Originally published in 2018

Trust Is A Big Word!

We Wanted To Share Some Thoughts On Scam Victim Saviors

Be careful what you believe and who you trust out there, every anti-scam hate group has an expert that claims to know it all. But misunderstanding and urban legends are everywhere. Anti-scam experts spend most of their time deepening the traumaTrauma Emotional and psychological trauma is the result of extraordinarily stressful events that shatter your sense of security, making you feel helpless in a dangerous world. Psychological trauma can leave you struggling with upsetting emotions, memories, and anxiety that won’t go away. It can also leave you feeling numb, disconnected, and unable to trust other people. Traumatic experiences often involve a threat to life or safety or other emotional shocks, but any situation that leaves you feeling overwhelmed and isolated can result in trauma, even if it doesn’t involve physical harm. It’s not the objective circumstances that determine whether an event is traumatic, but your subjective emotional experience of the event. The more frightened and helpless you feel, the more likely you are to be traumatized. Trauma requires treatment, either through counseling or therapy or through trauma-oriented support programs, such as those offered by SCARS. of those that follow them, and spreading false information.

Why Do Crime Victims Try To Control Their Situation By Trying To Control Others?

It is not uncommon for people who have experienced trauma, such as being the victim of a crime, to feel a sense of loss of control over their lives.

In an effort to regain a sense of control, they may try to control their environment or the people around them.

This can be a coping mechanism to help them feel more secure and less vulnerable.

However, it is important to recognize that attempting to control others is not a healthy or effective way to cope with trauma or to try to regain a sense of control. It is important for individuals who have experienced trauma to seek support from trusted friends, family members, or mental healthMental health Mental health, defined by the World Health Organization (WHO), is "a state of well-being in which the individual realizes his or her own abilities, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to his or her community". According to WHO, mental health includes "subjective well-being, perceived self-efficacy, autonomy, competence, intergenerational dependence, and self-actualization of one's intellectual and emotional potential, among others". From the perspectives of positive psychology or of holism, mental health may include an individual's ability to enjoy life and to create a balance between life activities and efforts to achieve psychological resilience. Cultural differences, subjective assessments, and competing professional theories all affect how one defines "mental health". professionals or support organizations to help them cope with their experiences in a healthy and adaptive way.

Countless victims believe they are instant experts

A significant percentage of victims instantly believe they are experts just because they went through a scam. Being a victim does not make anyone an expert. As the saying goes, it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert at something.

But the desperate need to restore control leads people into wanting and believing to be in control when they are really not. At least not yet. This leads them to believe they are competent to lead others.

Also, many victims fall into the delusion that they are the ONLY person that can save other victims. This is a real mental condition known as “Savior Complex” or “Messiah Complex” and may require assistance from a mental health professional (which we are not). Be watchful for people like this, they will pull you off course, try to dominate you in comments, and either prevent your real recovery or prevent you from recovering at all because they live in a constant state of outrage and angerAnger Anger, also known as wrath or rage, is an intense emotional state involving a strong uncomfortable and non-cooperative response to a perceived provocation, trigger, hurt or threat. About one-third of scam victims become trapped in anger for extended periods of time following a scam. A person experiencing anger will often experience physical effects, such as increased heart rate, elevated blood pressure, and increased levels of adrenaline and noradrenaline. Some view anger as an emotion that triggers a part of the fight or flight response. Anger becomes the predominant feeling behaviorally, cognitively, and physiologically. Anger can have many physical and mental consequences. While most of those who experience anger explain its arousal as a result of "what has happened to them", psychologists point out that an angry person can very well be mistaken because anger causes a loss in self-monitoring capacity and objective observability. while projecting concern for your wellbeing.

Scam Victims Are Easy Prey To The Incompetent Amateurs Out There

You were scammed once, and it only confirms that you are susceptible to being scammed again. Avoiding scamsScams A Scam is a confidence trick - a crime -  is an attempt to defraud a person or group after first gaining their trust through deception. Scams or confidence tricks exploit victims using their credulity, naïveté, compassion, vanity, irresponsibility, or greed and exploiting that. Researchers have defined confidence tricks as "a distinctive species of fraudulent conduct ... intending to further voluntary exchanges that are not mutually beneficial", as they "benefit con operators ('con men' - criminals) at the expense of their victims (the 'marks')". A scam is a crime even if no money was lost. is not about attitude, nor is it about knowledge alone.

