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Broke, desperate Americans are most likely to be targeted by scam artists and the amount they lose is rising, the National Consumers League said.
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Broke, desperate Americans are most likely to be targeted by scam artists and the amount they lose is rising, the National Consumers League said.
The non-profit group received 15,000 complaints last year about fraud, including 5,742 from people reporting they lost money, according to new data.
The average loss was $2,332.03 (1,630.79 pounds), about $500 more than in 2007. The amounts may seem paltry compared with what accused Wall Street swindler Bernard Madoff's investors lost but still were serious for those taken in by the scams.
With the United States in recession, the financial sector in crisis and Americans worried about keeping their jobs and homes, the National Consumers League urged extra vigilance.
"Consumers today should be even more on their guard than they were in the past. When you're in desperate straits, you're going to be more attractive to scammers," said John Breyault, the group's vice president for public policy.
Breyault said the number of e-mail scams -- like the one from the putative prince who will make you rich if you just send $10,000 -- are down, probably partly because of better spam filters.
But there were more Internet merchandise scams, he said, possibly because people in dire financial straits were hunting for bargains on unreliable websites.
His group also found more cases of "social engineering fraud" -- like "phishing" messages that purport to come from a bank and seek personal information that could be used for identity theft.
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(Agencies) |
美國(guó)國(guó)家消費(fèi)者聯(lián)盟稱，經(jīng)濟(jì)破產(chǎn)、心情絕望的美國(guó)人最有可能成為騙子的目標(biāo)，而且他們被詐騙的數(shù)額呈上升趨勢(shì)。
據(jù)最新數(shù)據(jù)顯示，這家非贏利組織去年共收到一萬(wàn)五千起詐騙投訴，其中5742起是錢財(cái)詐騙。
去年的平均詐騙金額達(dá)2332.02美元（合1630.79英鎊），比2007年增加500美元。雖然詐騙金額與華爾街伯納德?麥道夫的驚天詐騙案相比，也許不足掛齒，但對(duì)于受害者來(lái)說(shuō)還是很痛苦。
目前美國(guó)深陷經(jīng)濟(jì)衰退，金融領(lǐng)域面臨危機(jī)，人們擔(dān)心工作和家庭不保，美國(guó)國(guó)家消費(fèi)者聯(lián)盟敦促人們此時(shí)更要提高警惕。
該組織的公共政策副總裁約翰?布瑞約特說(shuō)：“消費(fèi)者現(xiàn)在應(yīng)該比以往更加小心。當(dāng)你處于困境時(shí)，更容易成為騙子的目標(biāo)。”
布瑞約特稱，去年的郵件詐騙數(shù)量有所減少，這可能得益于垃圾郵件過(guò)濾器性能的提升，例如某個(gè)傳說(shuō)中的大亨告訴你只要給他匯一萬(wàn)美金就能讓你成為富翁。
但與此同時(shí)，網(wǎng)絡(luò)商務(wù)詐騙有所增加，這可能是因?yàn)樯硖庁?cái)政危機(jī)中的人們?cè)诓豢煽康木W(wǎng)站上購(gòu)買廉價(jià)商品。
該機(jī)構(gòu)還發(fā)現(xiàn)“社會(huì)工程詐騙”增多，例如聲稱來(lái)自銀行，盜取個(gè)人信息以實(shí)施身份盜竊的“網(wǎng)絡(luò)釣魚(yú)”信息。
(實(shí)習(xí)生許雅寧 英語(yǔ)點(diǎn)津編輯）
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網(wǎng)絡(luò)釣魚(yú) phishing
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