#1337 – The Expat Files: AI Fraud, Bank Scams, Prenups, and Plan B

Automatically transcribed from the original recording; names and wording may contain errors.

[00:00] South of the border down Mexico way That's where I fell in love when the stars above came out to play and now as I wonder Hello there all you ex-pad wannabes. I'm Johnny Mueller and you're listening to the expat files living in Latin America The show that tells you just what it's like to live work play and or retire down here in Latin America It's a mix of the good the bad the ugly and the great and it's all right here. So let's get started Hey, you want to hear something really scary as if we need something else to scare the hell out of us You know, I basically come from a culture of nerds and all my nerd buddies keep me informed. I'm what's happening in the nerd world You know the nerd news that doesn't hit the lame stream media, you know news for nerds

[00:51] On that note, I've been wondering ever since way back in engineering school Why are there so many guy nerds and so few women nerds? I think in my engineering class there were two girls out of 50 Anyway back to nerd news. Yep. There are magazines and websites devoted to that stuff You know stuff that wouldn't capture the attention of the rest of the world just too boring for them to look at anyway One of my true blue old-school nerd buddies just sent me a disturbing email He said open AI, you know the chat GPT guys They just sent him a message Concerning a brand new AI development called a voice engine. Have you heard of that? Well, if you haven't you will and it's supposed to come out this week It's a new AI technology where now this new AI app can basically take 15 seconds of anyone's voice and

[01:42] 100% cloned it making any word constructs or phrases indistinguishable from the original human voice it's cloned all that just by sampling 15 Seconds of your voice and of course if you've got any kind of app at all, you've got your voice out there So anyway, my buddy says in their press release They're saying you should take this news as a warning because it can be used to steal from you or drain your bank accounts Anyway, the company open AI who's created this have sent out this pre-release notice so that banks Have time to change their security protocols So for example, if you lose your credit card You have to call your bank because you can't remember your password or pin number What do you do you call that 800 number on the back of your credit card, right and you talk to someone

[02:32] Well very rapidly that's gonna become a thing of the past Anyway from now on the use of your voice to try to solve a problem with banks customer service Will be upon release of this app in four days. No longer valid or secure In other words, the nerd community's got the warning already and the banks are getting the warning in the first world slowly But surely I'm sure they won't fully get on board for days if not weeks So look out AI is coming and drastic changes are coming with it Meanwhile down here in Latin America where lag time reigns supreme Where maybe only one out of 25 or one out of 50 Latin Americans has ever even heard of AI That voice clone problem should scare the crap out of people But it's not not unless it shows up as a warning on tik-tok

[03:19] But it won't not until millions have been scammed. It's not in the news. No one's getting any warnings about it on their phones Nobody knows and nobody cares but those bad boys out there who know how to hack Man, it's gonna be open season for a new kind of bank and credit card fraud. Just you watch Hell Latinos live on an insta crap and tik-tok if the news is not popping up there. It's a hundred percent off their radar So as soon as I got the news the first thing I thought of Wow this is gonna screw tons of people here in Latin America and Because of the ease of getting a fake license or identity card identity fraud is rampant in previous shows You heard me mention how you could get a fake driver's license down here That's almost perfect for around a hundred bucks Anyway, what I'm saying is if you bank down here in Latin America

[04:07] You better look at your statements carefully because for one it'll take the banks months maybe even years to get on board Always remember Latin American people run on manana time and Latin American businesses run on lag time Down here most banks still run their show like banks ran theirs in the States in the 1990s By the way, just to give you an idea of the state of banking here in Latin America You know right in the middle of covet a gringo friend of mine had $7,000 transferred from his bank up in the States to one down here in Latin America though as a caveat here It's not one of the Latin American banks that I would personally have recommended You know at my expat insider seminars We do recommend a few highly secure banks that have been around more than 50 years That's a prerequisite of stability for any bank here in Latin America

[04:55] Like for example in Guatemala There are two or three banks that we recommend out of a possible 20 and that's true of any Latin American country There are two or three banks that are solid have been around many many years And lots of banks that haven't been around long and yet don't know whether they're stable or not In any Latin American country. There are at least ten banks. So what do you do pick a name out of a hat? There are always a couple of really solid ones But how would a gringo expat know that especially if you didn't speak any Spanish? Of course, we talk a lot about that at our expat insider seminars By the way, no matter what Latin American country you're in the easiest way to find out the top bank or two Just ask your lawyer where he banks your local Latin lawyer will have the scoop on the stability of all the local banks

