Millennials More Likely To Fall For Scams Than Baby Boomers (washingtonexaminer.com) 293
A new report from the Better Business Bureau suggests that millennials are now more likely to fall victim to a scam than Baby Boomers. Washington Examiner reports: The Better Business Bureau reports that 69 percent of scam victims are under the age of 45. Young adults heading off to college are especially gullible, the group says. "College students can be easy targets for scammers and identity thieves. They are old enough to have money, young enough to be vulnerable and are likely unsupervised as many are away from home for the first time," writes Heather Massey of the Better Business Bureau. Phishing scams now target cell phones as well as email and social media.
"Millennials spend a lot of time on Facebook or other social media sites, where they can target them with these messages," said Jim Hegarty, Better Business Bureau president and CEO. College students also use sensitive information frequently, like student IDs, Social Security numbers, and banking information.
"Millennials spend a lot of time on Facebook or other social media sites, where they can target them with these messages," said Jim Hegarty, Better Business Bureau president and CEO. College students also use sensitive information frequently, like student IDs, Social Security numbers, and banking information.
A trusting bunch (Score:4, Funny)
Sheep to the slaughter.
Re:A trusting bunch (Score:5, Informative)
There is nothing new about this. I was in Berkeley in the early 1980s, back when the new freshmen were still boomers. In September, the panhandlers and scammers would be lined up along Telegraph Avenue. By October, the students would be jaded and cynical.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:A trusting bunch (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course, there was the recent /. article about the younger generation thinking socialism was a good idea [slashdot.org] so the millennials could genuinely be naive, gullible fools.
It is more likely that their idea of what socialism is is way different from your idea of it.
Many socialist proponents look and the Scandinavian countries as a template while you probably look at Maoism or something similar.
Now you probably think "what they have in Scandinavia isn't socialism" but that is just you have to remember that according to the American conservatives anyone who wants to fund schools or healthcare is a socialist.
If you make sure to use the same definition of socialism all the time you will either find that you have plenty of examples of where socialism works better than the current US system or you will find that there aren't actually a lot of people supporting socialism.
If you change definition depending on your agenda, well of course things will look inconsistent.
Re: (Score:2)
I've heard a swede say he would rather not work
Randomly reminds me of when a friend of mine worked for Electrolux. He went to a new international center they were building over there to do some kind of engineering. He had a friend over there that quit the engineering job because "I'd rather be a bus driver, it's easier and I'd rather think less."
Not really related to your statement, just something I always found funny.
Re:A trusting bunch (Score:4, Informative)
Anecdotes aside Sweden consistently comes near the top for things like quality of life, education, healthcare, crime etc.
I'd imagine that if your friend had to live in, say, the UK long term they would realize how good Sweden has it.
Re:A trusting bunch (Score:5, Informative)
Bullshit.
The Nordic countries are all very wealthy (in the 25 in purchasing power adjusted GDP per capita [wikipedia.org], Sweden is 16th 5 places behind the US and one of the highest in Europe, and Norway is actually ahead of the US) and productive (with the exception of Iceland, all in the top 13 in terms of GDP per hours worked. [time.com], with Denmark being pretty much equal to the US and Norway again being ahead of the US).
Then the socialists took over and for a while restrained themselves in milking the productive portion of the population dry.
