The FBI’s role in protecting victims from scams

0:01 This program is designed to provide general information with regards to the subject matters covered. This information is given with the understanding that neither the hosts, guests, sponsors, or station are engaged in rendering any specific and personal medical, financial, legal, counseling, professional service, or any advice. You should seek the services. Of competent professionals before applying or trying any suggested ideas. The information contained in this podcast is intended for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for individual professional legal advice. The podcast information was carefully compiled from vetted sources and references. However, Rose Resources outreach to safeguard the elderly cannot guarantee that you will not fall victim to a scam. Let's talk about scams. It's the must listen show for anyone who wants to protect themselves and their loved ones from scams. Every Tuesday am Pacific time on K four HD Radio, Joyce Petrowski, founder of Rose, and her guests will provide valuable insights and practical tips on how to recognize and protect yourself from scams. And now here is your host, Joyce Petrowski. Hi, I'm David staying active mentally, thing chess.

1:24 Those are all very important things. I'm seventy two, but I'm going to keep on learning. I'm going to keep on moving. I'm gonna keep on living my life. Health care for David's next move. Learn more at ar twelve health dot com. Good morning, everybody. My name is Brian Watson, community Outreach specialist for Rose Resources Outreach to Safeguard the Elderly, and today I am filling in for Joyce Petrowski. She will be back next week. And this week we have a guest. Her name is mari Sala Sabalis with the FBI, and we are going to learn what the FBI does in terms of preventing people from getting scammed, especially from older adults, because that's our focus here at at ROSE, and I have Marisella visit my class at the University of Arizona this spring as a guest to share what the FBI does in terms of educating the public to prevent them from being scammed.

2:24 I was very impressed with what they do. I was very impressed with Maricella, so I thought she would make a great guest today on Let's talk about scam So if we can bring in Marisella, we'll go ahead and get started. Good morning, Marcela. How are you doing today? Good morning, I'm doing well. Thank you for having me well. Thanks thanks for coming on our show and sharing all the wealth of knowledge that you have and sharing what the FBI does. So let's start out with what is an FBI Victim specialist and what do you do? So? Victim special and the FBI helps victims through a criminal investigation.

3:05 So there are two aspects when it comes to advocacy. So I work alongside agents, often responding within an hour after an incident has happened or when operations have happened. Also if they're doing search warrants or arrest warrants and there are victims that are there. Oftentimes my contact with victims would be through the phone or in person or even sometimes in different aspects in a hospital setting. We meet the victim where they're at where they can be comfortable in guiding them through the criminal justice system. If the case is indicted, I do pass the baton to my counterpartners at the US Attorney's office, and from then we kind of guide a victim through that process, through the investigation phase and then into the court phase all.

3:48 Oftentimes victims, when you are a victim of a crime, you're going to have rights that are automatic and then rights that you have to request or invoke. That's what we do is victim avicates and then also give them access to resources. How long has this position existed at the FBI? This position has you know, honestly, I'm going to get the year wrong of when it had started. It has grown quite a bit since the inception of it. Around nine to eleven is when it had expanded and just grew immensely. Nine to eleven had happened and there was the need to see on the federal side services directly to folks, and that was a boom, going from less than twenty to over one hundred in OAR Cadre now and it's expanded also to include cafes with our child child adolescent forensic interviewers as part of that too, administrative folks.

4:42 We have analysts. We've also have a support staff that are able to offer the administrative part of it too. So the FBI has something called Operation Level Up. Tell us about that operation what its goal is. So Operation UP began in twenty twenty two. What it is is a response to what was seen as a cryptocurrency investment fraud. These are often investment scams that are going on in stealing funds from people and with the perception that they are investing money in a legitimate way and that money is growing and then being stolen from them and sent to overseas organizations. So it began with the agents from San Diego and a forensic account here in the Phoenix office, and they created a proactive way to warn victims of cryptocurrency investment fraud. This program once was just a pine of a pilot or program, has now expanded to do a national initiative. So from that we've expanded to now in excuse me in Detroit, and we have added three more victims specialists to assist with that.

