The Emotional Impact of Being Scammed is Massive for Victims

Pig butchering and other scams that result in financial loss are often dismissed as “just” a financial crime. But they’re so much more than that. The emotional impact of being scammed is huge. Scammers aren’t just manipulating people and taking their money. They’re draining their finances, stealing financial security, and leaving people feeling violated and unable to trust others.

See Pig Butchering is Getting Worse with Erin West for a complete transcript of the Easy Prey podcast episode.

Erin West is a deputy district attorney in Santa Clara County, California. She has been a prosecutor for twenty-six years. For the past nine years, she has been on the REACT task force, a high-tech task force of lawyers and detectives focusing on cases involving the internet, cryptocurrency, or anything high-tech. Erin prosecuted sexual assault cases for most of her career, but the sexual assault team did a lot of trials. She found herself many nights putting on a movie for her two young sons so she could prep for a trial. Eventually she realized that isn’t how she wanted to spend their childhood, but she still wanted to help people.

At that time, there was a lot of discussion around child safety online. Erin thought that online safety and digital crimes could be a good place for her. She was delighted to move away from sexual assault into a place where she was still helping victims, but those victims wouldn’t be absolutely destroyed in the way they often were with sexual assault. At least, that’s what she thought. She very quickly found that victims of the kinds of online crimes she was working on now were often damaged in a way that was much worse than sexual assault.

It’s Not “Just” a Financial Crime

Five years ago, Erin was prosecuting SIM swaps, a type of hacking where the hacker takes over the traffic coming to the victim’s phone. The victim loses phone connection, and the scammer can take over everything on the phone, including cryptocurrency accounts. Victims lose access to everything, including potentially millions in crypto, through no fault of their own. A lot of people called it “just” a financial crime. But talking to the victims, Erin found that they would rather have been in a fight or been hit by a drunk driver than be SIM swapped.

I was seeing a lot of the, oh, it’s just a financial crime. … These victims would have rather been in a bar fight, hit by a car, or hit by a drunk driver.

Erin West

The emotional impact of being scammed is more than people who haven’t experienced it expect. There’s a lot of mental anguish involved in going from solid financial stability to not knowing if they’ll ever be able to buy a house. It’s a big deal. A lot of victims are in their mid-to-late 50s, which is pretty late to rebuild that kind of nest egg.

Most of us know where we stand financially and don’t spend a lot of time thinking about what would happen if we lost it all. But scam victims suddenly find themselves in a position they never expected, and it’s a devastating loss. SIM swapping especially is a real invasion. Someone getting access to your phone or computer is almost like reading a diary. Emotionally, it’s hard to take.

It Can Happen to Anyone

Erin makes a point of destigmatizing being a victim of a scam. She always says to lead with empathy, because you never know who around you has been a victim. If you lead with empathy, you could be a person they feel comfortable sharing with.

Lead with empathy, because you never know who around you is a victim of some of these crimes.

Erin West

One of the things victims say to Erin a lot is, “I need you to know I’m a smart person.” Erin responds that she knows, but even smart people are no match for someone trained to use psychological tricks to manipulate you. Even smart people who pay attention to it all the time can get caught by it.

There’s a perception that older adults are more targeted because they’re more vulnerable. But that’s not necessarily true. Scammers definitely want people with more money, and those at the end of their lives tend to have more money than those just tarting out. But they don’t limit themselves to any demographic. The first victim Erin ever worked with in Santa Clara County was a thirty-year-old software engineer. She’s talked to Millennials who have lost all their money. The scammers don’t care who you are – if you have money, they want it.

Anybody that has money, they will take all of that money, whatever it is.

Erin West

Erin’s Story

Erin has been a victim of these kinds of online fraud. The most recent example is from this morning. She had been talking to a victim on LinkedIn the night before who was really frustrated with how his case was going. This morning, she woke up early, and before even getting out of bed she checked her work email. One of those emails was an email from a victim saying they were a victim of a pig butchering scam, and maybe Erin should pay attention instead of ignoring them like she did the last three times they’d emailed.

Erin was just waking up and immediately confused and concerned. Who was this person, and had she really ignored them three times? There was a link in the email, and she clicked it. The website it led to looked pretty normal. Then her brain started to engage, and she closed the website and searched for this person on LinkedIn. There was no such person. She realized she’d just done exactly what she always tells people not to do.

Why Erin Clicked

How many times have you heard not to click on links from people you don’t know? Thousands. Erin tells people that herself. But the point is it’s not when you expect it. Erin knows not to click on UPS delivery emails or such because she knows they’re not real. But if a scammer were to sit down and think about what kind of fraudulent email Erin West would click on, a victim feeling unheard would be a likely success. And that’s exactly what happened.

