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On 01/04/14 13:42, lug@xxxxxx wrote:
She didn't, she was lied to by an energy company salesman, I was just saying that she is the /kind of person/ most vulnerable to this kind of scam, and on a pension what might be a small payment to a young working person could be half their pension to an elderly pensioner.On Tue, 01 Apr 2014 10:43:13 +0100, Julian Hall <linux@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:I don't think you can equate a deliberate criminal fraud with a bit of pre-installed software. You may think it's a victimless crime and/or it's a small amount of money but that ignores the emotional cost to the victim. Just after my Dad died my Mum was deliberately lied to by the salesman of one of the energy companies - I know it was deliberate because when I subsequently called them he 'no longer worked for them' - and as a result of believing the lies Mum lost all confidence in her ability to deal with people like that and it took a long time to rebuild it. I know for a /certainty/ that if she had fallen for a con like this the effect would have been similar, and she is not alone in that. How many hundreds, or thousands will this scammer have affected in this way?Well, I am sorry for your mum and the people like her that fall for these scams.
No point making cold calling illegal as the scammers are a) operating outside the UK, b) Breaking the law anyway so one more isn't going to worry them.The best solution would be if the government just outlawed cold calling completely
Not just the elderly, anyone who is not technically adept, which is a large percentage of people, drawn to computers since Windows made them easy(er) to use.or failing that ran a bunch of TV ads targeted at the olds telling them never to buy anything from people who call or email you out of the blue.
I agree there, driving offences like that should carry a manslaughter charge.. that would stop them!My perspective is just that on the grand scheme of things it isn't that big a deal. I cycle a fair bit and am very sensitised to the lenient sentences bad drivers are given. A "careless" woman killed an old guy on a bike last year outside the Grand Hotel in Torquay. All she got for that was a 2 year driving ban and a £400 fine. I would just rather my taxes went to things like keeping these people permanently off the road rather than prosecuting this MS guy.
Julian -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/listfaq