Erm what? You do realize the exact opposite is true? Finland became independent after first 800 years of rule under the Swedish kingdom and then another 100+ years as an autonomous part of the Russian Empire in 1917 (we kinda slipped loose after the revolution happened, and had our own civil war in 1918 during which the communists that wanted us to join the then still emerging soviet union lost). A 100 years ago we were one of the poorest countries in Europe, with low overall education and literacy rates and a massive issue with poverty. We started the slow climb up and then the 2nd world war came. After the war and the rebuilding effort the foundations of the modern democratic socialism that combines a market economy with progressive taxation were laid out, copied from Sweden in large parts due to their successes there. The schools system was rehauled and unified, universities are tuition free, tax-funded health care etc. All of these are things that are now in our constitution. And what has happened? As already showcased we sprinted forwards to be among the top economies of Europe. Now does that mean that there are no issues and this is a perfect Utopia? No, absolutely not. The '08 crisis hit us here in Finland extremely hard because it also happened to coincide with the implosion of Nokia which was like almost a third of our export sector that basically disappeared, and we've spent the last decade recovering from that, and that's still an ongoing process, partially hampered by the fact that the current center-right (in Finnish terms, even the rightmost party here is to the left of the democratic mainstream in the US in their support for the existing universal systems) hasn't been very effective in tackling some of the structural issues, but nevertheless, we're still doing very well.
But to say that the socialists 'ruined everything' is just utter BS. Without the social policies that we've put in place, we'd likely still be a very backwater nation instead of a global first world economy,
Oh so you heard 1 Swede say that did you? Well that proves the whole system is ruined then doesn't it? C'mon man.
Sweden took in a lot of refugees, way more than any other compared to the size of the population and that has obviously become a heated issue, as they have had problems with their immigration system previously as well. This has been made worse by the fact that Sweden changed its elementary school system away from the model they used to have (and that we still use) and allowed the creaton of privatized elementary schools, which has lead in parts of the large suburbs to rapid segregation creating schools for well-off natives and left the public schools in those areas to be heavily for immigrants. This obviously creates problems as it hampers those kids from learning the language for example, making integration and thus employment harder which creates a host of issues, the most prevalent of which is the rise of organized crime in those suburban are
40-year-olds being "vulnerable"... (Score:2)
The article talks about people under 45 being "vulnerable". Sorry, if you're in your 30s-40s (or even really mid 20s) and are still "vulnerable" to scams, your parents have failed spectacularly in preparing you for life in the real world. Perhaps it's just a form of natural selection at work. Parents that fail to educate their kids deseve a little penalty to their gene pool.
They're not more likely to fall for scams (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
until they get fearful and ignorant again and will once more fall for dumb tricks and blingy things.
Re: (Score:2)
I know it's AC but, I would imagine a donation drive would be the old person version of crowd funding. They'd understand the concept.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I know there have been and are scams there, but I honestly dont have a grasp of the proportions.
Show me the data.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't know a single Kickstarter project that is not a scam. Or at least a very poor form of "investment".
Funding a KS-Project is a high risk venture. One where you would expect an insane ROI for the simple reason that the chance of a sensible ROI is very low. Why do you think VCs usually take a sizable portion of your enterprise for the money they throw at you? We're talking about WAY more than 100% ROI. Usually by at least 2 orders of magnitude. Simply because they know that about one in ten or even just
Re: (Score:2)
I don't know a single Kickstarter project that is not a scam.
Bard's Tale IV just launched last week. Brian Fargo's got enough experience in the industry he didn't seem like much of a risk (and that has been proved true). By paying early I got a game plus some extras, and more importantly for me paying early allowed the game to be made in the first place.
Re: (Score:3)
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Sheltered (Score:5, Insightful)
This is something that I have also observed with a lot of millennials. Most of them have the works they way they think it should, and now how it actually works. In the ideal millennial world you should be able to walk down the street naked at 2 am. They just don't take in to account there are fucking evil people out there that will happily take advantage of them.
It is not that millennials are stupid, it just they are not getting the same life experiences any more that most of us non-milennials got.
Re: (Score:2)
In the ideal millennial world you should be able to walk down the street naked at 2 am.
"The world should be my safe space." -- woke millennials.
Yeah, good luck with that. Come back when you're a little more worldly and educiatized.
Re: (Score:2)
It is not that millennials are stupid, it just they are not getting the same life experiences any more that most of us non-milennials got.
They are getting it. But far too late, when the harm is a lot larger than what it would have been at the age they should have been getting it. Stupid. Protecting your children like that harms them.