[05:41] In any case my gringo friend used one of the non-recommended banks to move some money down Well, guess what? It landed in his account and within half an hour Disappeared completely that happened right in the middle of Covid where banking hours were limited and some banks were even closed Well, he immediately went down to his bank got a printout of the movements of that day Sure enough. It was right there in black and white the seven grand landed and got immediately transferred to one of the other banks in the city Well, guess what happened that customer service ladies said it looked like a legitimate transfer all was in order He said wait a minute. Wait a minute. Show me the paperwork Show me who ordered that transfer where I signed off on it because I didn't and so she called the bank's fraud department

[06:29] Located at one of the other branches in the city. He left it in her hands days went by he kept calling She kept saying they were working on it and after about two weeks He stormed into the bank and confronted her in person again. It's still no resolution at all She said these things take time. We're working on it He said this is unacceptable. Where's my money? I want to know who you're dealing with down at the fraud department Give me a name. I'm going down there myself She said oh, that's impossible. You could talk to him by phone, but you can't go to the office It's been closed because of Covid. She said the fraud department and lots of banking departments are working from home now By the way, he said the customer service rep was very nice and happy But still there were times he wanted to kick her teeth in

[07:16] Oh, and I forgot to tell you at least his gringo could speak some Spanish Imagine how all of that would have gone down if he only spoke English all the people he'd spoken to about it so far Spoke Spanish no English. So anyway, he got the phone number and email the person working on his case now by this time almost a month had Passed he got on the phone with one of the banks fraud ladies He said look you have the bank transfer information the name of the account name of the bank the name of the person or business Whatever where the money got transferred to you know, all that why aren't you going after these people? She said we have our policies and our protocol. He said give me that information. I'll go after him She said under bank privacy laws. I'm not allowed to give that information to you he said you mean you're protecting the thief and not the victim and

[08:03] He blew his time with seven grand of his being transferred to another account He couldn't even get her to reveal and she had that information right in front of her She said these things take time The only thing left to do was wait and if he was impatient He could file a complaint with the superintendent of banks the authority of last resort So she sent him a form he filled the whole thing out in Spanish wrote the whole story out file the complaint with the superintendency of banks that was three years ago and in that three years, you can't imagine how many times he phoned up that government office and each time got switched to a different person a Person unfamiliar with his story So he had to recount the whole thing again on the phone before even getting to the right questions And now three years later when he goes online to check his case

[08:52] At least they gave him a case number. He could check online Anyway, he gets a pop-up window that says your case is under investigation Please be patient. So anyway after three years lots of grief aggravation and hand-wringing My gringo friend thinks he knows what happened Right around that time in the middle of covid, you know, a lot of banks change their rules about showing up and doing banking. So most banks including his Had a big push on phone apps doing banking online on your phone as most people including you do your banking right now on your phone Right, by the way, I have not or never have done any kind of banking on my phone I never even checked my account by phone nor have I ever ordered an item like from Amazon on my phone

[09:40] The reason why I mentioned this is because online banking on your phone though Very convenient has opened up a whole new world of fraud that did not exist before about 2005 I'm sure you've heard cases of friends and relatives or you've read articles up in the states about huge data breaches and banking hacks It's worth thousands of customer deaths have been stolen When you read about that stuff, are you worried or just numb to it since it happened so often? Well, imagine down here in Latin America with lag time in effect How easy it would be for even a mediocre hacker to steal reams of data and recall kinds of habit All you need is one dishonest or pissed off bank employee with access to the customer files Yep, hackers are cleaning up here in Latin America. It's a golden age for hackers

[10:28] Especially when the average bank employee only makes a little over minimum wage like 300 bucks a month How tempted would you be if a hacker approached you with a scheme? And now with open AI's voice clone technology where you only need 15 seconds of someone's voice to completely clone it We're looking at chapter 2 bank fraud on steroids. So anyway in the end my friend not only lost 7,000 bucks He also lost countless hours of his time standing in line Being put on hold for hours and hours forced to listen to Latin American music Etc. Etc. Oh, and he tells me he has no hope of ever getting that seven grand back Even though he knows if he was ever given the actual transfer that's himself which by the way, his own bank still hasn't given him at least be able to go to the bank where the money landed an

