely a thing that could happen.
So when you encounter graphics or images,
they might say "graphic" or "image" or "blank" or whatever
because someone has not bothered to describe that image.
But if someone does add a description, that is alt text.
So what you might have is something like a picture
of a black dog playing in the snow.
And someone adds a description to that image
so that your screen reader says,
"black dog playing in the snow."
I guess what's happening here, though,
is that the description does not match the image.
So you may think you're sharing
that picture of a black dog playing in the snow
but maybe not so much.
I actually had,
this has happened to a few of my friends unfortunately,
where one of them had reposted a picture.
I think it was on Twitter at the time.
And when I looked at the alt text,
it said it was a picture of, like, a sunset
with an inspirational quote,
but the actual picture was something very much different.
It was actually something that was explicit.
So I ended up calling my friend on the phone and going,
"Hey, did you mean to share this?
Do you know what's in that picture?"
And they were mortified because they had no idea.
One of the posts I have on my website
is about how to access images without alt text.
And it's important, like,
when you're on social media sometimes
where if you're resharing something from an account
maybe you don't know, maybe it showed up in your feed
through the algorithm or whatever,
it can be helpful to just run the picture
through, like, a visual assistance app
to make sure it is what you think it is.
Yeah, that makes perfect sense.
So, if you're not able to see that image,
be careful about what the alt text description
is telling you it is.
And sometimes even if you can see the image,
there will be things that happen
where on social media you might see a picture of someone
and it says, "Oh, I'm going to miss him so much,"
and the implication is that the person has passed away
and there's a link that you can click
to learn more information or read the obituary
or what have you, and the link for that is the scam.
And when you click that, goodness knows where you go.
So, again, it sounds like what we're really talking about
is while we're sharing some specific scams
that people might run into,
the general thing to do is to carefully look
at whatever it is you're doing before proceeding.
Whether that means, if you're using a screen reader,
you're spelling things letter by letter,
or if you're reading it visually,
that even though you've got that eye strain,
it can be important to just take the time
to carefully look at those things to make sure
that it's what you thought it was at first glance, right?
Absolutely.
Another strategy that came to mind as well
for helping with email scams
is I take the trusted domains for websites.
So, maybe for example,
I need notifications from WordPress for my website,
I whitelisted the WordPress email extension
so I know that any email that comes from there
is likely from WordPress,
and I filter those to a folder in my email
so I know that when I open that folder,
it's actual emails from WordPress
as opposed to the scam emails pretending to be WordPress
that may show up elsewhere.
That's a really good idea
to do some of that filtering beforehand.
And if you're thinking, "I have no idea how to do that,"
we're happy at Hadley
to direct you to some of these resources
for just the technical part of doing that.
So, we can be as careful as possible
and try and think through all of these and say,
"Okay, I've got a plan in place and so on,"
but sometimes the worst happens anyway,
and we find that we have been the victim of a scam.
So if that does come to pass,
are there some tricks for just navigating that
and getting safely on the other side?
Absolutely.
So, one of the things that comes to mind
is that when it comes to changing passwords,
the first one you should change is your email password,
because if somebody has your email password,
they can hit the forgot password button on any other website
and change all of the passwords for you,
and then it'll be much harder for you to get them back.
So, it's very important to make sure,
if you have a compromised account
or anything was compromised,
definitely secure your email first
and then work on securing everything else.
Another thing that comes to mind
is just being honest about what happened
and reaching out to family members
or other groups for help and saying,
"Yes, I know I got scammed,"
instead of keeping it secret
because you can't believe it happened to you.
Be honest about it and let people help you
try to get everything fixed again.
I think that's really important as well.
Another thing too is just, again, being on top of things,
like, make sure that your bank account is secured,
like, changing the passwords there, of course,
freeze the cards if needed
and make sure that when you are contacting
places to help with this,
that you are using their official phone numbers
that you find directly on their websites,
not something you may have found
in the recommended first result on a search engine
because sometimes scammers will pay
to have those phone numbers listed first.
I had an issue at one point
where I was trying to find a hotel reservation
and I thought I had booked something over the phone.
Luckily, I did not give any credit card information.
I just had just given the information over the phone
to book a hotel.
And when I went there the next day,
I found out I had never actually made a reservation.
Oh my.
So that was really frustrating,
but I was able to get it fixed.
I was just...
I felt very silly because I couldn't believe
that I had fallen for that scam,
but it turned out that the phone number I had called,
if I had asked the Google Assistant
to dial this hotel chain,
that phone number was the first in results,
and that's what came up.
So, that was many years ago.
Luckily, that issue has been fixed,
but that was another thing that came to mind
as sometimes these fake phone numbers
can take precedence in the search results.
Another tip I had as well
was to save the accessibility support phone numbers
for tech companies and things like that.
These are specialty phone numbers
that are designed to support assistive technology users,
such as people who use screen readers
or screen magnification
with being able to access their products.
There's a lot of different companies that have these,
like Amazon, Microsoft, Google,
telecommunications companies and things like that.
And those are another helpful thing to contact
if you're having trouble with accessing a product
or accessing a billing service.
Yeah, those are all really, really great points.
And I especially appreciate when you said,
be honest about what happened,
because I do feel like there is some shame around,
"Oh, I got taken.
I fell for this."
And People are reluctant to admit that,
but the truth is that it can happen to anyone,
and it doesn't do you any good to hide that.
It's okay to admit that moment of vulnerability
so that you can move forward and get things fixed.
So, this has been amazing and just a wealth of information.
We'll have a lot in the show notes
and direct you to some resources.
These are all really, really great tips.
And it may sound a bit overwhelming at first,
like, "I have to think about all of this
before I even do anything?"
But, you know, once we break it down and say,
what you're really talking about
is just taking that extra second or two
to think through what you're doing
and then deciding to proceed.
Once you have all the info you feel like you need,
that can be a wonderful thing.
And having those plans in place
for if something unexpected does happen,
you kind of know what to do next
instead of reacting with that adrenaline and,
"Oh, no, I have to get this fixed
or I have to respond immediately."
So, thank you again, Veronica, so much.
This has been fantastic and informative,
and so glad you took a little time to join us.
Thank you for having me.
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