 Good afternoon. I am cough and this is confidence game theater we are going to demonstrate a couple of con games and Talk about how they work Yeah, sorry that was that was my whole introduction. I didn't have anything else to say so yeah, okay and our first Our first demonstration is gonna be a confidence game that I'm guessing a lot of you have heard of and some of you may have even seen It's called three card money And I don't actually I don't actually have any cards up here. So you know don't bother standing on your chairs So I've got I've got You guys ready All right, I've got three little cards here One red Queen and two black cards The Queen wins the black cards lose I move them around if your eyes are faster than my hands you win Here we go one two three 20 get you 40 40 get you 80 all you got to do is keep your eye on the lady Which one is she? Hey, this one right here that one right there. Hey, we have a winner here you go The winning card is exactly where I thought it was gonna be this game looks easy Alrighty, look here win lose lose watch them cruise. Which one do you choose right there again right there? This one here. Oh, hey, that's a red card. We have a winner. There you go Card is exactly where I thought it was again. This game is easy Alrighty here we go. I don't bet low. I only bet high Look look look try try try. Where'd you go? Is that one right there? Oh No, that one's that one's a black card. Sorry the black cards lose the red card wins That's this one here the red cards the winner She totally chose the wrong card. I knew exactly where the card was going to be Alrighty alright here. We got here we go Pardon speak up. I can't hear you can't hear you All righty here we go win lose lose watch them cruise. Which one do you choose? This one right here. Oh, nope. See that's a black card the black cards lose the red card wins That's this one here the red card wins Scoot this game man. Oh, whoa, whoa, please please don't don't don't throw my cards on the floor Don't throw my cards on the floor if they get they get on the ground They get on the ground they get dirty they get soiled you can see one from another then it's not a fair game I'm playing this for money. This is a real game. I'm playing this for money. You know, please please play fair Did you see that she just bent the winning card? This game is gonna be so easy to win. Heck. This is a sure thing Hey All right, here we go one two three which one do you choose 20 bucks 20 bucks that one? I'll double that bit. All right, and we have a winner. There you go, sir Thanks, I had the winning card if I just bet more I would have won All righty, here we go Win lose lose watch them cruise which one do you choose 20 bucks 20 bucks that one? All right, I'll see your 20. I'll raise you 80 hundred dollars or no bet hundred bucks or no bet. Um, I've got a 80 bucks I'll go in for 20 my 20 his 80. That's 100. All right money in hand money in hand or no bet All right turn over the card. Oh No, see sorry, that's that's a black card the black cards lose the red card wins. Oh shaman cops. Oh, thanks WTF I can't believe this what just happened. I shot. I thought I had a sure thing You should go to the cops These guys came by and there was a game going on and I lost the money game three card money Oh, yeah, I was here last week and they took me for about 120 bucks So maybe I should go to the cops. No, man You go to the cops are gonna be a citation You're gonna have to show up in court and then you're gonna have some problems I mean I would just and cut your losses. Do you need cab ride or something? You got did you lose all your cash? I can walk to the bus or something like that. I'm good a couple bucks. No, I'm good You know I got taken to man But just the best thing to do is just cut your losses and don't tell anyone. All right I think I'll do that and That's how mr. Victim lost his money Three card three card money illustrates a lot of the important aspects of a confidence game A confidence game is a crime of deception Where the victim is persuaded to more or less voluntarily hand over their money Now where confidence games differ from other crimes of deception for example cheating and gambling or outright fraud is That in a confidence game the victim believes that he is taking Dishonest advantage of one or more of the con artists typically This has this has several advantages for the criminals one is You will take you will get more victims Right, you can only take someone with fraud if they're actually interested in buying what you're pretending to sell You can only take someone by cheating in a it's like in a card game if they're interested in gambling at that game Whereas with a confidence game when you when you offer someone an opportunity To to play and they think they have a dishonest advantage. They are confident that they're going to win You can get more people involved They confidence games also have another advantage, which is You can typically take a victim for more money than you can With with straight fraud right a a savvy gambler will only bet what he can afford to lose a prudent purchaser Will only buy Things that he can afford. I mean I realize not everyone does that but on average You you can get more money out of your victim with a confidence game because They don't think they're going to lose the money and so they can be persuaded To to risk more than they could afford to lose. They can be persuaded to risk borrowed money they can be persuaded to risk their