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* [[Get-rich-quick schemes]]
* [[Get-rich-quick schemes]]
* [[Internet fraud]]
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* [[Social_engineering_(computer_security)|Social engineering (computer security)]]
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Revision as of 18:08, 15 May 2006

Confidence Man redirects here. For the Lost episode, see Confidence Man (Lost).

A confidence trick, confidence game, also known as a con, scam, grift or flim flam, is an attempt to intentionally mislead a person or persons (known as the "mark") usually with the goal of financial or other gain.

The confidence trickster, con man, grifter, scam artist or con artist often works with one or more accomplices called shills, who try to encourage the mark by pretending to believe the trickster. In a traditional con, the mark is encouraged to believe that they will obtain money dishonestly by cheating a third party, and is stunned to find that due to what appears to be an error in pulling off the scam they are the one who loses money; in more general use, the term con is used for any fraud in which the victim is tricked into losing money by false promises of gain.

Most confidence tricks exploit the greed and dishonesty of their victims. Often, the mark tries to out-cheat the con artist, only to discover that the mark has been manipulated into this from the start. This is such a general principle in confidence tricks that there is a saying among conmen that "you can't cheat an honest man."

However, some tricks depend on the honesty of the victim. A common scam is where as part of an apparently legitimate transaction the victim is sent a worthless check which they deposit. The victim is then urged to forward the value of the check to the trickster as cash which they may do before discovering the check bounces. A fashionable scenario (2006) is where the victim is recruited as a "financial agent" to collect business "debts". "Paper" Checks are not always involved - funds may be transferred electronically from another victim. More detail can be found at ScamSpeak.

Sometimes con men rely on naïve individuals who put their confidence in get-rich-quick schemes such as 'too good to be true' investments. It may take years for the wider community to discover that such 'investment' schemes are bogus, and usually it is too late as many people have lost their life savings in something they have been confident of investing in.

Origin of the term

Though dishonesty for financial gain had existed long before, the specific term "confidence man" was first coined in 1849 by the New York Herald to describe the deceptions of William Thompson. Thompson, dressed in genteel fashion, would approach wealthy New Yorkers and, after brief conversations, ask, "Have you confidence in me to trust me with your watch until tomorrow?" The mark, placing "confidence" in Thompson's honesty, would lend him his watch, only to have Thompson never return. Thompson's arrest was a nationwide sensation, and the term "confidence man" passed into widespread use, including the title of Herman Melville's 1857 novel The Confidence-Man.