5:55 Over the years, we have contacted seven thousand victims and have noticed that we have say four hundred over four hundred and fifty million dollars falling into the hands of scammers. Wow, that's impressive. I love being proactive. So when you say warn, how are you advised? Like, how does that? How do you guys get warned or how do you guys find out that someone is being scammed potentially losing money, How does what's the nuts and bolts behind that? So it's all through means that there are platforms that have gone through legitimate means that we gain that information and it has shown that they are fraudulent platforms that we communicated with and that we can see that people have been victimized by that. So we call the victims, identify themselves and its agents that are calling the victims and making that initial contact to let them know that they have seen that they've invested in a fraudulent platform. Oftentimes, we have these scammers that are running multiple fraudulent platforms that we have identified in that aspect, and we want to warn them and say like, hey, we see that you've given them money. You need to stop. It is not legitimate. They're stilling from you. We also encourage them to vet where we're from, giving them the first and last name and also the field office that we work with, so the victims can call that field office and confirm and then be transferred over to that agent to do that.

7:17 My role is a victims specialist. It comes in to this is that they were seeing the need. When you're notifying people, it is a traumatic notification to let them know oftentimes over one hundred thousand dollars that people find out have been stolen to them. The impact of that is deep and the feelings that come with that are not easy to process or digest, and oftentimes there can resume suicidal ideations that come for that, and our part is Victim specialist, is to intervene and to offer that process for them and to talk that over and get them connected with resources in their area and also nationally. For that, do you struggle to get these victims to believe that they're actual being scammed.

8:01 Yes, that's always a struggle for it because it is very much a cold call. We don't know where they're at, and it does it's very common that folks get hung up on there is a process that they'll do to call them, send them an email, and then follow up with that phone call again. And then at that point when they're receiving that information, then they do tend to call back and when we're encouraging them, please call this field office. This is where I'm at. Here's where it is. And in addition to that, since the program has expanded on the FBI at website, we also have Operation Level up where there is information to show that we are calling folks to notify them that they have been a victim of a scam. From your experience, how are most of these victims being contacted which methods through?

8:47 There's a variety. Most of the time it's all through social media. It could be one through social media on Facebook, dating sites, even we've seen networks for entrepreneurs that are going or the random text that people receive on their phone, like Oh, I'm trying to contact Sue, it's been a while, can we talk and then end up finding out it's not Sue, and then they develop a relationship a lot of social engineering and connecting that contact with folks and developing a fake relationship and a friendship of some kind with them, either through an investment scheme or they do different ways, either romantically or an investment scheme. That they're trying to do is to make extra money to get better kind of had like education plans for their children or put more money into the retirement that gives attractive options for people that they're encouraging them to invest.

9:42 When people report things to IC three dot gov is that one of the ways that the FBI finds out about these scams. Yes, So there's a few ways, but that's one of the biggest ways that we collect information from folks. We have thousands of these scams that do come in every single day, and then that is the ones that are reported that we do get reported. Oftentimes the information we pull when we're building cases come from an IC three complaint, and then oftentimes what we have is we have one person who has filed the ICY three complaint, but then they share like, hey, I was seeing that I was earning income or earning an investment that it was growing, so I brought in my sister or my best friend, and then they didn't report. So there's the other aspect of that, where you have one person that discloses their victimization and then there are other people that they have brought in. There's also that guilt because they brought in family members or friends to it that it often exacerbates the shame that they've already initially felt.

10:43 Right, you know, one of the things that when I've done presentations, people say, well, if I report to this government database, is it just going to go into some black hole and no one looks at it. There's this fear. But the FBI reviews these ongoing case and sees if they're connected to something else. Just like you said, you know, what do you tell the public when they bring up that concern. I'm just reporting to this massive government database. So oftentimes I want them to know, like, even if there isn't an outcome or resolution that was made to feel whole, I want you to know that you've done everything that you can. You've reported, you've gone forward and protected yourself. You have done everything that you can. While I can't guarantee that a case is going to be investigated, I can say that you've done everything that you can.

