Scaachi Koul
Appearances
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
Wow. So we're talking a lot about family obligation. And I was really shocked when Josh agrees to go into the compound after Max, even after he learns about what the circumstances are. Why does Josh go in?
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
It's so good to be with you today. I'm so glad to be here. Okay, so we're just going to start with the obvious. How did you find this story?
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
It just seems like everything is set up to be the perfect circumstance for Dev to take advantage of these people. Like, he can use Charlie's brother and then her brothers as leverage to keep Charlie doing what he wants. It's so evil. Yeah, 100%.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
There are a lot of horrific endings in this story, including about Doge. But one of the scariest ones is the revelation that Charlie's identity is still being used by other recruiters. I need to know how Charlie is doing now.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
From Wondery, this is a special episode of Scam Factory. I'm Sachi Cole, one of the hosts of another Wondery show, Scamfluencers.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
Executive producers are Julia Lowry-Henderson, George Lavender, Marsha Louis, and Jen Sargent for Wondery.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
Well, we have a lot of questions about Charlie. But before we get into it, I'm curious why you wanted to explore the scammer side of these calls. I think they're usually really dominated by stories around like how consumers are impacted and what it means and what happens to us. But no one's always thinking about like who's doing this and why. I think that's really true.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
I would imagine verifying these stories was probably really hard because people get nervous or really anxious about sharing information. But you're also talking about a story that's about scams, people who scam and people who are lying. So how do you determine who to trust, what to trust, and how do you know where to put your faith and what is like undeniably true in this story? Yeah.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
Which is actually pretty similar to the charm offensive that scammers within the Scam Factory use to lure in their victims.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
Right. And we've covered a lot of stories of scammers on our show, but I didn't expect a scam at this scale.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
Yeah, this series has really changed my perspective on these scammers, which is why we're both so excited to have a conversation with Denise Chan, the reporter and host of Scam Factory, to talk about how she found this crazy story, what else she learned reporting on these sophisticated scams, and what these characters have been doing since leaving the Scam Factory. Scam Factory Hi, Denise.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
OK, so at the center of the story is Charlie. And on Scamfluencers, we cover people who are often just straight up awful. But we do have a lot of stories where we can kind of sympathize with the person becoming a scammer, which I think is where Charlie lands. She's a victim. She got scammed. Her brother is in danger. She keeps digging the hole she's in deeper and deeper.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
But at the end of the day, she commits real crimes in order to get what she wants. So I'm curious how you navigated having such a complicated main character. Did your understanding of Charlie change from the first meeting over the course of reporting the story? I feel like your feelings must have changed as you were working on this.
Scam Factory
Factory Tour | 7
So the way that Charlie eventually finds herself out of this trap is through a man named Colonel. And he starts off skeptical of her involvement with the syndicate, but eventually he changes his mind. So what do you think it was about Charlie that made him feel like he could actually trust her?
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
On Scam Factory, we uncover the people who bend the rules, the ones who break them entirely. But sometimes, the biggest deception comes from the very person enforcing the rules. Billy Mitchell wasn't just any gamer. He was a legend, the first person to achieve a perfect score in Pac-Man.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
Well, Sarah, today's story is about what lengths people will go to in order to survive and who they're willing to sell out in order to thrive. That's right. It's time for another Hashtag Girlboss. It's late May 2020, and Priscilla Barbosa is at a park in Los Angeles. She's wearing a short white sundress and a flower crown and standing under a tree of purple blooms.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
Priscilla is in her mid-30s and barely five feet tall. She's Brazilian with long brown hair and lots of curves. And right now, she's gazing up into the eyes of a man named Mario Medrano. A reverend stands between them in a mask. It is the height of the pandemic, after all. And he's here to officiate their wedding. It's an intimate ceremony.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
Priscilla's family is back in Brazil, so she has only one friend with her. And on the groom's side is his girlfriend.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
Well, Sarah, this is not a polycule situation. This whole wedding is actually a sham. Priscilla and Mario actually just met each other. And if all goes well, they'll never have to see each other again after today. Priscilla is in this for a green card, and Mario is in it for $10,000. Among the few guests at the park is a staffer from the sham wedding agency that put Priscilla and Mario together.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
They take photos of the fake couple to document the day. Priscilla FaceTimes her family back home, who seem to go along with the whole charade. And then she heads down to the beach where she snaps a photo and posts it to Instagram. But online, she fails to mention that she's just gotten married. Sarah, can you describe the post for us?
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
the reigning Donkey Kong champion, and a self-appointed guardian of integrity in the video game world, helping to expose players who faked their high scores. But when the documentary King of Kong, A Fistful of Quarters came out, cracks started to form in his carefully built image. The film showed a different side of Mitchell, one that used intimidation and manipulation to maintain his reign.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
And ever since she moved to the States two years ago, she's been posting things like this on Instagram. Glamorous, mysterious images with vaguely inspirational captions that make her life seem perfect, especially to her family and friends back in Brazil. But like so much on social media, the reality is something else entirely. Because just like her marriage, Priscilla's work isn't what it seems.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
She's portraying herself as a successful businesswoman. And she is. But her empire has been built on the backs of undocumented immigrants illegally driving for rideshare companies. She's managed to outsmart some of the biggest companies in the U.S. and the government. And it's given her and her community of undocumented employees a really good life.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
But Priscilla's starting to cross over from helping others to just helping herself. And soon, her picture-perfect American story will meet cold, hard reality. From Wondery, I'm Sachi Cole. And I'm Sarah Hagee. And this is Scamfluencers. Priscilla Barbosa began scamming when she came to the U.S., but it wasn't out of greed. It was out of survival.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
Priscilla figured out how to game popular apps like Lyft, Uber, and DoorDash. And then she set out to share the wealth, earning a reputation in Boston's Brazilian community as a modern-day Robin Hood. But as her business grew, Priscilla bought into her own hype and crossed over from sympathetic scammer to ruthless capitalist. This is Priscilla Barbosa, the rideshare Robin Hood.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
Listen to scamfluencers early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
And when accusations surfaced that some of his own Donkey Kong scores were achieved using edited footage, the gaming world turned on its king. Was Billy Mitchell a true champion? Or was he playing a different kind of game? I'm about to play a clip from Scamfluencers. Follow Scamfluencers on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
Like the people in Scam Factory, today's scammer also moved to a new country for the promise of a better life, but she actually worked her way up to running an illegal rideshare empire. She was giving immigrants like her a chance to make a living, but it wasn't without risk, both for her workers and for their customers.
Scam Factory
What To Listen To Next: Scamfluencers
We sometimes have scammers on this show who we empathize with because at least at the beginning, their hearts are in the right place.