Re: (Score:2)
Well, experience is information you get after you needed it.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
As someone who never locks my front door, whose girlfriend walks home just fine at 3am through an unlit park, maybe the fact that millennials are not getting the "experiences" you got is because the world around you has improved.
Re: (Score:3)
The same is said of every generation. Were hippies and flower power any less ridiculed?
Young people, by virtue of having been alive for less time, are less experienced. Some would say less cynical and worn down. It will always be that way.
Re: (Score:3)
The same is said of every generation. Were hippies and flower power any less ridiculed? Young people, by virtue of having been alive for less time, are less experienced. Some would say less cynical and worn down. It will always be that way.
Not like this generation. Hippies, despite all the shit I give them, had enough basic life skills when they started out. When I came out of high school, at the age of 18, I knew how to create a budget, balance a checkbook, type, cook a basic meal, buy and maintain a car, look for, apply for, and get a job. Any many other basic skills.
I've met Millennials, in college, that can't even do basic math with out a calculator. I'm not talking algebra here, but addition and subtraction. Some of them are almo
Re:Sheltered (Score:5, Insightful)
Not like this generation. Hippies, despite all the shit I give them, had enough basic life skills when they started out. When I came out of high school, at the age of 18, I knew how to create a budget, balance a checkbook, type, cook a basic meal, buy and maintain a car, look for, apply for, and get a job. Any many other basic skills.
And then your generation voted to gut school funding and tie it to standardized tests that do not involve any "basic life skills". And you are apparently surprised by the results of your votes.
Re: (Score:3)
Not exactly surprised. I remember when we started down this path when I was first enrolling my kids in school. I looked over the curriculum and recall that I didn't see any of the stuff I had in school. I seem to recall teachers saying that the new stuff would lead to a generation not being prepared.
Of course this didn't stop Bush Beta and his band of merry idiots from rubber stamping it. Then it got worse under Obama. Now we have a willy wonka escapee at the helm and I don't see anything getting b
Re: (Score:3)
Just because one says they should be able to do something (given a series of ideals), does not fucking mean they do it daily and fail to understand the consequences or drivers.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Might get even shot by the police, you know because you tried to assault them visually with your nude looks.
Re: (Score:2)
Uh, but FEMEN activists get arrested all the time?
Re: (Score:2)
That's either in countries where any form of protest is already illegal or in countries where trespassing is stil illegal in the buff.
Re: (Score:2)
Well, have you looked at them? Them naked is a crime against nature AND good taste.
Re: (Score:2)
Indeed. In a recent art performance somewhere in Europe, all that happened was that the police came to check whether woman doing it was all right and not confused or something. That assured, they left again and no harm done.
Re: (Score:2)
Try that as a man and you get arrested for indecent exposure.
Equal rights, my ass...
Re: (Score:2)
Not necessarily, but the risk is certainly higher. You have a point.
Re: (Score:2)
It's true; in my day, when I walked down the street naked at 2 am I consistently got a savage beatdown. Looking back, I'm honestly grateful to my assailants; how the heck else could I have learned?
I didn't have that problem. When I walked down the street naked, people fled in terror, fainted, or threw up in the street.
I've generally heard that in Japan (Score:3)
I guess what I'm saying is that the US seems to have a reputation for being a nasty place. That said, crime's been dropping non-stop for decades. What hasn't been dropping is pol
Re: (Score:2)
Even if crime's dropping, that doesn't mean there are fewer assholes. Furthermore, an easy way to get crime to seem to drop is to discourage reporting, e.g. "don't bother reporting if your smartphone was stolen". Distrust of police also leads to fewer police reports.
Re: (Score:2)
I've lived in West Philly, and I love in Wilmington Delaware now.
Crime in Philly has indeed dropped, Wilmington I wouldn't necessarily bet on for the last decade anyway.
Just my feelings in the rougher spots though, don't have real stats.
Re:Sheltered (Score:5, Insightful)
You should be able to leave your apartment unlocked/walk down the street naked and not have an issue. You of course won't. But that doesn't excuse the actual people who take advantage of them.