[11:14] Idiot could root it out. He says oh and by the way, if you think this running gag of a terrible experience Would have completely soured my friend on Latin America. You'd be wrong The silver lining of the story is that while he was waiting in line at that bank one day He met the Latina girl of his dreams They've been together a year and a half now and I asked him if that made up for the $7,000 loss He said my divorce lawyer up in the States cost me more than 7k Yeah, he'd been through the divorce ring her up in the States. Another reason why he's living down here in Latin America All right, speaking of love romance meeting and dating and meeting the guy girl or her math or daddy your dreams comes this email from Cal CaL dear Johnny in a past show you talk about prenaps and how in Latin America

[12:03] They're sort of baked into the marriage contract. In other words. Yes split in half only what you obtained after the marriage date By the way, Cal's from Michigan. He says Johnny when I was a young software engineer I worked under an older guy a project engineer who went through a very bad divorce and Every time the subject of love and romance came up. He said, you know what instead of getting married Why don't you just find a woman that hates your guts buy her a house and give her a half of your money? Cuz half the time he said that's how it's gonna turn out. Well, Johnny obviously for him It was sour grapes, but by the time I was 26, I did make a shit ton of money I met a beautiful girl. I asked her for a prenep. She moved out of my house two days later

[12:50] That decision Johnny most likely saved my life. He says Cal says my brother's a lawyer and he told me never to sign a contract where the other party benefits from breaking it and you don't So anyway, he says I thought that I'd lost the love of my life But a few years later when I was 30, I met an insanely beautiful girl and we become great friends I thought she could be the love of my life, but I put on the brakes right away. She is very high maintenance Anyway, he says early in our friendship. I asked her what she thought of preneps She gave me the cliche modern first world American woman response She said if he was a prenep, then he's already planning for the marriage to end. She said that's a bad start I'd never go for it

[13:35] Anyway, Johnny, here's the thing when I first met her she was making around 40,000 bucks a year now three years later She makes a hundred and fifty K a year. Anyway, he says just a couple of weeks ago at a company party I asked her that hypothetical prenep question again this time though. I flipped the terms on her I said what happens if you meet the guy of your dreams and he only makes a third of your income And I made it clear to her that if she divorces that guy her retirement money would be half his She responded by saying I guess I'd be open to a prenep and I said to her my my how the tables turn when You've got the dough and he doesn't then Cal says, you know, Johnny Even if I find the woman of my dreams and she's richer than me. I'll still ask for a prenep

[14:22] I don't care about her money as long as I get to keep my spider-man comics and my beer can collection Then he says Johnny. I told you my brother's a lawyer. Well, I have another brother who's blue collar He worked for the same company for 13 years He's told me some of the stories of the guys he worked with like for example He said three of the guys at his plant killed themselves because the wife was cheating They got a divorce. She was awarded half the house and half his pension that's 25 years of working saving and a paid-off house gone with the wind and Johnny he says all of us know of men friends acquaintances that haven't killed themselves But are going through the same kind of hell some just drink and do drugs because they're miserable and depressed all the time

[15:07] He says Johnny. I know no matter how great a woman is if you ask her for a prenep You're treading on thin ice then he says, you know, Johnny. I've never heard an older man. Tell me, you know what kid You should get married But you know what? I've lost count of the times an older guy a more experienced guy Has given me advice saying something like, you know kid if you're smart, you'll never get married Funny how old guys have said that to me many times go ahead and live together But if you get married you marry two people her and the state All right, speaking of nerds and engineers and the problems they have with women and dating. Here's an email from Billy B He says dear Johnny. I'm normally an upbeat and positive person, but recently I can't help being depressed

[15:57] I'm nearly ready to throw in the towel and come on down to Latin America permanently. Here's my story I'm a specialist an engineer at HP I've worked 15 years for HP in Texas and until about three years ago. I never heard of a diversity hire Was a new one on me three years ago. If you'd have asked me to define diversity hire I'd have failed the test But man did I learn fast? My team now includes two diversity hires and from day one It just rubbed me and many of my 40 something tech buddies the absolute wrong way I Understand if your company has 30 or more employees you have to swallow the diversity hire rules or lose government contracts I say F the government and F the diversity hires

