February 10, 2024 / 2 Minute Read

i got scammed by my brother

And I deserved it.

This event occurred during my Freshman year of college.

A time of experimentation, imagination, and eventually condemnation.

I’d heard about scams before, and I knew a lot of people who claimed to partake in the ritual, but I never paid much attention; until one day a “friend” approached me with an offer. 

Do I blame it on youthful naivety, or simple selfishness?

Oh by the way, I meant my Morehouse brother, not my actual one. 

This was a time of rebellion in my life. I’d already been smoking and stealing, not to mention my tattoo phase. Why not add scamming to the list? All I had to do was provide him with my account info, and I’d receive a profit.

I say “a profit” because he didn’t tell me how much I’d actually be pocketing, instead giving me some hogwash soliloquy about how “every hit varies.”

At this point, I’ve done a little research on scammers, so I’ll provide the SparkNotes version of what I think he did. From what I understand, scammers use the Dark Web to order Credit Cards, and account Passwords. They then use this information to gain access to people’s accounts, preferably rich ones, and steal their money. They rely on people either not checking their balances, or not noticing the charge.

I gave him my info and went on about my life. About a week later I got a text to check my account. I’d earned $50. Sorry, not earned, “acquired.” This may not sound like a lot of money to you, but it was more than enough to fund my hoodrat activities.

I was hooked.

Not in the sense of addiction or some neurotic compulsion; more like I’d gotten away with it once so why not push my luck?

I’ll tell you why. 

Because the second time, it didn’t work.

After approaching him again, and replicating the routine I ended up with a negative balance of $600.

To this day I have no idea what went wrong. I tried to get him to fix it, but he started to avoid me and getting in a fight didn’t seem worth the risk. Can’t blame a guy for trying right?

A few days later I called my bank, alleging that I’d been hacked. In response to my nefarious intent and bold faced lie, they gave me the run around, and I eventually ended up in limbo. After a while I stopped calling and did what any logical kid in my situation would. I logged out of that account and I haven’t used it since. I’ve also never done another scam.

So yeah, don’t do scams.

Bye Chance.