It also worked because it reached her at just the wrong time. She wasn’t fully awake, and was immediately emotionally triggered – was she doing this person wrong? She made a quick reaction. That’s exactly the technique scammers use. Erin has heard it from victims a million times. If my wife hadn’t left me, or if this or that hadn’t happened, I would have known better and wouldn’t have done it.

The good news for Erin is that the link didn’t take over her whole phone or anything. Instead, it was a Canary token. The sender now knows her IP address. It wasn’t the worst thing in the world, but it definitely sounded the alarm. Anyone can fall prey to an expert manipulator, even smart, aware people who fight these criminals for a living.

Smart people get hit [by scams]. Smart people who are in this field get hit. They’re that good.

Erin West

Pig Butchering and the Emotional Impact of Scams

The emotional impact of being scammed becomes even more devastating when the scam involves an element of betrayal. And “pig butchering” is one of the worst.

Pig butchering is a combination of romance or friendship scam and crypto investment scheme. The scammer spends a lot of time build trust with the victim as well as showing off a wealthy and successful lifestyle. They tailor the particular relationship to what the victim whishes they had. Eventually they tell the victim that they’re so wealthy because they invest in cryptocurrency – someone taught them, and they can teach the victim.

People think they would never fall for it. But these scammers don’t immediately start talking about crypto. They build a relationship and trust first. They work it into other conversations more naturally. Instead of asking you to invest, they frame it as wanting you to have what they have. And if you’re not interested at first, they wait. They’re playing the long game.

At some point, the victim buys in. They invest their money in a fake crypto platform. A fake dashboard shows astonishing returns. But when they try to withdraw that money, there are taxes and fees that have to be paid with new money. Victims start taking out home equity lines of credit, getting payday loans, or borrowing from friends. There are more and more fees until the victim realizes it’s a scam. At that point, not only have they been scammed and lost money, but this person they trusted and thought was a genuine friend or romantic partner betrayed them. The emotional impact of being scammed in this way is terrible from all sides. It also erodes trust. If this person was out to get you this whole time, who else might be trying to hurt you?

How Pig Butchering Starts

One really common way for the initial contact that leads to pig butchering is “misdirected” texts. Have you ever gotten a text that looks like someone sent it to the wrong number? It could have been something like, “What time are we meeting tomorrow?” or “Can you cover my shift at work?” These are scammers trying to see if you’ll respond. Whether or not you think you would, plenty of people do. When you respond, they’ll try to strike up a conversation. Often they’ll send a photo of an attractive young woman claiming it’s a photo of themselves.

There are plenty of people at home and lonely right now. The World Health Organization named loneliness as something to watch out for. This isn’t the behavior of a normal person who texted the wrong number. (Would you follow up an accidental wrong number text by sending that stranger a photo of yourself?) But many people are lonely and want it to be true, so they don’t think about how strange it really is. And it’s human nature to want to let someone who texted you mistakenly know they got the wrong person, especially when the message seems important. Unfortunately, scammers can use that as an opening for manipulation.

Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, and dating apps are other ways scammers make these initial connections. There are a lot of different techniques. You might have someone saying they appreciate your career trajectory and want to learn from you, or their niece is moving to your city and they want to connect her with you. Some people are good at being skeptical about every unsolicited interaction. But if you’re not in that mindset, it’s easy to be swayed by things that are flattering or sound reasonable on the surface.

The Challenge of Reporting to Law Enforcement

Along with the financial and emotional impact of being scammed, many people who try to report it to law enforcement have a terrible experience. This is part of what motivates Erin’s work. Local law enforcement isn’t set up to deal with these kinds of crimes. In November 2022, she started collecting law enforcement officers doing this kind of work so they could create a community and educate people. This group now has 1,800 members of active law enforcement, and as it grows, victims are getting better reception.

But it’s still rough to report these crimes. Erin gets emails all the time about how local law enforcement make people feel stupid, or tell them it’s a civil matter or because they gave their money away it’s not a crime. In reality, you’ve been the victim of a sophisticated criminal who has trained for years to use impressive psychological tools and techniques to steal your money. When you file those reports, recognize that’s what happened to you. You were tricked, and it was a crime.

It’s not easy or pleasant to be your own advocate, but you have to. When the person at the desk says it’s not a crime, you have to be the one to ask for a financial crimes detective. This is a worldwide crisis, but it’s still not well understood by local police.

We’ve got a worldwide crisis [of cybercrime] … and it is still not widely understood or known by local police.

Erin West

Everyone who goes into a police station and reports their experience makes it easier for the next person. Think about that when you do it. And if reporting doesn’t go well, email Erin. She’ll do what she can to find a place that can help you, or at least hear your story.

More Advice for Reporting

The emotional impact of being scammed and the fact that law enforcement response often blames you for it can make reporting hard. But it’s important to do it. Report to local law enforcement as soon as you can. If there’s any chance of recovering your money, you need eyes on your case as soon as possible. It helps to show up to make the report with the right information. In crypto cases, for example, that includes the deposit address and transaction hash. It’s what law enforcement will need to trace it.

