Scammed

by Danny Bradbury

A new kind of computer con has emerged in the past few years. It's technically mundane but psychologically brutal: using false threats of arrest, scammers trick low-income victims into repaying debts that do not exist. And one rainy day last January, they accidentally targeted one of the smartest hackers around.

Mike Davis is a good guy who gets to play at being a bad guy, a man who gets paid handsomely for testing the limits of his clients' security systems. Davis wanted a new challenge; when the fraudsters called, he realised he’d found it.

Award-winning technology journalist Danny Bradbury sits in as Davis tries to unpick the scam, following a trail that leads to the spam capital of America, through a wholesome town in the Midwest and, finally, to the other side of the world.

Genres: Nonfiction

26 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 22, 2012

Reviews

[Kent Winward · Rating 3 out of 5]

I gave this Kindle Single three stars because the problem it points out is a serious one -- online payday loan scams, yet the article missed the insidiousness of the problem and ended up being fractured. In reality, the article consisted of three different concepts all of which could have been fleshed out much more completely: the thin line between internet security and insecurity, the shadowy world of lead and information selling and finally, the payday loan collection scam -- but hey, what can you expect for a buck.

[José Pedro Gomes · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is totally needed in times when you just stopped reading newspapers or watching news on whatever media: journalism aiming search and pursuing data with a literary narrative, as a rich diary of information. You get cultivated and aware. Not in a chaotically depressed manner of powerlessness. Scarce nowadays, when little kingdoms of words fight themselves to pompously achieve the conquering of larger now in more fashion cybernetic audiences, bombing and inflammatory rhetorics thrown to the unprepared and naive readers.

[Nick O'Neill]

A good third outing from Matter, though a little weak on technical know how.

[Derrick Schultz]

Excellent. MATTTER reminds me of my favorite long form Wired articles.

[Henrik Berggren]

Good story but I wish it would have been solved. I want to know how to actually crack down on these scammers.