Reading. Variant 8

Read the text on the next page. Match the sentences a–g to the gaps 1–5. There are two extra sentences.

a In order to report the crime, the victim must confess their own guilt, and not surprisingly, they are not keen to do so.

b Only after the two had left did he realise that he had been taken in and his necklace stolen.

c And of course, it does not help that most people can’t tell a fake badge from a real one.

d Most policemen help victims and catch fraudsters and criminals.

e However, just as she was about to pay for it, a policeman came in and arrested her.

f First, the crime was carried out very quickly before he had time to think about what had happened.

The psychology of tricking people

Why is it so easy to trick people out of their money and possessions? According to psychologists, it is not because the victims are stupid. It is because criminals have known for centuries how to exploit human nature and human weakness.

Take a recent scam* shown on a British TV programme. In the scam, a woman went into a jeweller’s to buy an expensive necklace.

1______   He told the jeweller that the woman was a con artist and claimed that she was going to pay for the necklace with counterfeit money. The jeweller was delighted to have been saved and when the police offi cer asked him to hand over the necklace as evidence, he did so. However, what the jeweller did not know was that the offi cer was a con artist himself and the woman was his accomplice.

2______  

Why was the jeweller tricked so easily?

3____   More importantly, it was based on what psychologists call the ‘social compliance principle’. In other words, we tend to obey people in authority because this is what we have been taught to do from an early age. So, for example, if someone says they are a police offi cer and shows us a badge, we believe them and do what they say. 4____  

Another way of tricking people relies on what has been called the ‘dishonesty principle’. The criminal involves victims in something illegal and then tricks them. 5 _______   _An example of this type of scam was the Nigerian email scam. In this now-famous scam, victims received an email asking for help to transfer money out of the country. The victims sent the fraudster money to cover expenses and allowed him to use their bank account. In return, they were promised their money back plus a percentage of the money being transferred. The victims usually realised that this was in fact money-laundering, which is illegal. However, they were attracted to the idea of gain. Of course, they never got their money back.

So what is the best way to avoid being tricked? Basically, we should use our common sense: if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is!

Glossary:

* scam = getting money or goods from people by tricking them

* fraudster = a person who commits fraud

* money-laundering = making money

Read the text again. Write true, false or write (?) if there is no information.

1 According to the text, people are usually conned because they are stupid.      

Read the text again. Write true, false or write (?) if there is no information.

2 In the jewellery shop scam, the woman and the police officer were working together to con the jeweller.