You should also report it to IC3.gov, the FBI’s portal for online crime. Remember when you do that, you probably won’t get any response back. That’s okay. The goal with reporting to IC3 is that your case can be folded into a bigger case, or some assets will be recovered and you can get some of that back. But another big thing that IC3 does is let the government know how big the problem is. The more reports they get, the bigger they see the problem as, and the more resources they will put towards fighting it.

Expectations and Operation Shamrock

One factor that doesn’t help the emotional impact of being scammed is that it’s really hard to set expectations for victims. Chances are good that you won’t get your money back, but nobody wants to hear that. It’s reasonable to expect to be able to speak to a detective when you report to local law enforcement. But on the whole, victims deserve better.

There are people trying to make this reporting process better for victims, and that’s part of why Erin launched an initiative called Operation Shamrock. It brings together stakeholders from a variety of industries to look at the life cycle of pig butchering scams, gaps in how we’re handling victims, and opportunities to disrupt international bad actors.

One important part of Operation Shamrock is getting victims to a place where they can be heard. Police officers aren’t therapists, and Erin doesn’t have any psychologist training. But she can point you to people who do. Shamrock is meant to create a workflow that puts people in front of the right people or get them to existing resources that are already great. Victims need to know that they’re probably not going to get satisfaction from law enforcement, but they should at least be able to find someone to hear them out and potentially deal with the emotional impact of being scammed.

Avoid Third Party Recovery Services

Erin knows victims are frustrated. She doesn’t blame them. You’re a taxpaying citizen who has watched police investigate other crimes, but they’re ignoring you when you’re a victim – that’s awful. But you should be very wary of any company promising scam or fraud recovery.

Scammers prey on the emotional impact of being scammed. They know you’re devastated and frustrated. So they create secondary scams. They claim they’ll help you get your money back for a fee, but all you’re doing is losing more.

Not every fraud recovery company is a scam. But Erin isn’t aware of any successes out there. Again, if you’re a victim, you have to be an advocate for yourself. Ask the service for examples of where they’ve gotten money back for victims. Check them out on the BBB website. Google the company name to see if it really exists.

Erin recommends never paying any money to help you get money back. She’s seen over and over again that victims get hit a second time with these scams. Right now, the only people who can get your money back are law enforcement. If someone claims they can do it for you, ask who they’re working with in law enforcement, because there’s no other way. Ask for case numbers with existing agencies that you can look up online and call yourself. And be very, very wary.

The Scammers Don’t Always Want to Scam

This fact blew Erin’s mind when she found out. But many of the scammers on the other end of the phone or computer don’t want to be scamming you. They’re human trafficking victims.

Scammers are good at parting us from our money, and they’re also good at making people think there are good jobs available. In places like Southeast Asia, where unemployment is around 20%, they create beautiful websites advertising attractive jobs with living space provided. People think they can work there and send money to their family. They look like real jobs, and the scammers even do interviews, often multiple interviews.

People show up to their new jobs thinking they’re going to work in graphic design, travel, or something else. But when they get there, the scammers take their passports and bus them to camps with locked gates and barbed-wire fences. Guards with guns force them to scam.

In the United States, we are seeing suicides from the financial and emotional impact of being scams. In Southeast Asia, we’re seeing suicides of scam victims forced to scam others. They thought they were going to work a corporate job, but instead are held against their will to destroy people’s finances. It’s operating on an industrial scale, and the only winners are the bad actors in charge getting the money.

Prosecuting the Scammers in the United States

For a long time, people working on scams thought that most of it was done in Southeast Asia and there wasn’t a lot that could be done locally. But now we’re seeing scam activities happening on US soil. Victims are sometimes being asked not to wire money or send crypto, but to put cash in a duffle bag for someone to pick up. And when someone picks up that bag of cash for the scammers, law enforcement can arrest them.

[There is] an opportunity for United States law enforcement to put handcuffs on [scammers] that are operating in our country.

Erin West

Last week, Erin’s team arrested a courier who came into Santa Clara County to pick up $250,000 in cash. There are rings of money launderers who operate from southern California and just do pickups for scammers. Arresting these couriers is an opportunity to disrupt a means of taking money from victims.

For a long time, law enforcement has felt helpless to stop these scammers from sucking victims’ wealth to the other side of the world. But this is an opportunity for us to get involved locally. We’re at a point where people are realizing this issue isn’t going away and are willing to make changes. Part of Operation Shamrock is a banking working group that talks about how to recognize when a scam victim comes in and how to talk to them in a way they will be receptive to. There is a long way to go, but there is definitely movement towards making things better.

If you are in financial services or law enforcement, or if your organization wants to help but doesn’t know what to do, connect with Erin West or Operation Shamrock. Erin is easy to find on LinkedIn.