Earlier in the Age of Electronic Theft and Fraud, fake grandchildren had their moment. Nearly always male, he might be Tom, Dick, Gabriel, or Jose.  He might be in jail, or an emergency room, or a broken car on a dangerous road. Please, Grandma, he would sob in print or over the phone, on his only permissible call, please send money. Please save me. Now! 

The Desperate Grandsons (DGs) are still slinking around. One called me “from Europe” only a few weeks ago. However, they seem like unsophisticated relics from a more innocent period in the Age of Electronic Theft and Fraud. My experiences in our current age are significantly common, differing only in their particulars from those of millions of other people. For example, recently I was deluged with upbeat notices from USPS.  They claimed to need more information from me in order to deliver a package now in the warehouse. If I would give my correct address and enable a temptingly low $.30 to be put on my credit card, my package would be mine. The messengers signed off by blithely wished me a happy day. 

Far more dismaying was a hacking of a “support service provider” at TIAA, or, to speak in current  lingo, a “cybersecurity incident.” TIAA is a huge financial services firm that specializes in funding retirements. Among its clients are 12,000 non-profit institutions, many of them educational. It has $1.3 trillion in total assets under its management. Its individual customers add up to 4.7 million— including me.

I count on TIAA, as I do Medicare, for security in my dotage. I hope for wise investments, prudent counsellors, and competent administration. I was let down when I got a letter addressing “Dear Catharine Stimpson,” dated March 11, 2024, about a “Security Incident— Credit Monitoring.” I knew the situation was serious because the company president signed the letter. One of those “cybersecurity incidents” had occurred. Some “data may have been impacted”— possibly my name, or my annuity contract number, or some other element of my TIAA identity.

Let down, but not surprised. Over the past years, I have gotten similar letters from large corporations with which I am either reasonably engaged or frustratingly entangled— including an earlier notice from TIAA.  Their rhetoric all seems to come from the same manual of crisis management, a smoothie of regret, promises of transparency, mitigation, and a devotion to “an abundance of caution.”

 The TIAA letter admits immediately that a “cybersecurity incident” has occurred. Then, the letter reassures the reader, as quickly as possible, that the faulty system has been “disabled,” shut down, put out of commission. Next, an “e-discovery firm” is investigating what “data was impacted” and whose.  For example, it will find out if it was my “life insurance policy number” that is now in mischievous or dangerous hands. Finally, TIAA is offering me, “at no cost” for two years, access to highly reputable firms that will help me monitor “indicators of potential fraud or identity theft.” I was also warned to self-review my “credit reports and account statements” for the next two years.

I count myself fortunate. TIAA was apologetic and promised to help me and others in its wide band of customers to repair what damage might be out there. 

Less protected from the predations of The Age of Electronic Theft and Fraud are people who are not sheltering under a guilty, hand-washing corporation’s umbrella. Many victims may be isolated. If they discover that they have been preyed upon, and if they are not too ashamed to admit it, such victims can resort to the local police, their bank, or their credit card companies.

However, their reports may be too late. The population of Southold, NY is now a little under 7000 people. Our local paper has a section called “The Police Blotter,” which the Suffolk Security Systems sponsors. Like others, I read it avidly. It nearly always has at least one terse narrative about hacks, scams, and identity theft. Last fall, for example, the “Police Blotter” had eight items. Two were about people and their cars: one driver had been failing to maintain her lane, apparently because she was eating too gluttonously while at the wheel; the second driver had an accident, apparently because he was drunk.

The other six items all focused on electronic fraud and identity theft. The victims were equally divided between men and women. Some victims suffered “no financial loss” or less than $1000.00. But other losses were in the tens of thousands, the worst $70.000. A woman had listened to a siren song from “Norton Antivirus.” The “Police Blotter’s” final words were, “The woman’s bank told her the transactions could not be stopped in time.”  

Out there: during the worst of COVID and even now, part of the psychic dislocation many people felt was was never knowing exactly where the virus might be, only that it demonstrably was out there. Fraud and theft in the Electronic Age are as demonstrably out there. But where? The man at the end of the phone asking sweetly and yet insistently for money to be sent to Hong Kong might be any place but Hong Kong. He might even be in a neighboring village.  

I listen to warnings about identity theft. I try to be careful when an apparent predator comes calling. However, even the most careful amongst us can make a mistake and open that bad attachment. We have no COVID test for electronic thieves and fraud-mongers. No little pink line shows up when one is trying to move from out there to in here.

We can only be certain that predators are out there and that anyone of us, no matter how computer literate, might be hapless or foolish or momentarily careless prey.  Adding cruelly to the epidemic of disinformation, this uncertainty is another cause of the suspicions, paranoia, and angers of our moment.