11:35 It may not be today, it may not be tomorrow, and it might even be three or five years, but your information could lead to a bigger piece. Okay, very good, thank you. When have you seen any of these portals that the scammers have created to make it appear that this cryptocurrency investment is actually making money? Yes? Oh yes, I've had victims share screenshots, screen recordings of apps that they have been developed in platforms of where they're taken to where it is very much believable. It looks very sophisticated. There has been time and energy that have been put into these platforms, and this isn't something that looks cheap or that. It's very much believable, and I can recognize and understand why folks become victims to that because it is very much believable, and it does look like you are gaining money and your investment is growing.

12:38 Right, and there's that you know, fomo fear of missing out when you're making money. And then I like that you shared earlier that people bring in their family and friends, you know, because they want them to be part of it. And that's part of the scheme too of the scammers. Now, I've also been told by victims that a lot of times the scammers will let them, you know, withdraw some of their money or even all of their money to make it appear that their quote investment is liquid. Have you seen that as well from your point of view. Yes, we have, and that actually makes it more believable. It is a tactic that scammers use by saying initially they had let's say twelve thousand dollars that they invested, and say like, hey, you've made some money. It looks really great. You've made about doubled what you had. How about this, are you needing to pull any money out, so they give them like twenty five hundred or five thousand dollars, and then the scammer will come back and say, hey, we just have another one, another investment. We have a short window because you're a preferred member or VIP, I'm only going to offer you to get in on the base floor of this. So if you come and invest like thirty thousand dollars, you know you saw already that you got to twenty five hundred back or the five thousand back, so you can see. So that gives the incentive for them to give even more money.

14:02 Right right on these I just thought of this question. On these conversations. Are these by phone, text, social media or some other method. They're a variety of them, so phone texts, what's app, they even move them into other platforms that they'll use, either messenger and depending on what the camera is, signal, signal and what's app seemed to be the most popular ones. And that's because we believe a lot of these bad actors. We believe and we have seen that these bad actors are overseas, so that seems to be popular with them. The other thing aspect to it is that they teach folks. So if you're not very comfortable with technology, they are.

14:42 These cameras are excellent teachers in coaching people on how to develop and sign up for a cryptocurrency account, how would you wire from your banking account online to a cryptocurrency and then invest in the platform. So they are very good teachers. They're very patient with them, they encourage them, and they manipulate into that and developed that false sense of relationship and trust that they develop with their victims. So we've talked about the cryptocurrency scams, pig butchering. What other scams do you see where older adults are targeted. So some of the other scams that we've also put on our site and even on a Phoenix FBI the gold so gold couriers or wiring money from your account and taking or taking money out from your account and buying gold. We're seeing that a lot right now, and that's victimizing elderly too, is that we're seeing that scam that they're going to buy gold and then having someone pick up the gold because gold is more stable, it's more functional. It's an argument that they give. We also have sometimes the scams that they're saying they're their government, either from the IRS, the FBI, or some federal agency that is saying like, hey, you've been a scam, either from computer pop ups or something of that nature. And then they say like, hey, the way to do this is that you need to get bold, because that's the way that we can make sure that you're safe and your money is safe. It's all fraudulent and a scam.

16:11 And then there's the other traditional ones where we have the money excuse me, the romance scams, where they develop relationship with folks that are online and often pray on those who have been recently divorced or widowed or just are kind of lonely, and they develop that contact with them as a romance scam. Then we have the grandparent scam is another one where grandparents are getting a random phone call from a phone that they don't know, but it's their grandchild saying that they're stuck somewhere or they're in the hospital and they need money right away to be doing that, and oftentimes the folks panic and then they have what are called the fakes of it. The AI are using phones for that, and not very much, it's convincing enough that they believe it is their grandchild in danger without vetting or calling their phone to double check to see if they're safe.

17:04 So an estimate, like how many victims of these, you know, financial scams that are older adults have have you talked to say in the last five years? What would be your guess? Oh, I can't, It's that's hard, I would say. To be I would honestly probably say like one hundred a year. I have multiple cases that are on there, and that's I mean, even just from my caseload, I have quite a few that are on there, and I would say, just to be like even conservative, probably like one hundred a year. I have folks that I talk to constantly. I have new people that I'm making contact with, and then other folks too within operation level up where I don't have an active case, but I'm part of that notification connection to resources initially so that I have that aspect of them. So even in the community and doing outreach, I often find people that share, hey, I have been or they know someone. It's quite common. So probably like in the past, I would say like one hundred times, like one hundred people a year. It's not uncommon.