savings and A a third advantage of the confidence games have over typical fraud again from the criminal's perspective is They tend to be less risky It's harder for the victim to complain because then the victim would have to admit to having done something either illegal or immoral For example trying to trying to take advantage of someone else trying to in the case of three-card money trying to cheat at the game and In fact, it's it's common for victims to give reports that are wildly inaccurate I've heard stories from law enforcement agents of actually having to arrest the victims in three-card money games for filing a false police report for example saying that that they were robbed with threat of violence when that's not what happened and Another way in which they are less risky is the fact that typically the con artists outnumber the victim significantly Now now aside from sort of the obvious advantages in the case of violence or threat of violence This also has the advantage that the the con artists can create a consensus reality and a very powerful and compelling one Since they're pretending not to know each other When they things that they just all sort of agree on, you know, the victim is kind of drug along into In in the case of three-card money in particular There there are a lot of a lot of interesting subtleties one is this game or Relatives of it go back over 600 years. In fact, the earliest Currently the earliest known deception with playing cards is from 1408 and it was a game very similar to three-card Monty now we don't know all the details the the records are vague, but The basic idea is that the dealer dealt some cards out one of them was a winner right it There was a pretend game that the con artists were playing Where where the the dealer dealt out cards the players Tried to pick which one was the winner and the victim thought he knew which one was the winner because it was marked In its current form it came into New Orleans in the 1820s or 30s from Texas then a part of Mexico Later spread to the Mississippi River Boats After the Civil War spread to the railroads was an extremely popular confidence game in the in the Old West You'll even see it in some old westerns in in three-card Monty there are There are a whole bunch of of sort of lies that are sold to the victim as part of this consensus reality For example, the biggest one is it's a game There's also the fact that the the other players are playing against the dealer Right when you when you see people who are apparently in conflict and they agree on something like oh It's a game that that makes it easier to be drawn into There's there's the lie that that if you bet on the correct card you will you will win You will be paid now. There are lots of ways to not pay someone if they bet on the correct card We we only showed off one one of them, but you know long story short is the Even if you do manage to get the correct card, you will not get paid one way or another And and it's extremely rare to get the correct card Because the dealer cheats So yeah in reality In reality, you're not gonna get paid The the other players are working with the dealer in fact frequently there are several of them It's not it's not uncommon for there to be five or six shills and really the the only Only one person in the group is is not part of the mob and that's the victim The the card can be marked in other ways. It doesn't have to be have a bent corner It can be torn a little bit it can be more a dot gear a marking can be placed on the back of it with a pencil Someone can smear something on it. For example a female member of the mob can can rubber lips and rub little lipstick on the back of the card Well, she's turning it over Small piece of paper can be stuck on the back of the card However, it's done right the point is the victim believes he has a dishonest advantage And when he tries to take advantage of it, he loses It's also worth remembering Sometimes sometimes in these in these games well while tourists are being attracted and watching the game It's easy for the mob to press in on them and pickpocket them And it's also been heard of That you know since since you're dealing you're dealing with a whole group of thieves, right? They pretend not to know each other, but they're really all working together against the victim It's not unheard of for the victim to go, you know leave the game not get taken for everything or not play and Then some members of the mob follow him around the corner and mug him and let's see It's also related to the shell game Which I'm sure some of you have heard of the the walnut shells and the pee which is over 300 years old Nowadays, it's typically done with bottle caps used to be done with thimbles. It was called thimble rigging and Let's see there there are there are some There are some some techniques in that to also give the victim the the illusion of having an advantage over the dealer I'm not going to discuss that for time And I think we're about ready for our second demonstration So let's let's pull a couple of chairs out Mom chance Got your phone. Okay. Let's let's pull a couple of chairs out and we need okay. You got three over here. I think three is good Okay, so this part of the stage is a bar That part of the stage over there is a sidewalk on the street and the action starts over there take it away First I need to select a victim and learn about them. Oh Yeah, the the painting convention is going great No, no, it's My office isn't building