Well-known confidence tricks

  • Three Card Monte, The Three-Card Trick, Follow The Lady or Find the Lady, which is (except for the props) essentially the same as the probably centuries-older shell game or thimblerig. The trickster shows three playing cards to the audience, one of which is a queen (the lady), then places the cards face-down, shuffles them around and invites the audience to bet on which one is the queen. At first the audience are skeptical, so the shill places a bet and the scammer allows him to win. This is sometimes enough to entice the audience to place bets, but the trickster uses sleight of hand to ensure that they always lose, unless the con man decides to let them win to lure them into betting even more. The 'mark' loses whenever the dealer chooses to make him or her lose.
  • The Spanish Prisoner scam, and its modern variant the Nigerian money transfer fraud, takes advantage of the victim's greed. The basic premise involves enlisting the mark to aid in retrieving some stolen money from its hiding place. The victim sometimes goes in figuring he can cheat the con artists out of their money: anyone trying this has already fallen for the essential con, by believing that the money is there to steal. Closely related is the Fake Lottery, in which the victim is told he or she has won a large lottery prize in another country, and that, in order to collect the funds, legal or other fees of several thousand dollars are required in advance. The victim pays the fees, but never sees the supposed winnings. See also Black money scam.
  • The early-20th century favorite The Big Store, around which scam the plot of the film The Sting revolves. Big store scams are described in detail in David W. Maurer's The Big Con (See references), on which the film was loosely based. They often involved teams of dozens of con artists working together with elaborate sets and costumes.
  • The Protection Scheme This scheme takes advantage of the fact that there are con artists out there. The con man tells the mark that there is a web site you can put your credit card number in to keep it safe from stolen identity, the mark then willingly gives the con man their credit card number. The con man is then never seen again.
  • The Pigeon drop, also featured early in the film The Sting, wherein the 'mark' or 'pigeon' "assists" an elderly, weak or infirm stranger to keep their money safe for them. In the process, the stranger (actually a confidence trickster) "puts his money with" the pigeon's money, i.e., in an envelope, briefcase, or sack, which the pigeon is then entrusted with. The money is actually not put into the sack or envelope, but is switched for a bag full of newspaper, etc. The pigeon is enticed to "make off with" the con man's money through the greed element and various theatrics, but in actuality, the pigeon is fleeing from his own money, which the con man still has (or has handed off to an accomplice).
  • The Fiddle Game is a variation on the Pigeon drop. A pair of con men work together, one going in to an expensive restaurant in shabby clothes, eating, and claiming to have left his wallet at home, which is nearby. As collateral, the con man leaves his only worldly possession, a fiddle (violin) he uses to make enough money for himself to live and eat. He leaves, and the second con man swoops in, offers an outrageously large amount (e.g., $50,000) for such a rare instrument, and then looks at his watch and runs off to an appointment, leaving behind his card for the mark to call him when the fiddle owner returns. The mark's greed comes into play when the "poor man" comes back, having gotten the money to pay his meal and ensure the return of his violin. The mark, "knowing" he has an offer on the table, then buys the violin from the fiddle player (who "reluctantly" sells it eventually, for say $5,000), and we are left with two con men $2,500 richer, and a maitre'd with a cheap wooden instrument. (This trick is also detailed in the Neil Gaiman novel, American Gods, and is the basis for The Streets song Can't Con an Honest John.)
  • The pyramid scheme. See also Ponzi scheme, Matrix sale.
  • In a drug dealer scam, the conman pretends they are selling illegal drugs and sometimes uses intimidation as part of the scam. Usually the victim hands over the money and is told to wait until the 'dealer' comes back with the product. They never do. Some fake drug pushers will give out bags full of things such as parecetemol, herbs etc.
  • Insurance fraud - the con artist tricks the mark into damaging, for example, the con artist's car, or injuring the con artist (in a manner that the con artist can exaggerate). The con artist fraudulently collects a large sum of money from the mark's insurance policy, even though they intentionally caused the accident.
  • Pig-in-a-poke originating in the late Middle Ages, when meat was scarce, but apparently rats and cats were not. The con entails a sale of a "suckling pig", in a "poke" (bag). The bag ostensibly containing a live healthy little pig, but actually contains a cat (not particularly prized as a source of meat, and at any rate, quite unlikely to grow to be a large hog). If one "buys a pig in a poke" (a common colloquial expression in the English language, meaning "to be a sucker"), the person has bought something of lesser value than was assumed. This confidence trick is also the origin of the expressions: "Left holding the bag" (meaning to find oneself with nothing for their efforts, as the cat is quite likely to flee when the bag is opened), and "let the cat out of the bag," meaning to reveal that which is secret, though the latter may also refer to the Cat o' nine tails.
  • Many religious cults and most mainstream religions have been described by their critics as confidence tricks. It is alleged that their aim is to obtain money from their followers by deception. It can be unclear, however, whether they are doing it for con-artist reasons or for religious/welfare reasons. If the cult leader can be proven to use any form of deception or trickery to garner funds, then it is a con.
  • Pseudoscience and snake oil. Some popular psychology confidence tricksters make money by falsely claiming to improve reading speed and comprehension using speed reading courses by fooling the consumer with inappropriate skimming and general knowledge tests. These popular psychology tricksters often employ popular assumptions about the brain and the cerebral hemispheres that are scientifically wrong, but attractive and easy to believe. Similar scams involve the use of brain machines to alter brain waves, and intelligence amplification through balancing the mind and body. See neurofeedback
  • Psychic surgery is a con game in which the trickster uses sleight of hand to pretend to remove bits of malignant growths from the mark's body. A common form of medical fraud in underdeveloped countries, it imperils the victims, who may fail to seek competent medical attention. (The movie Man on the Moon depicts comedian Andy Kaufman undergoing psychic surgery.)
  • The Thai Gem Scam, in which layers of conmen and helpers tell a tourist in Bangkok of an opportunity to earn money by buying duty-free jewelry and having it shipped back to the tourist's home country. The conmen guide the victim to a tuk-tuk which brings them from one destination to another until the victim is convinced and arrives at the jewelry store. This scam has been operating for 20 years in Bangkok and is alleged to be protected by Thai police and politicians.
  • Hydrophoby Lay was a scam popular in the 1920s, in which the victim pretended to have been bitten by the mark's (possibly rabid) dog.
  • Deceptive Contest This scam relies on the fact that it is a real contest but whose true objective is to sell the victim a low value item at a high price. The victim sees an ad in the papers asking poets to send their poem to a poetry competition. A few weeks later, a letter arrives annoucing that the victim's poem has been selected by the judges and the victim has entered the "semi-finals". As per the rules of the contest, the victim's poem will be published in a hard cover poetry book once the contest has concluded. The victim is asked to travel (at their own expense) to New York to participate in the "semi-finals" (and the finals). The victim is encouraged to buy/order the book of poetry containing their poem at $80. The scam is of course, one in every four contestants enters the "semi-finals" and it appeals to their vanity to buy a low quality $10 book at $80. The contest is real but irrelevant to the scammers.
  • Glasses drop is a scam in which the scammer will intentionally bump into the mark and drop a pair of glasses that have already been broken. He/she will claim that the glasses were broken by the clumsiness of the mark, and demand money to replace them.
  • Lottery Fraud by Proxy In this particularly vicious scam, the scammer buys a lotto ticket with yesterday's winning numbers. He or she then alters the date on the ticket so that it appears to be from the day before, and therefore a winning ticket. He or she then sells the ticket to the mark, claiming it is a winning ticket, but due to some reason, he or she is unable to collect the prize (not eligable, etc). The peculiar cruelty in this scam is that if the mark attempts to collect the prize, the fraudulently altered ticket will be discovered and the mark held criminally liable.
  • The Darr Acting like a man with the "shakes" or another obvious disease that creates social anxiety, the con man drops a bottle of medicine tablets, usually tic-tacs or another medicinal look-alike near mark. Then, hopefully, the mark helps pick up the dropped medicine, but since it was on the ground, should be dirty. The con man then goes on about how expensive medicine has become and asks the mark if he has any change. If the mark agrees, the con man then iniates a conversation about an illegal prescription drug ring. The con man continues saying that with an intial backing in the ring, much profits could be made, but without a decent size of money, the ring will never start up. With the perception that the con man wants cheap drugs and the mark wants a large return on his investment in this operation, the mark donates the money and then the con man is never seen again. Named for acclaimed underground Con-man Gregory Mitchell Darr.