It is about a combination of knowledge and new behaviors that hold you back when you want to make an impulsive action. It is about learning that your emotions are easily hijacked, so you change your behaviorBehavior   Behavior / Behavioral Actions Otherwise known as habits, behavior or behavioral actions are strategies to help prevent online exploitation that target behavior, such as social engineering of victims. Changing your behavior is the ONLY effective means to reduce or prevent scams. to give yourself time to let it fade. Avoid Messiahs.

Saviors are every bit as dangerous as scammers because saviors believe they are the only one that knows anything – when in reality they only know bits and pieces, and large amounts of false or urban legends spread by other victims who have also been misled. They tend to be very domineering with other victims and argumentative towards real professionals.

There are thousands of one-person or small amateur anti-scam groups. Always be careful of who you trust and follow. They are a big part of the reason why less than a third of victims actually recover. And all the amateur anti-scam groups combined have never made a dent in the growth of scamming.

We are always on guard for saviors in our pages and groups and remove them, just as we do moles, mules, and victims still engaged with or in denialDenial Denial is a refusal or unwillingness to accept something or to accept reality. Refusal to admit the truth or reality of something, refusal to acknowledge something unpleasant; And as a term of Psychology: denial is a defense mechanism in which confrontation with a personal problem or with reality is avoided by denying the existence of the problem or reality. over their scammers, not to mention scammers themselves. Our goal is to help you by keeping the threats out.

It is always a disappointment to remove someone from one of our pages or groups who assumes the position from the moment they enter that they are an instant expert. But we have also learned over the years that we can’t help them until they are willing to be helped. It is the age-old saying that you do all that you can do and ignore the rest.

But the truth is we don’t ask you to trust us. Use what you find useful or not, that is up to you. We have a process that we follow. We are government-registeredgovernment-registered It means to be registered with departments or agencies of the government. In the case of SCARS, we are registered with state and federal governments in the United States, Europe & Asia. SCARS is registered as a crime victims' assistance nonprofit with agencies of the Department of Justice and Department of Homeland Security. And is incorporated in the State of Florida as a nonprofit corporation. certified professionals recognized by governments around the world. We literally wrote the recovery program for scam victims and help a 1,000 times more people than any other “group” – almost 1.7 Million victims this year alone (2022).

We are a nonprofit corporation and the only incorporated and government-registered victims’ assistance organization dedicated to cybercrimesCybercrimes Cybercrime is a crime related to technology, computers, and the Internet. Typical cybercrime are performed by a computer against a computer, or by a hacker using software to attack computers or networks. in the world. We have been combating cybercriminals for 32 years (as of 2023). That gives us a different perspective. We are certified cybersecurity, social, and regulatory professionals.

Do Your Homework. Trust The Trustworthy, But Not Because They Say So!

We hope you find this SCARS website beneficial. We hope we can help you avoid scammers and to recover who you were before. We offer support groupsSupport Groups In a support group, members provide each other with various types of help, usually nonprofessional and nonmaterial, for a particular shared, usually burdensome, characteristic, such as romance scams. Members with the same issues can come together for sharing coping strategies, to feel more empowered and for a sense of community. The help may take the form of providing and evaluating relevant information, relating personal experiences, listening to and accepting others' experiences, providing sympathetic understanding and establishing social networks. A support group may also work to inform the public or engage in advocacy. They can be supervised or not. SCARS support groups are moderated by the SCARS Team and or volunteers. if you feel you need help. But if not, that’s ok too – we will wish you well. To join one of our support & recovery groups please visit support.AgainstScams.org

Just remember that it is your duty to be watchful and thoughtful and cautious in everything you do online. Because somebody always wants something, either your money or your loyalty or your time. Be sure you choose wisely.