a you know, I don't go into building G with the accountants. No, you've gone too far Yes Okay, so you found it great So What am I supposed to bring to the office party next week? Okay, I guess I'll just beg my wife Gina to make her world famous ribs like last year Yeah, so Yeah, the convention floor doesn't open for another couple hours. I I don't think I'll have a problem finding something doing Vegas though Okay, now I need to interrupt their train of thought so they forget about the immediate conversation. They just had Excuse me. Sorry about that Now I need to put the victim at ease Hey, I know you we work together. No, no, no, we do work together, but and But we work in different parts of the same company. Yeah. Yeah You came to this painting convention and I came to this game painting convention. They sent two of us at the same time That's unbelievable. That's a huge waste of money and they sent me here to check out accounting software Unbelievable what we have totally works and yet they want to buy something new. It's just a huge waste So so you're in accounting. Oh, yeah, yeah out in building G in the thick of it addition subtraction multiplication and division Yeah, but we're all having a good time over there in accounting. Hey, don't you don't we have an office party coming up next week? Maybe yeah, and your wife last year. She brought potato salad. No, no, no She brought barbecue something wasn't it? Yeah, my wife strips. Oh, yeah, those were great. Oh, I'm looking forward to that party this year Oh Good times at the office really really good times there so um Look at the time What do you have a plan while we wait for the convention to open up? I don't have any plans yet Don't have any plans. Check this out. My hotel gave me coupon bring a buddy. No cover charge. Want to go get a drink? Sure, let's go. Oh Hey man long time no see how's it going going? Okay? I can't remember the last time I saw you and this guy. Oh, I would be rude forgot to introduce him This is a guy who works with me over in paint. Of course. He's not an accountant, but he still is a pretty good guy You know it's been such a long time since I've seen you I can't even remember and I last time I saw him was at our office party last year. Let me buy the first round of drinks. Well, we could Okay, so Hey, you want to you want to help me have a little fun with my buddy over there when he gets back Sure, I'll give you in. Okay. I Didn't plan for the mic when I was rehearsing I Got a yeah, I got a deck of cards here And I'm gonna I'm gonna propose a little something to him and when I cut the cards what I'm gonna do I'm just gonna take a couple cards off the top of the deck And I'm gonna let you see the bottom card of the rest of the deck Then I'll finish the cut and and later I'm gonna ask you to name the card to name a card and just just say the card that you saw there Okay, can you do that? Sure? No problem. All right? This is gonna be fun Thanks, man It's real nice of you. It's real nice of you to buy drinks and all but you know, I'm thinking I'm thinking we should we should be kind of sporting about this Maybe maybe you and I should you should play for who buys the first round. No, what kind of thing do you have in mind? Mom chance. What's that? It's a game of pure chance. We each name a card and then we then we We deal through the deck. I got some cards here We turn the deck face up and we deal through the cards one at a time whoever's card comes up first as the winner That seems fair. All right here shuffle them up. Okay? Here you go. Alrighty, and I'll just I'll just give these a cut And now what card do you want? I'll take the jack of clubs All right, what's my card to a diamonds? To a diamonds. All right, so what'd you say again Jack of clubs Jack of clubs to a diamonds? All right? Let's see what we got Three spades five of hearts eight of spades up to a diamonds. Well, I guess you're still paying Oh Wow, I just cheated at cards. I don't normally do that sort of thing But I guess it was just just for fun and he was gonna buy anyway So, uh, hey buddy you want you want in on a secret? Sure. I like secrets. You didn't lose by pure chance Oh, what do you mean? It's an old scam. I learned years ago. You see what you do is When when I was cutting the cards I Only took a couple cards off the top of the deck and then I let him see the bottom card of the rest So then the card that he saw was gonna be right near the bottom just a few cards from the bottom Huh, that's pretty clever. You know, we got to remember this at the office party next week We could we could have a lot of fun. Oh, okay, so he's all right with it. I guess everything's cool Are you guys playing cards like totally a lot of cards? Oh My god, can I take your picture? Oh My god, this is going on my face. I totally love my space if you are not on my space You know like way like, I don't know old or something But you need to like check out my space. Will you friend me on my space? Oh my god Will you be my friend? I'm on Facebook. You can fan me too. It's totally awesome. So you guys playing cards Can I play some cards? What's going on? Do you know her not at all you? Come on guys Let's play some cards cards cards cards cards cards cards cards Okay, we're um We're playing a game called mum chance. It's a game. It's a game of pure chance What we do is we we each name a card and then we we deal through the deck face up like this and whoever's card comes up First is the winner that sounds like totally