18:10 Wow, So those hundred people, how has being scam scammed affected them physically, mentally, emotionally. So when we talk about the elderly and there is a scam, I kind of think of it in a few ways. There is that impact that comes from it. First, the emotional part of it of shock that comes by it, and then shame is quickly followed because we know better. I've done this, I'm successful, I'm intelligent, I've done a lot of things in my life where I believe I can see that I should have seen this coming. And then there comes a second part of it of realizing that money is gone, it's not coming back, so it's called like the erosion of legacy. The money that you have saved and built and worked hard for is gone within like a month, and you don't have that window to be able to earn that income back and build it.

19:12 So then that's again you feel helpless for that. And then there are the concerns of independence when it's shared with family members, the impact to you and asking for help and support. There's a concern that your loss of independency also that family members are going to be taking over your finances and stewardship of that. So then there's that loss of independence, so already you've been impacted with the distrust of that, and then it can spill over as to a secondary victimization mistrusting your family members, doctors, and even people at the bank thinking that they're out to get you because you've already had that, so you get the distrust of the public in general. Then there's also the aspect where you hear of the broken heart syndrome, so that impact has affected you and you're feeling all these different things your health that may have been compromised earlier to begin with, and then it exacerbates those symptoms where it isn't uncommon that you'll see people physically decline after a victimization.

20:10 Wow, it's so And the thing that you said at the very beginning of our show today is as a victim specialist, you deal with people that are the victims of violent crimes. And I know you shared that when you were in our class, people that have been physically abused and assaulted and victims what we call violent crime, and then you're also interacting with people who are victims of these financial crimes. How do the two victims compare? What are the similarities and what are the differences. Trauma is very similar in the first part of a shock, right that you end up having, and that is a loss of control. You no longer have a control of a situation. It is not something that's planned, It is something that happened to you. So it's the resources in respect to that, I have victims of physical assaults and shootings or even the loss of a loved one through a homicide, where their resources and access to their resources and needs will be very different from those impacted by financial crime. The physical manifestations of the emotional impact do come out in the same way. They have self isolation.

21:24 They tend to go through some depressions, loss of appetite, trouble sleeping, having nightmares. Those are very consistent as reactions to trauma, regardless if it's a violent crime or a financial What we're seeing though in financial crimes is the resiliency part of it. Wealth and financial stability that brings you independence, and that loss of independence and resiliency can very much affect how you move forward. Where you can have folks of a violent crime that have that financial stability that know, well, I have some savings, so I can be okay for ANWW or they're going to see it a little bit different and just focusing on the physical assets of recovering from what they need to do, and then safety concerns. Safety concerns would be a little bit different. Within a financial crime aspect, it's going to be access to their personal information. And then also what are they going to be facing if there are any financial like find some and fees associated with money that was pulled out for a one case for example, because sometimes they'll be facing finds and fees with the IRS.

22:30 So I had I was online and actually this was actually in person. I'm sorry. I had someone tell me I am not a victim. I have to be a survivor. This was someone who lost money in a financial scam and did not want to use the word victim but intentionally chose the word survivor. What are your thoughts about that? People not, you know, avoiding the use using the word victim, and. That's where they're at in their journey and our and iris that that's one of the things if like, can you please not call me a victim? It's like absolutely, what do you prefer to be called? I prefer the term survivor. In advocacy. We often have that that you'll see survivor, excuse me, victim, survivor and then thriver as they're going through their victimization and processing through that, and it's not linear. It can go back and forth and then they can stain that and the legal system using the term victim is very impactful and powerful. It is a right that is afforded to people. So it's very important where in my role as a victim specialist, when someone is identified as a victim, it is automatically access to the court system, access to resources, access to me is a victim specialist with coordinating those resources and finding out they're through a needs assessment what's going to fit their situation. So in that aspect, it's very important when we are seeing that to understand that every person's different.