[16:44] But in a way, I guess it's a good thing because it pushed me in a hard way to go for early retirement in my plan Be he says I have an idea for an IT business But I have no desire to try a startup on a US soil F that by the way, John He says no one that's been here more than five years has anything good to say about a diversity hire In fact not long ago on the company bulletin board someone posted this no one knows who but before everyone could read it It disappeared. He says I was able to get a picture of it now read it for you now It's a little poem called said no one ever It starts like this. I hope the person performing surgery on me is a diversity hire said no one ever I

[17:32] Hope the person performing dentistry on me is a diversity hire said no one ever I Hope the person flying this plane is a diversity hire Said no one ever. I hope the person who designed the brakes on my car is a diversity hire Said no one ever and Finally, I hope the person in charge of the nuclear codes is a diversity hire Said no one ever Thanks, Johnny loved the show will be seeing you at your next seminar I'm a Bitcoiner and El Salvador is looking really good to me right now regards Billy B Okay, since we're talking about engineers and nerds right now Here's an email from Chauncey s is that Chauncey Chauncey CHA UNC

[18:24] Let's see. I remember two Chaunceys Chauncey from Tennessee tuxedo and Chauncey Gardner You know played by Peter Sellers in that movie being there have you seen that one not a lot of Chaunceys out there or maybe it's a French Chauncey or Chaunce as usual. I'll paraphrase this a bit. He says. Hey, Johnny recently discovered your show and I am binge listening backwards in time He says a while back you read emails from Bitcoin Boomer and a conversation about Google intelligence tests and the subject of Bitcoin It brought to mind my first experience with engineers electrical engineers to be precise You see I lived in a frat house in college Yep, just like you'd imagine a house full of young guys barely passing classes and hosting a couple of keggers every weekend

[19:13] Just trying to work our way through the sorority sisters without causing too much trauma Anyway, he said the frat system sometimes called the Greek system Although I don't know why they call it that except we learned Greek Alphabets and the fraternities and sororities usually have Greek letters for names that said the frat system on a college campus is pretty tight You're in or you're out everyone knows everyone and if you're not in a fraternity or sorority then you're sort of GDI Goddamn independent or just SOL the status lines and sororities anyway were well-drawn We could invite GDI ladies to a party, but the sorority gals definitely did not appreciate that Until we told him it was a recruiting strategy to help them find new members

[20:00] Then he says as well known throughout history whether you're in a fraternity or not Young guys don't want to go to parties where there's just a bunch of other guys sitting around. We call them sausage parties Though maybe things are different now in the woke Non-binary world and the sausages could identify as anything they want. No, thanks glad I'm not in college these days now He says that one particular frat house party I answered the front door to a group of a half dozen of the geekiest button-up shirted Taped glass nerds you can imagine never seen those guys before in my life, but it turned out they were from the electrical engineering frat Now Johnny, you probably know how a kegger works You buy a plastic glass for five bucks or whatever the current rate is then you drink your fill from the keg

[20:47] Well, you know those electrical engineers tried to do an end-run around that by bringing their own German beer steins You know the tall ceramic ones with flip lids. Well, we set them straight right away They coughed up the five bucks and we let them in Needless to say they stuck out like those guys in revenge of the nerds now one good thing about letting those nerds into the party They posed absolutely no threat as rivals to even the homeliest of sorority girls Like you said Johnny young women are not interested in brains on men at that age It's all about the muscles and the coolness factor Now after that when I got out of school and I had to work I worked with engineers mostly civil engineers But mechanical and electrical too For my part I helped them with the marketing to win projects and coach them on presentations nerd presentations can be pretty dry

[21:34] Anyways as engineers tend to be introverted and thoughtful not every engineer, but it's a pretty good generalization Anyhow much more introverted then their other professional counterparts like architects And now these days when I think back to that strange little group of electrical engineer nerds Standing on the doorstep of Alpha Delta Gamma frat house Holding up their stupid beer steins. I Appreciate as introverts how difficult that must have been for them that took some guts just to show up Johnny I bet you're right ten years out of college. They're making tons of money which can make even the most unpolished nerd Irresistible to women case in point Jeff Bezos. Anyway, Johnny, you're certainly making me think hard about that plan B signed chance or Chauncey or Chauncey