easy I'm gonna clean you guys out, but wait. I gotta twit this but here's a hundred to get started well Shuffle them up whenever you're ready totally And I'll just give them a cut So what the what card do you want? It's spades Okay And you know what I'm gonna let I'm gonna let this honest fellow who I just met today name my card for me What's what's my card for clubs? for clubs Okay, let's see what we got Six of hearts for diamonds eight of spades four clubs. I guess this is mine Whatever I tell you what let's make this a little bit interesting because that's kind of boring Let's um, let's make a round of betting after each each card So I'll start how about another hundred? Well, I can cover that with a hundred. I just won from you whatever Here shuffle them up and now I'll just give them a cut And what card do you want ace the spades? Okay What's my card nine of diamonds? Ace of spades nine of diamonds Let's see what we got first cards the ten of clubs Okay Here's I'll raise you another hundred Let's see. Um, I'll see your hundred. I'll raise you. I'll raise you another hundred Deal or call deal the next card. Totally. I got it. Alrighty Let's see Six of hearts. I'll raise you three, honey Yikes, let's see. I've only I've only got 50. I might need to tap out here Wow, that's a lot of money, but she is getting on my nerves and I am sure to win so Alrighty and now let's see we got Ace of spades Suckers, I told you that I would clear you out Yeah, that's right. Peace out Damn it How could we lose? How could we lose? I mean, what are the odds? What are the odds? Just out of curiosity. What's the next card? Nine of diamonds nine of diamonds. We will we lost by one stupid card, you know I lost least on this. I still have credit card. Why don't let me buy the next round of drinks and That's how mr. Victim lost his money three Mike Monty here So is this on Now this is this is an example of Or this is this is a fairly representative example of a Gambling type con In order in order to pull this type of thing off. You only really need three things, right? You need a you need a game that you could bet on or something you can bet on really You need a way to cheat at it and you need a way to lose even though you're cheating If you have those three things you can you can put this together fairly effectively Okay, if you if you want to see if you want to see this being done in a in a poker context There's there's a movie called shade which has a decent depiction of it There's also a movie called the sting which I'm guessing many of you have seen which shows the same basic idea in a race horse betting context and In this particular case we used a sort of a two-stage process to get the Get the victim comfortable with cheating and familiar with doing it and confident in the process an actual practice there would be multiple games, but you know we we wanted to try and stay under time here and Let's see we also we also try to illustrate the idea of Making the victim not feel empathy for the person that they're trying to swindle This this this particular game that we used to illustrate this with you know naming the two cards and dealing through the deck is Also over 400 years old so these these things still work pretty much the way they always have and Let's see that's that's all I've got to say about that for now. So Let's move on to our next demonstration We are now in the lobby of a hotel and There's there's some kind of shindig going on which includes a Swap me So let's see where's Here when I should take this one here. There we go. It's not good tangled up and Alrighty. Oh, what you got in that box? Oh, just some old electronic components and taking up space in my garage She I was trying to get rid of them at the swap meet But they wouldn't let me park my garage in the look or park my truck and loading dock. Oh, man So I got to go move it. Would you mind watching this box for me for a little while? Yeah, sure. No problem. All right, thanks Are is this your stuff or are you selling this? No, no, the guy the guy who is just stepped out for a minute. Oh dang Oh my goodness. Would you look at that? That is an Apple one that look at that look at all that detail That's a that's rare. That's classic right there. I bet you the walls himself made that How much are you selling here? How much is he selling it for? You know, I have I have no idea I mean he said he was gonna try and be back as soon as he could but he also said he's parked away as well I'm totally late for a meeting. I can't wait for him. But here I'll tell you what Give him my car. Would you please darling and let him know that I will buy that? $20,000 Thank you. Yeah, sure. Oh, wow. Thanks for watching this stuff for me Yeah, sure. By the way, how much are you selling it for? Well, it's mostly junk. Well, see this part right here That's a that's a flux capacitor and I figure it's worth at least a grand But I don't want to have to deal with finding buyers for all the pieces. I'm just gonna sell it as a set Well, I'm well, you know, whoever whoever buys it's gonna have to piece it out, too I mean you're selling it as a set for your convenience. Maybe maybe you'd be willing to go down a little How about 800 900 and you got a deal? Okay I just happened to have a huge wad of cash on me one two three four five six seven eight nine Thank you, sir. All right. Thank you Be take it. We're sorry the number you've reached has been disconnected or is no longer in service And that's how mr. Victim lost