Extra finesse

Many con men employ extra tricks to keep the victim from going to the police:

  • Illegal money. A common ploy of investment scammers is to encourage the victim to use money that has been concealed from the tax authorities. The victim cannot go to the authorities without revealing that they have committed tax fraud.
  • Illegal enterprise. Many swindles involve a minor element of crime or some other misdeed. The victim is made to think that they will gain money by helping fraudsters get huge sums out of a country (the classic Nigerian scam). The victim cannot go to the police without revealing that they planned to commit a crime themselves. Similar tricks can be played on people shopping for pirated software, illegal pornographic images, bootleg music, drugs, firearms or other forbidden or controlled goods.
  • Pitiful fraud. The con artist may tell their mark pitiful lies about their family, children, etc therefore the mark feels sorry for them and does not alert the police
  • Family member. Many con artists con on family members because the family would not want to hurt the con man by alerting the police
  • Embarrassing enterprise. If the victim loses a small sum only, they may be unwilling to contact the authorities if the circumstances are embarrassing, e.g. if they would look like an idiot or if their spouse would find out that they paid lots of money to access a website of (worthless or nonexisting) pornographic material.
  • Stolen Cheques. A recent twist on the Nigerian fraud scheme, the mark is told he is helping someone overseas collect "debts" from corporate clients. Large cheques stolen from businesses are mailed to the victim. These cheques are altered to reflect the victim's name, and the mark is then asked to cash them and transfer all but a percentage of the funds (his commission) to the fraudster. The cheques are often completely genuine, except that the "pay to" information has been expertly changed. This exposes the victim not only to enormous debt when the bank reclaims the money from their account, but also to criminal charges for transacting the forged cheques.

It is to be noted also that the above list is only a sampling. Confidence games are continually evolving and subject to many variations and refinements, as in the following:

Con games never remain stationary. The principle may be old, but the external forms are always changing, for con men know they must adapt their schemes to the times. This is especial true of the Big Con. A good grifter is never satisfied with the form his swindle takes; he studies it constantly to improve it; as he learns more about people, he finds a way to use what he has learned.
-- From The Big Con, by David Maurer (Chapter 3)

Famous convicted and alleged con artists

Note: Some inclusions in this list may be disputed.

Confidence tricks in the movies and television

Confidence tricks in literature

This section is incomplete. Please expand it if you can.

See also

Quotations

  • In response to the question "Who's going to believe a con artist?" Ben Matlock of Matlock responded, "Everyone, if she's good."

References

  • Blundell, Nigel (1984) [1982]. The World's Greatest Crooks and Conmen and other mischievous malefactors. London: Octopus Books. ISBN 0-7064-2144-2.
  • Maurer, David W. (1940). The Big Con: The Story of the Confidence Man and the Confidence Game. New York: The Bobbs Merrill company. ISBN 0-3854-9538-2.
  • Maurer, David W. (1974). The American Confidence Man. Springfield: Charles C. Thomas, Publisher. ISBN 0-3980-2974-1.
  • Ball, J. Bowyer (1982). Cheating and Deception. New Brunswick (USA), London (UK): Transaction Publishers. ISBN 0-88738-868-X. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
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