23:56 And I explain that you're going to be heard as being listed as a thing them and the reason for that is access to information and resources. But if you prefer for me to call you survivor, that is understandable. We'll do that and in meetings will also let the team know, hey, they prefer to be called a survivor, even though the legal language has specific meaning to victim. So recently I read an article by ARP and it basically was about saying that words matter when we talk about people that have been scammed. For instance, we don't say they fell for a scam. They say. The better words would be a scammer targeted this person, and they had a whole chart of words that are better choices.

24:42 And I've actually gone back and looked at some articles I've written about two years ago, and I was guilty of using some of those terms, and I've since upgraded my vocabulary. Are you at the FBI, are you guys intentional about the wording that you use as it relates to victims. Yes, we are. That's one of the big things. So we often hear like pig butchering, right. It is not victim centered and it tends to do blaming the victim, right. So we've moved away from that and we are using the term crypto investment fraud is what we're moving towards and using in that language to label it, because isn't the victim's fault. It is the scammers. They were the ones that targeted, they were the ones that developed in relationship, they were the ones that lied. It was not the victims.

25:31 And that's one of the things too, reminding folks like, hey, it may feel like that self blame, but you are not guilty for doing this. They did this too. They targeted you, they lied to you, and they created a whole narrative that was fake. No. Absolutely, I love that you're transitioning from pig butchering to crypto investment fraud. I hate the term pig butchering. The only thing good about it is it gets people's attention. Because every time I do a presentation, the vast majority of people have not heard that term. So you know, I'm going to try moving in that direction as well. I mean, we're constantly trying to get better at what we do. I know that you you as well in your colleagues. I wanted to bring up the crypto ATMs.

26:18 So when we're talking about these crypto scams, you know, what is your you know, what is your opinion on these crypto ATMs and what are like the warning signs? What do you tell people about them? Just there's it's different. It's something that could great as an option for people to put in there. What I see cryptocurrency or the ATMs is my interaction with them or I see is not always positive. It is a tool that is used for that. Unfortunately it's not used in the best sense or what we're seeing it's supposed to be used for. So it's like with anything new that I always see people do your research before and look at it to see what it is there. There is legislation now in Arizona when it comes to the ATMs that people can enact. It is a small window, but I do encourage folks that you just look atm KIOSK Arizona Lot and you can read in there what that is and there is a specific thing. If you've lost money through a scam and it was into putting it into an ATM, please look into look into that see if you fall into it, and report it. And I'm hoping I always hope, you know that we would be able to get money back. But I always tell people plan for the worst, but hope for the best, and definitely be proactive in that reporting. The more that we report, the more that we're going to be able to tighten that circle around these scammers. And they're constantly evolving.

27:47 They're very sophisticated. But the more that people report and not sit in shame the closer that that circle is being able to tie that they cannot pivot as fast. If someone feels that they've been vic them victimize any sort of financial scam, who should they report the crime to? So definitely, I see three for the federal aspect of it. So I see three is a big clearinghouse for a crime. We encourage people to report through the other aspect too, is that we work with State Attorneys Offices AG's offices here in Arizona. They have their threshold of what they do for prosecuting and investigating scams too. So I would also recommend reporting to your local Attorney General's office and within your state, and then if your municipality has that ability to investigate crimes on the internet or financial fraud.

28:39 Some municipalities do have that ability, or they may work as a TFO, which is a Task force officer within the FBI and they work alongside agents and investigating financial crimes. It just depends on the jurisdiction. I want to make sure that folks have all those options that they're available, and I think if you do on a local state and then a federal level, you got all your bases covered all right. I want to focus on something positive here, because we've been talking about some dreary stuff, you know, people losing money, people being victimized, people being emotionally traumatized. What's the most rewarding part of the job for you? I think when you see people grow and that resiliency, humans have that ability to adapt and improvise and overcome.