And, year-by-year, we get closer to that ideal world. So, you know, it's improving.
Re: (Score:3)
Alternatively, it could be a post-scarcity world, it's a world with little enough crime that cops can solve crimes after the fact with forensic evidence, it's a world where drug-addicts get treatment and don't need to steal to fuel their addiction, it's a world where everyone has a good job. Look, there are always some dipshits, but most crime is desperation. If we can remove that, we remove a lot of crime. If we remove enough crime, cops can start solving burglaries.
Re: (Score:2)
So you believe that one should be attacked for walking down the street naked ?
Obviously it's not safe behavior, bit why do you think it shouldn't be?
Re: (Score:2)
Millennials are also the first generation where bullshit like "I should be able to walk down the street naked and have nothing happen to me" is considered neither a joke nor a statement of "why yes, I am bat shit crazy, just wanted to get that out there while breaking the ice."
I live in the middle of a big city and I do feel this way. But of course the fact that I am bigger than most people out there and am usually walking down the street with a 90 pound dog probably help me feel like I am not going to get hassled. But it's not something I would recommend to any of my friends or family.
Re: (Score:2)
Reminds me of Star Trek, particular Next Generation. Obviously the product of the boomer generation, and they had entire planets where people could walk around practically naked (it was TV after all) without worry. Seems like an admirable goal really, a society with that little crime.
The whole Federation was pretty much that way.
Re: (Score:2)
Millennials are also the first generation where bullshit like "I should be able to walk down the street naked and have nothing happen to me" is considered neither a joke nor a statement of "why yes, I am bat shit crazy, just wanted to get that out there while breaking the ice." Or girls just leaving their apartments unlocked and then wondering why they had problems with creeps.
No, they aren't. Young people being a bit naive is nothing new... The fact is young people just lack the experience we take for granted. I'm a gen-xer... Which makes me older than you. You were once the naive young fool you think all young people people are.
Wisdom comes with age and experience, your kind of thinking is when you gain years, but retard experience.
Of all your examples, there were young people of my generation doing it, there were young people of my parents generation... Remember the 60'
Re: (Score:3)
Hopefully this conversation stays in these bounds. But I really like how Jordan Peterson puts it in his Maps of Meaning Havard lectures. I'll paraphrase it.
"Your culture protects you and allows you to operate within those bounds. Remove the protections of that culture, and you don't know who you'd be"
I grew up in Africa. I'm of Indian background. Life was far more dangerous. I wasn't protected. I did ignore/not help someone who looked injured on the side of the road. It could be a scam to rob/hurt me. I did
Re: (Score:2)
"Young adults heading off to college" (Score:3)
...are not millennials.
They are Generation Z-ers.
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/05/0... [cnbc.com]
Lack of critical thinking (Score:3, Insightful)
no surprise, given how public schools these days do little besides indoctrinate kids in leftist ideology. Chairman Mao would feel right at home.
Re: (Score:2)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Leftist ideology? Is that why bullshit like "creationism" is getting pushed into schoolbooks these days?
Re: Lack of critical thinking (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Wishing geometry was replaced with numerology?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
When I was at school there was plenty of indoctrination. Mainly religious, so I guess things have changed a little.
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
You know people can lie right? (Score:3)
Mao said he was a communist but did not run a communist country. He took complete control and ownership of all property in the country. That's the opposite of communism; where the proles are meant to have ownership and control via a Democratic process.
This was the cause of most of the deaths. Mao insisted they double plant, everybody knew that was a horrifying idea but couldn't override Mao because rather than being a communist country it was a fascist dict
WTF?!?!? (Score:5, Insightful)
Seriously? Comparing millennials (born mid-80s to early-90s, currently around 20-30 years old) to boomers (born mid-40s to ~1960, currently in their 60s and 70s)? They're more likely to fall for scams BECAUSE THEY'RE YOUNGER AND HAVE LESS EXPERIENCE. There may be more vectors for them to be scammed these days, but I don't think they're any more or less gullible than boomers were *at that same age*.
