Dear All, I've recently received a call from FSM Smart. Now I'm not sure if they obtained my numbers from one of the contest here in OzB as I've participated in a few recently. So I'm just listing it here in case any of you come across this calls.
I have his app call TrueCaller which usually warns me who is calling but on this occasion it did not detect their caller ID.
I decided to play along to see their tactics and sound like someone that is interested and gullible. (I've also had some time to spare while I surfed the net, so away we chatted.)
- They claimed they're from "Switzerland" but one of them was clearly a filipino and another Caucasian called Gus.
- They're not registered with ASIC but they claim they do. They even had what ASIC stood for. In fact ASIC labels them as "could be involved in a SCAM".
- They're selling this so called tool which can predict and automate trades in forex and stock exchange.
- The tool they're selling is automated trading bots which you can never loose. "Their clients make $600 per week" "This is so easy anyone can start up"
- They tried every trick in the book to make them sound trust worthy and friendly, even predicting my star sign (wrongly).
- They were pushy to get me "registered" or "activated" with a one time fee of $250 which is whole "refundable"
- They're were name dropping Australian banks because you know….they're in the business.
- Pushy to get credit cards and for some reason they preferred mastercard as they had a promotion for $50 extra money. I generated mastercard online with a due date and they knew it was a credit card based in Japan (even I was impressed), the card generator said it was from Malaysia.
- I was like how can it be from Japan, I'm living here, I just bought something of Amazon.
- All the time I was operating with a fake name and all they had was my phone number but was quick to ask for my DOB and postcode.
- They were insistent for me to say "I consent" to proceed with the charges even though they were fumbling with the generated credit card provided, with fake cvv number.
- This is where Filipino lady started to get very agitated "Sir it is our duty to protect you in these transactions" and "I've been working in this company for 15 years"
- Expletives followed and this call was ended.
In summary, these filth are operating and actively calling Australians everyday. They pick on those who has lost money (like how I portrayed), those who are gullible, those who know a tiny bit on trading but not too much and most of all the pick on the very kind well mannered Aussies. As soon as I started playing along as if I trusted them, they begun showering me with "trust us" crap, "you're very careful and you should" etc etc.
Anyway I wasted a good 45 minutes of them trying to beg me to give them another credit card. I also realized that in a way I "wasted" my time entertaining them but I was also online shopping and surfing on OzB. Maybe this is community service, the time lost from their end is a gain to protect someone else that could have been a victim.
Scams like these do not often fall for the educated and skeptical people, but the older generations, those in desperate situations. Towards the end of the call, I revered in their frustrations and agitation. Maybe this is just an accidental community service.
And you've just wasted a whole lot more of your time writing up this essay!