Conversation

QC (in Berlin 7/29-???)
@QiaochuYuan
i did, she said the profile would be a picture of a phoenix and it was, i asked her to log in to confirm she controlled the account and she did. very few fb friends. would have been more convincing with a real profile pic
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QC (in Berlin 7/29-???)
@QiaochuYuan
relevant background here is that i've been scammed like this twice before in boston as a college student, one guy asked me for money for gas which i gather is a pretty common scam. so that's v much on my mind and i told her so
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QC (in Berlin 7/29-???)
@QiaochuYuan
i asked her why she didn't have anyone in her life she could borrow $100 from and she said she grew up a foster kid so no parents, sort of implied she didn't have friends, said she came to SF to try to get work at amazon
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QC (in Berlin 7/29-???)
@QiaochuYuan
she got teary-eyed at various points. after a little more back-and-forth i offered for her to walk with me and tell me more about herself while i got breakfast (if it's a scam this tests her cover story more and wastes her time)
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QC (in Berlin 7/29-???)
@QiaochuYuan
she paused to think (no tears) then said (tearily) that she needed enough time to get back to the hostel in SF or they might not let her keep her room. this is the point at which i decided not to help her and told her so
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QC (in Berlin 7/29-???)
@QiaochuYuan
it was 2:30 at the time and it takes maybe 2 hours worst case to get to a random place in SF from berkeley via BART etc, so i didn't entirely buy the time thing, she had enough thinking time to make that up
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QC (in Berlin 7/29-???)
@QiaochuYuan
i thought if she was genuine she'd be willing to take the time loss to have more time to convince me but if she was scamming me she'd want to give me as little time as possible to probe her cover story. but idk, who knows
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QC (in Berlin 7/29-???)
@QiaochuYuan
i told her that i couldn't help her, that i thought if this was real she'd come with me, and left. i walked away and i didn't hear a sound from her; no bursting into tears or anything
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QC (in Berlin 7/29-???)
@QiaochuYuan
asked a few people for thoughts and they brought up that apparently it's a common scam / lying thing to offer a bunch of "proof" / evidence unprompted; i wasn't paying much conscious attention to that but it is weird that she showed me her driver's license unprompted
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KiwisPillow
@kiwispillow
If your gut tells you not to give them $$, fine. What's not fine is stringing them along and requiring them to jump thru hoops before telling them you aren't going to help them.
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sadals🪐🔮d
@sadalsvvd
Replying to
@QiaochuYuan
real lie detection in this sort of situation is basically a 50/50 shot but yeah it sounded scammy based on your description. also, $100 is a lot to ask _one_ person. don't worry about it too much, you still can't help everyone even if it was an honest mistake
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Trillionth of a second
@picklesecond
Replying to
@QiaochuYuan
Your solution is incomplete -- churches do a similar thing to test for actual need (spend time w/ them), plus they try to actually get people on their feet instead of just handing over cash. Very advanced social tech there.
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Stoobe
@stoobe
Replying to
@QiaochuYuan
Interesting dilemma. It's weird tho that she'd move to a whole new city to work in an amazon warehouse without a guarantee. Plus there are amazon warehouses all over the country. Still, hard to get a definitive read.