I Got Phished Out Today By a Fake GCash Notification

It didn't help that I had a bad night of aching muscles and earache. I woke up in the morning finding an email from "GCash" which looked legitimate. What happened was that I lost some money in my GCash wallet. Fortunately, it wasn't my life savings compared to the loss of Tong Zou--a Chinese-Canadian who lost it all during the rise of Quadriga-CX. I won't disclose any amount of money in my personal accounts for confidential reasons. What I'm going to write right now is a warning. Granted, I'm not tech-savvy so I wasn't too aware of phishing. I did reject a couple of phishing such as those too good to be true employment.

However, I wasn't so wise today and ended up "verifying" my account and lost the money I put in the GCash wallet set aside to pay for groceries. The official GCash site or the application is where transactions should be done. I even forgot that the MPIN and the OTP should be kept personal. I had to change my MPIN because of that. Besides, what was even worse was that I failed to see the anatomy was that while it looked legitimate--the email wasn't. That's what I failed to consider during the time I was emotionally and physically tired. I should've taken rest days when I should've.

This is the sad reality we need to face. Some of my peers (I won't disclose their names) were scammed too. There's always the fear of temporary maintenance and the like. Obviously, what scammers do is appeal to emotions. How I lost money last 2012 was because the scammer appealed to my emotions. After some time, I fell to it (again) after I woke up feeling so bad. I tend to forget the warning not to do any important transactions when not in the mood. It's like don't drive when you're too angry or drunk. I tried having a car accident near one of my favorite restaurants because I felt so bad.

What I did was screenshot the transaction. The number where the money was sent was there. There are some financial institution employees that want to feed their own pockets. You can compare them to extortioners at the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR). If dishonest tax mappers should be reported then so should employees who are like that. Then again, some people have targeted even the nobody officers who aren't megastars in the financial world. It seems these phishers will target anyone who has money even if the person isn't a billionaire. A wrong assumption I had was that because I wasn't a big-time rich guy I wouldn't be targeted. I tend to make that assumption way too many times. Today was indeed a hard lesson. Even a friend of mine who was a "low-level worker" was even targeted--she was someone who's struggling financially yet she was even targeted. These phishers are as heartless as robbers who would even rob the barely-earning working class!

Like Tong Zou in the documentary Trust No One: Hunt for the Crypto King--I'm here to send a warning since some people are still unaware. Just because I'm an MBA graduate doesn't mean I'm invincible. I tend to think my graduate degree makes me better. It doesn't if I just use it as a shield against criticism. In fact, some people who got scammed by Ponzi schemes were MBA students too. The cybercrime world is a very deep and dark world. Cryptocurrency is something that might sooner or later appeal to some who rejected it. I had to unsubscribe from some financial channels because of their recommendation of cryptocurrency. This no is no different--a scam is a scam.

COMMUNIST Vietnam Has Defeated DEMOCRATIC Philippines Again This 2025

Cổng thông tin Trung ương Đoàn TNCS Hồ Chí Minh A few days ago, I wrote about warning Filipinos that they shouldn't wait for more unmitigated typhoon disasters, before realizing that the Filipino First Policy isn't working ! There's a statement that says, "Just because being tanga (inattentive) is libre (free), doesn't mean you should be tanga!" Analyzing the different policies: why policies matter I found a Business World article, written by Cesar Polvorosa, Jr., on my Facebook news feed discussing the Vietnamese economy . In fact, it would be better to share some hard truths that the article offers about what really went wrong with the democratic Philippines compared to Communist Vietnam : DIVERGENT ECONOMIC MODELS Vietnam pursued an export-oriented manufacturing strategy which has proven significantly more successful over the past half century than the Philippines’ service-heavy, remittances-dependent model . Export performance alone tells a compe...

The OFW Working Abroad and Their Family on Christmas

It's a few days before Christmas. I don't like December because of heavy traffic, some people prefer Christmas shopping at the last minute (since procrastination is a common habit in the Philippines), the stress of year-end work, and December is the end of the year's cycle. I decided to write this entry. There's nothing wrong with celebrating Christmas or having a good time. The problem comes when one celebrates beyond one's means (read here ). That means having extravagant Christmas parties that require a music band that one can't afford, inviting the whole village, etc. when one can't afford it. Speaking of which, these incidents remind me of OFW families. I remember a study presented at the University of San Carlos. If I remember correctly, it was done by accounting students. It was a study showing the spending habits of OFW families. Outstanding Filipinos Worldwide Facebook Page Here's a meme on Facebook that I found. For the sake of non-Tagalog spea...

Having the BADLY NEEDED Tenacity to Hold My PSEi Related Investments During INEVITABLE Paper Losses

I decided to do a portfolio review, especially because Christmas to New Year is around the corner . I thought about checking my AXA Chinese Tycoon Fund. For the sake of confidentiality , I wouldn't give out the exact loss. I was tempted to sell my AXA Chinese Tycoon Fund (which was at a paper loss , not an actual loss) and go for cryptocurrency . However, after looking at the ghost of Quadriga-CX Crypto Scam made I said, "I need to stick to what Warren Buffett said about the stock market." Buffett's advice doesn't require an MBA or even a PhD in business administration to understand them. Instead, I was looking at these lessons that Buffett such as: If I'm not willing to open to own a stock for 10 minutes, I shouldn't think of owning it for ten years! Definitely no day trading for me! The stock market is a device that transfers money from impatient people to patient people. I have to be more patient as the stock market inevitably corrects itself, unless t...

External Validations, like Masters and Doctorate, Mean NOTHING with a LOUSY Education System

I have the tendency to use my MBA as a license to avoid criticism. It's a real problem that some people use their credentials and/or academic achievements to try and win an argument. One incident I wrote about was Rep. Raoul Abellar Manuel flexing his "smarts" by using his cum laude degree to win the argument . It was all about how I would often say, "You're the moron because I have the MBA and you don't." There are times I felt like taking an MBA would make up for my "moral shortcomings" during high school when I was barely passing (and the passing rate was 80% , which is rather high), that I wasn't having honors, and that there was this saying, " Thou grades shalt determine thy future! " That, of course, has led to the reality where cheating is prevalent . I wanted to make a review. I took my MBA in 2011 and graduated in 2014. I always felt that the MBA program was what I needed to become "invincible". It was also at ...

Economics 101: Pre-Colonial Philippine Natives Already Did Business with Foreigners

Art by Hugo Yunzon It's finally August or Buwan Ng Wika (Month of the Language), though it may be better to call it Buwan Ng Kultura (Month of the Culture). Buwan Ng Wika programs tend to focus more on the uniqueness of several types of Filipino people. What I recall back in my high school days (late 1990s) is how I was asked to play an "American" in a Buwan Ng Wika program. There were also other people asked to portray the Chinese traders, Arab traders, Indian traders, and the Japanese occupation. It would be good to do a review of the pre-colonial Philippines. The name Philippines was derived from the Spanish king, King Philip. Back then, the natives were called Indios which sounds very similar to Indonesia . Yes, most Filipinos are either Malay or Indo. A look at the Indonesians and Malaysians would have one mistake them for Filipinos. A note is that the Chinese population there usually speaks Hokkien. From Purdue Filpino --here's some basic information about Fili...

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