Also, didn't slashdot used to warn us about (or better yet, not link to) sites with autoplaying video?
Re: (Score:2)
... boomers (born mid-40s to ~1960, currently in their 60s and 70s) ...
Growing up as a Boomer, we were taught that it ran from 1946 to 1964. The peak year for births in the baby boom was 1961, with second place going to 1960.
I notice that Wikipedia redefines it using births per 1000, which seems a bit problematic when you’re introducing a large number of babies during a relatively short time - so the population is skewing younger fairly rapidly over the hat period.
Re: (Score:2)
Seriously? Comparing millennials (born mid-80s to early-90s, currently around 20-30 years old) to boomers (born mid-40s to ~1960, currently in their 60s and 70s)? They're more likely to fall for scams BECAUSE THEY'RE YOUNGER AND HAVE LESS EXPERIENCE. There may be more vectors for them to be scammed these days, but I don't think they're any more or less gullible than boomers were *at that same age*.
Also, didn't slashdot used to warn us about (or better yet, not link to) sites with autoplaying video?
It's actually interesting because the current cultural idea is that it's mainly the oldsters falling for scams, and that the youngsters are so much more sophisticated, etc.
Re: (Score:2)
The article also starts Millennials at 1973, resulting in an even more lopsided grouping of people.....and apparent GenX doesn't exist again.
Re: (Score:3)
And a smart person with a bad upbringing will learn to not get scammed because of life.
So for any birth year, the number of people from that birth year that are easy targets declines every year.
Or are saying that every Boomer has an excellent upbringing and none learned from life?
Re: (Score:2)
I tend to think of a "bad upbringing" in this context as one that does not prepare you for life. Of course other forms of "bad" are possible in other contexts.
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, I did too.
I didn't mean because they'll go to the shoot of hard knocks.
My point was simply that a smart 13 year old can be taught avoid scams, but no matter the upbringing, by 60, that skill will exist.
Young people need to rely on their upbringing to avoid scams, old people don't. So the older cohort will always have an edge.
Without being able to check the scam success rate on today's 60 year olds in the 70s, we'll never be able to compare. We could track today's youth though and try to quantity how s
Re: (Score:2)
I see what you mean.
Although there is a large scam wave here in Europe that specifically targets retired people. So I am not sure about that life-experience necessarily accumulating simply by existing. Could also be that those over 65 or so just do not have enough experience with the Internet.
Re: (Score:2)
But the fact is that THEY DO think that it sounds forthright and that I DO NOT think so. This divergence is the fault of the federalization of the education system in 1979. The beginning o
Re: (Score:2)
Bullshit. A smart 13 year old can spot a scam. The problem is not age but upbringing.
No, smart has nothing to do with it. An experienced person regardless of age can spot a scam. But you're absolutely right, it's all the Boomer's fault :-)
Shouldn't be an issue (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Well, while true in theory, just TRY to lend a dollar as a millennial without a dollar to your name.
Gen-X wins (Score:2)
I've protected myself in a thick scratchy blanket of cynicism.
Older is wiser? I'm shocked! (Score:5, Insightful)
So the school of hard knocks teaches life skills? Wow!
When Baby Boomers were young, they were stupid too.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Millennials have been brought up in environments which were overly protective, and that produces people who are weak and lacking in understanding of how the world works.
Psssst.....you made that environment. You were the adults, they were the kids. Participation trophies? You were the parents creating them and handing them out.
So time to actually take responsibility for the world you created and help us clean it up....oh wait, your'e a Boomer. We'll have to clean it up after you die because you can't take responsibility for anything your generation does.
Sounds Legit (Score:2)
I buy it
The problem starts with the parents (Score:2)
Without fail, when I meet such a special snowflake millennial (they're not all like that, by far not, mind you), you will soon after meet their helicopter parents. Who keep these kids under a cheese cover 'til they're 18, and usually much longer than that, keeping reality away from them while reinforcing their belief that they are god's gift to the world.