[22:22] P.s. Johnny. I got carried away with that engineering story, and I didn't ask my question What's your take on traveling slowly through Latin America as opposed to focusing on permanent residency right away? Alright, mr. See me Johnny here I think what you mean by the quote slow travel method is to just kind of visit and poke around a few different Latin American countries Until deciding which one you like best and then go for residency That method could take years You could call that backpacker style because that's what lots of them do They visit many many Latin American countries over the years and in the end they generally home in on a favorite Here's my take mr. See we're in very uncertain times now and the rules and regs are changing rapidly

[23:08] so I Suggest you apply for permanent residency in the Latin country of your choice as fast as possible Because you see the rules and regs regarding such things never get looser They always tighten up used to be for example in many Latin American countries You only had to be in the country one day a year to maintain that permanent residency Then after keeping that permanent residency in good standing after three to five years Then you apply for passport and nationality Which is the ultimate goal? You know because anything could happen with your u.s. Passport Hell if you somehow get behind on your child support the feds have the right to put a block on your passport Then you can't travel outside the country and don't forget little things like that could show up on your FBI Report which you will need to go for permanent residency

[23:55] And if there's any kind of smudge or stain on your FBI report most Latin American countries will reject your residency application The whole point is to get your ass and your assets out of the first world while you still can Even if your plan B only involves having an escape route in case of a greater disaster up by where you live Bigger and better disasters will come you know they're coming out right in the clocks ticking Can't you see there are just so many catastrophic tipping points just pick one how about another false flag plague? I bet you still got a box or two of useless masks hanging around and you're gonna need them Oh, and what you gonna do if someday you find out the feds force you to convert all your IRAs and 401ks into t-bills You know the US is beyond bankrupt and they've been floating that idea around for some time now other countries have done it

[24:44] you know again the plan is to get at least one foot planted in a country in Latin America as They say move to a place or get a foot in the door to a place that treats you best Because certainly you know or maybe you just don't want to admit your own country treats you badly like a piece of shit Just look at the news feeds your government and your politicians treat illegal aliens and criminals better than they treat their own citizens Somehow they haven't got a dime to clean up America's big cities Which have become sewers, but they've got hundreds of billions to send to Ukraine I mean look Zelensky's already got a dozen or so multi-million dollar mansions. She's got one in Florida Oh, but I'm sure you don't mind paying for that kind of corruption. I Don't get it. How could Ukraine before the war be labeled as the most corrupt country in Europe?

[25:32] In fact the world and now it's populated with nothing but angels in that wonderful Noble valiant politicians with hearts of gold isn't it nice your Congress has pledged billions to such deserving folks billions They don't have oh wait a minute. I forgot they can just bring it up nothing new there Which begs that perpetual question? How's your plan be coming? And finally a little off the subject comes this email from Judy in Ohio She says in one of your most recent shows you were talking about how rotten corrupt lawyers can be well we all kind of assumed that but few of us are personally touched by it at least that's what I thought until my grandpa died and Left 14 people in his will the lawyer dragged on the probate process for two years

[26:17] And he informed practically no one of anything all 14 people knew they were in the will they got a letter early on That was it and after a year of absolutely nothing happening a year had gone by with no additional correspondence at all So last year all of us were together at a Christmas celebration, so we said to each other Why don't we get on that lawyer a little bit? Every one of us should give him a phone call and find out what the hell's going on put some pressure on him So everyone in his own time phoned up and said what's going on? What do I do? How do we settle this thing each time his secretary fielded the calls? each phone call lasted no more than a minute and finally after two years the whole thing was settled and The lawyers charges were tallied up There was a little matter of around fifteen hundred dollars for miscellaneous phone charges guess what he charged a hundred dollars for every

[27:09] Inquiring phone call and he himself spoke to no one it was just questions to his secretary as mentioned The breakdown each phone call around a hundred bucks By the way Johnny grandfather's estate was around two hundred thousand dollars divided by 14 So no one got rich, but the lawyer still gouged us and left a permanent bad feeling about lawyers somehow I think every family has a bad lawyer story You've been listening to the expat files living in Latin America if you need some help with your own plan B We can schedule a one-on-one phone or Skype consult Just send me an email the expat files at gmail dot com And if you want to get on the waiting list for my next week long expat insider seminar in Central America Where you're guaranteed to get a two to five year head start on your plan B

[27:56] Send me an email the expat files at gmail dot com