29:25 And then seeing so I have one victim that she calls me about every two months, every three months, and then we're just going in cases, still proceeding. We're just kind of in that process waiting for things to develop and just kind of doing a needs assessment at that time. And I was like, well, you know, what are you doing right now? What's going on with you guys and kind of seeing where they're at right And for her it was pretty funny. She was going to be celebrating her forty fifth wedding anniversary. I was like, oh, that's excited and that She's like, yeah, my kids are throwing it. We're doing well, we are recovering still financially. But the thing for her, she's like, I am looking forward to that and I've been married to him. And I was like, well, congratulations, and then she goes, well, he should be getting a medal of honor for being married to me. I just thought that was the funniest thing and I could not stop laughing. And then I was like, I'm probably gonna end up using that with my husband. So I think seeing the resiliency that people have and that capacity to still see and look forward to the joy in life, whether it's a big celebration in milestones and still having that victimization that's always going to be with you, but still creating that space to just feel pure joy.

30:40 What advice would you give for families who have an older family member, you know, trying to protect them. So the biggest thing I would think is to listen. Right. Oftentimes when someone tells them and someone we love tells them they've been a victim of a crime, the first thing that we wanted to do is fix it, right, That's what we want to do. It's a natural thing to fix, to solve, and to amend. What I recommend is that you listen and that you say I'm really sorry this happened to you, saying I'm sorry and creating that space just to hear, and then even asking is like, do you want me to hear or do you want my advice? And then the other thing is like I am concerned, or these are the things I'd like to help you with. Ultimately, you want to give folks that space to make small decisions on how they're going to move forward. They have lost control of their whole situation and having someone come in, especially if it's someone that they have raised, to come in and take over, that can be very much that loss of independence, and you then are just that fault and trying to help them. Unknowingly, you're taking over and that's not helping them process their own victimization.

31:50 Maricela, how can your listeners get more information about financial crimes like the ones we discussed today? I think very much your organization Rose does develop some of the information and resources on their sites here in Arizona, in the Maricopa County, we have the area on Aging the I Book of Resources for local here. We may have lost Marisella. Well, if we can get our back and ask her one last question. Yeah, So, I really appreciate the things that Marisella said today. I mean, she's encountered over one hundred victims in like the past five years, and I love that she shared the unfortunate situation where these people have been traumatized and affected people in a variety of different ways. And the one big thing I learned today was a lot of people end up bringing in their family members or friends trying to think in they're helping them out, thinking that they're going to make some money, but they end up actually creating more victims. So then there's that built over bringing others into a scam. I mean, I that was the big thing that showed up today And god, that's got to be horrible. So but unfortunately that's what these scammers do.

33:14 They will mention, Hey, is there anybody else you know that might be interested in making a lot of money on cryptocurrency? And god, that's that's just horrible. Yeah, And I also like what she said about trying to get away from the word pig butchering. So pig butchering is basically a scam where they convince you to invest in cryptocurrency, but you're really not even investing in cryptocurrency, and when you've put all your money into this so called investment, they will basically kill you financially. That's where they get the pig butchering. They don't kill you physically, but they take all your money and it's absolutely dramatic and horrible.

33:58 So they've definitely they've moved into crypt though investment fraud, and I'm going to try using that as well. It's a much better term, and it, you know, it takes the focus away from the victim and actually places it on the actual scammer itself, because these scammers are targeting us and our family members and friends. So all right, well, Marcel's not coming back, so I'm going to wrap it up. I wish I could have thanked her in person. I'll talk to her afterwards, but I really want to thank Maricela Sabalis from the FBI for sharing some of her insight and experience with us today. Definitely go to FBI dot gov and find out more about Operation landed Up or Operation Level Up. I'm sorry, and definitely if you have a crime, report it to IC three dot go ov.

34:50 That's IC three dot g o V. And thank you for listening to Let's Talk about scams. Joyce will be back next week. Please go to Rosadvocacy dot org and sign up for our email list. We love to provide information for you, for your family, your friends, and your neighbors. Our goal is to prevent people from getting scammed in the first place, So thank you for listening and we'll see you next week. Well that's all the knowledge for this episode. Tune in every Tuesday at eight am Pacific time on KFOURHD Radio at KFOURHD dot com as Joyce explores a variety of knowledge. So you have the power to make scam protection your healthy habit and until then, feel free to reach out to Joyce and let's talk about scams.