By Randy Cruz
Just recently I happened to receive a call from an agency informing me of the win of a lifetime: a ten-day excursion to the Bahamas, including a tour through Disney World in Florida, rental car, an all-expense paid cruise, inspirational scenery, whales and a series of other bullshit details culminating about fifteen minutes of uninterrupted speech.
On any other day I would think this fortune would be another scam, but a reminder that I had entered such a contest at the Calgary Folk Fest made it seem all the more convincing.
I remembered while walking through a crowd of elder Calgarian folksters a shack set up with hundreds of tiny entrance slips crammed into a box. Without a moment’s hesitation I filled out a tiny form and it took its place among countless other hopefuls. After all, this is Calgary, what could be criminal?
The caller’s nagging persistence that such a contest took place in a “government regulated event” and that I had “willingly entered” had some persuasiveness to it, but after a lengthy talk and a noticeable irritation in her voice, I got the sense this was the three hundredth call she had made that day.
The kicker? A required credit card number.
“I’d rather call you back, this is a bad time…”
“This is our official call.”
“I would rather visit you in person.”
“We’re based in New York.”
And that was supposed to make me trust her?
Every year thousands of Canadians are victims of fraud whether as a result of “winning” a trip, a prize, internet purchases (PayPal isn’t theft-proof), “charity” donations via credit card or even buying advertised puppies. The list goes on. According to the Competition Bureau of Canada and the Commercial Crime Branch, in 2006 alone the value of loss reported totaled $23,912,252, with identity theft following close behind with reported losses at $16,283,777.
Similarly, our supposed “private information” is more available to public access than most presume and ready to be exploited by fraudsters. Whether from entering contests, mail, sold from retail outlets to telemarketing firms (we’re statistically more likely to give information we wouldn’t normally after we’ve made a purchase) or most notably Facebook, these days, a name, address and phone number aren’t private or protected. “It’s all fair game,” explained Peter Exner of Credit Counseling Services of Alberta. “Assume all that info is already out there.”
He also highlights the anger many undergraduates have after they’ve signed up for various credit cards to afford books for school, only to realize months later why that fine print is just so darn small: signing up for credit cards is a good example of an increasing blur between scam and legitimate commerce.
Nevertheless, aside from a natural skepticism, fin-de-siècle anxiety and ever-present post-9-11 paranoia, ultimately what made me question the whole Bahamas fiasco was the fact I had won a contest at Megatunes a month prior, and the odds of winning two contests in that span of time are just utterly ridiculous. To leave you with a refreshing example of a real winning notification, this message was left on my answering machine: “You’ve won the Interpol album. Come pick it up already.”