What else do you expect to come out of that as soon as these completely unprepared people are dropped into reality?
Many fell for a scam before they went to Uni (Score:2)
Raised from birth (Score:2)
To think we're special and that we'll get ours eventually without putting in half the work our parents did. It's not a wonder that when "Too good to be true" things come our way that most tend to jump on them.
This just in.... (Score:2)
Population Statistics? (Score:2)
I don't see that (Score:2)
I have had no less then a dozen calls in the last month from boomers who let someone access their desktop and locked it demanding money to unlock it. I arrived at one location where the scam was still ongoing. I promptly unplugged the ethernet on the computer and when the guy on the other end said I lost connection the lady made me reconnect and wouldn't listen to my explanation that she was going to get ripped off. I left and two days later she calls in to complain that her computer needed a password a
Percentages can mislead (Score:2)
...and what about... (Score:2)
What about when Baby Boomers were the age of current Millennials? I know I fell for a credit related scam when I was in college 20+ years ago. Did credit cards even exist when Baby Boomers were that age?
More like to fall for the same scam? (Score:2)
The info graphic just says that '69% of victims are under 45'. 58% of people in the US are under 45, so one could construe this to mean that millennials are gullible, but that is a stretch. 'Millennials' are a subset of people under 45. Babies are under 45 and they are gullible as fuck. No attempt was made to assess how many scams are encountered, nor the rate at which they are rebuffed, let alone any attempt to show some kind of apples to apples scam comparison.
We needed a study, for this? (Score:2)
Re:Gen-X are millennials now? (Score:5, Funny)
Gen-X here. Nobody ever gave a shit about us, not even other gen-x'ers.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
What could be more generic than X?
Re: (Score:2)
So what, I don't care.
Re: (Score:2)
Like Millennials, we did our activism when we were younger.
The fact that you don't know about it kinda indicates the power dynamic of a much smaller generation versus two larger generations.
The thing that hath been (Score:2)
“The thing that hath been,
it is that which shall be;
and that which is done is that which shall be done:
and there is no new thing under the sun.”
This is the same crowd (35-45) that fell for "Sign up for a credit card, get this free T-Shirt" during the first days of college.
Some people weren't taught how credit works. I graduated in 2006, sometime before I graduated the campus rules changed and suddenly all the credit card companies were gone. I knew people with 5 T-shirts through 5 different creditcard companies. "It's free, who cares".
The same people that buy micro-transactions to play a "free" game.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't know what's more entertaining to watch, people who use one credit card to pay off another, or those that think that "paying" with your credit card is free money because you already paid with the credit card and that's it, no need to pay that off.
Re: The thing that hath been (Score:2)
I don't disagree with you but I think reward points are an even better scam.
Sure I will give you $0.005 on the dollar and let you reward yourself with spending money.
So when credit card company took the full amount out of checking instead of that months payment, I took the chance cashed in all my reward points, and dropped the card. Switched it to a cash back without a program (a fixed rate) canceled my secondary card, and am in a much better option.
Re: (Score:2)
No.people are all just a bunch of morons. Get lost.
ftfa
Re: (Score:2)
Fully agree on that.
Re: (Score:2)
Slashdot, like the rest of the world, is moving towards extremes. With the moderates and other sane people pretty much playing the role of the UN soldiers in the Gaza strip and getting shelled by both sides for being "for the enemy".
Sooner or later the sane ones simply withdraw, fed up with the whole bullshit, and what's left is two extremes. Who of course claim that the world is overrun by the respective other extreme because they drank so much of their own kool-aid that they think their position is the no
Re: (Score:2)
Well, on the other hand you have the dimwit old farts that never got out of the US, never saw what a hellhole their country actually is (unless you're rich and able to buy your way out of the dump) but still consider it the greatest thing since sliced bread.
There's dumb fucks on both ends of the age spectrum.