OCTOBER 10 — Which country is Scam Central? Hard to tell since underreporting — out of shame, despair or ignorance — is rife anywhere in the world.

Lately, our government raised multiple alerts about the uptick of scams to suggest Malaysia may verily sit in the higher tiers.

As scams are localised, probably scammers and the scammed share nationality. Live side by side. Love thy neighbour, eh?

My fascination compounded reading the claim that US$12.8 billion (RM55 billion) or three per cent of our GDP was lost to scams.

The other way to look at this alarming number is that the scam industry is at least a top 20 employer in Malaysia. Just the past seven days this website posted seven scam related news reports with the majority above the RM100,000 total.

The government taking the idiom “a fool and his money are soon parted” to heart asks the rakyat to temper their gullibility — saying “not be foolish” understandably is too much on the people’s nose.

More math, please

Mothers are not wrong to ask their children to count their money twice when they begin to transact without adult supervision.

Because counting matters a lot.

Talking about numerical competency, some political pundits maintain that the rakyat were less upset that Najib Razak received RM2.6 billion in his account rather than RM260 million because many felt the latter is much more than the former.

This week the education minister revealed 122,000 Standard One students cannot read, write and count six months into their first school year.

It gets a bit scarier as only 448,000 students enrolled this year, meaning more than one in four of these pupils lack the minimum.

Like a house, it only gets weaker with a substandard foundation.

A future generation of scam-free Malaysians is only guaranteed by a culture of evidence-based reasoning among our young. Which is embodied in maths and science. Which rejects outrageous tall claims and fictitious solutions as they lack evidence.

Treat math like Christopher Walken’s cowbell in the SNL Blue Oyster Cult inspired sketch. For every problem, the answer is, “more math”.

Down blind authority, up reasoning

People get scared easily in Malaysia. Can you blame them?

The wider opinion among Malaysians is that they can be approached, accosted, interviewed, arrested, locked up pending an arraignment or go missing. Half the country has a living memory of seeing our prime minister dragged out of his house in 1998 by armed cops in masks.

Therefore, the fear is real.

The prime minister today assures all that this is a land of law and order but public perception is far behind.

Perhaps measures to balance the power dynamics, and include more explicit rights to citizens and curtail unfortunate actions like serial remand, can tone down the masses’ collective apprehension.

How is that related to scams?

Conditioned to comply with those who display authority and aggression has turned Malaysians in general into perfect targets for con artists.

They somehow put the onus on themselves to accept authority rather than question it.

To ask them to question potential scammers is to also ask them to exhibit a level of scrutiny when any person approaches them by whichever means.

Which probably means asking all law enforcement officers to present their credentials when they are to interact. To go the extra mile to call the station or department to ascertain if the said person is who they say.

Authority on one side of the coin means scepticism is on the other side. The other tool to fight scams.

If authority needs to be rationalised by policy-makers, to be qualified and suitable, and not let state agents have a free hand and unfettered powers, then scepticism must be equally promoted.

Scepticism in plain language is to doubt. A dose of it is imperative.

If Malaysians lack decent scepticism averages it may be down to the fantastical past all of us have lived through the past two decades.

A time where contracts were handed down and wealth created overnight thanks to political connections. Pakatan Harapan politicians brought issue after issue up since the 2000s, these travesties of justice and demanded action.

While corrections of the past remain outstanding, regular rakyat know that the right connections can give them impossible returns or rewards. Even if the whole matter sounds outlandish and preposterous. Because connections trump everything else.

As such, the sceptic muscle atrophies and the opportunist bone develops a swagger.

Technology inches away

Everyone has a throwaway line about AI and its mass effects on society.

For today’s column, it suffices to admit that it is harder to navigate technology and avoid Internet scams.

While a level of technical know-how is necessary to circumvent pitfalls, to not rush into an unnecessary step just to play along is even more vital.

Our commonsense can dominate our thinking if we are not overwhelmed by our technological inadequacies. To hesitate when necessary.

Undoubtedly, technology marches on and with growing strides.

However, as security experts would point out, the weakness often is human rather than machine.

Over the years many younger colleagues claim identity theft when others take over their social media account. While at the same time, I observe them logging into various PCs in the office and not logging out. And also sharing their passwords with other colleagues, just so it is easier.

Again, technology is a challenge, and while all of us learn the minimums to keep up and be functional, never underestimate the value of scepticism to protect oneself in today’s environment.

Words and more words

What does not work is the usual reminder from ministers that scams are bad. No matter how many times it is repeated. Societal change is required to scam-proof Malaysia.

For people mired in scams, they are deep in fear, confusion or greed. They tend to forget government brochures or TV ads at those junctures.

It’s low efficacy to campaign on scams, as to appear to care about the problem but to not address the underlying reasons why Malaysians are susceptible to scams.

That if they count better, question authority, maintain a degree of scepticism and not lose their confidence and experience when confronting technology, they have better than a fair chance to defeat scams.

Those are changes in attitude to education, power dynamics, trust development and self-belief.

It’s the more circuitous path but the right path, nevertheless. If smashing the spectre of scams is the objective.

* This is the personal opinion of the columnist.