his money So this is this is an example of what I call the buying con right where the the object is to to induce the victim to Buy something that is not worth nearly as much as he thinks it is now This is of course a very common theme in fraud. It's it's sort of the definition of a lot of kinds of fraud but what makes this into a confidence game is the fact that the victim is Induced to believe that he is taking advantage of someone else In this particular case Right the basic idea is oh, he doesn't know what he's got. It's worth way more than he thinks it's worth Now I'm guessing this hasn't actually been done with Apple ones But you know the basic the basic principle is the same this one's also centuries old you know, I've I've personally found found references over 400 years old and Beyond that they they go into languages. I don't speak but Yeah, so the basic Now now this this scams been worked with all sorts of objects ironically enough Both some of the oldest and some of the newest stories are about the same Right the stories from 400 years ago One of the most popular things is jewelry in particular rings That's also there are also plenty of stories floating around of it being worked today with rings jewelry rings It can be seen worked with a ring in the movie shade again But but this basic scam can be worked with anything jewelry lottery tickets violins gold bricks art stock collectible coins For example with with a gold brick, you know, oh, I know a guy who's who's bought this gold brick 40 years ago. He's short on cash. He needs to sell it he thinks it's worth the same as it was worth 40 years ago, right things like that and My goodness, we're we're ahead of time here I'm just about done and so I'm going to leave you with a couple of thoughts One is there is a lot of truth in the saying that you can't cheat an honest man Ironically, although confidence games are one of the kinds of Crimes of deception that can harm a victim the most They're also one of the crimes that are the easiest to protect yourself against There are really only two rules you have to follow to not be taken by most the vast majority of confidence games Avoid any chance to take dishonest advantage of another person and don't try to get something for nothing Now I am I'm gonna I'm gonna open for questions, but before I do I want to say where's Where's our fourth? All right, I want to say I want to say a huge. Thank you to my cast We all did they they put in a ton of work on this yes, indeed Nikita and Alex and Kevin Mitnick who made a special guest appearance and And and that guy that I found in the parking lot sleeping on a cot And I'm gonna I'm gonna open the floor for questions now pardon That would be awesome So I've just been informed that someone agreed to demonstrate the Monty With actual cards so like here or somewhere else here. Okay So I will I will open the floor for questions for a couple of minutes and And then we can we can move into that and Before before I do I'm I'm just gonna say I will I will try to share what I can about confidence games I'm not going to answer questions about myself personally or my history or experiences So are there any questions? Well, that was easy Did I miss one? Okay, yeah you Repeat the quay repeat the question back. The question was would the made-off scam be a confidence game? That really depends on your viewpoint well, well because I Guess what that comes down to is what do you think the victims believed? You know do they Did they think that oh, there's really no way he can be making these kinds of returns honestly But screw it. I'm gonna invest with him anyways If you know if you think the victims really believed that then I guess you could make a strong argument for that if you If you think they just thought he was really good Then then no, I would I would just call that fraud. I mean, it's still it's still crime But I mean it doesn't fit quite it doesn't fit quite so neatly into in you know into the categories as the things that we demonstrated But any any other questions? Damn, I can't see anything with these lights. Okay. Someone's pointing to someone. Oh in the green shirt. Okay. I finally saw you I see I saw three people pointing at you. Oh Goodness I could go on I could go on and on sorry the question the question was do I have any recommended reading and confidence games? There are a couple of references that I contributed to the the DEF CON CD and I imagine they'll be on the website There there is so there has been a lot written on the subject and personally I Find most of the older material just as good as most of the newer material So, you know, I've sort of spent half a lifetime reading on it and I think there's plenty left for for the rest of my life but a Really good place to start is a book called gambling scams by by Darwin Ortiz It's got a whole chapter on the subject which which has good illustrations of Of the different roles played by the confidence artists in the gang Good illustrations of what it is What it is in the game that that hooks the victim in each case So so gambling scams by Darwin Ortiz is a very good place to start Actually, someone just before the talk I was talking to someone who reminded me about a wonderful book called the big con by David, I believe it's ma you pardon Maurer excellent excellent. I was just gonna spell it. I believe it's ma you are er. Is that correct? Yes so Wonderful wonderful book on the subject and I could probably keep listing books for for ten minutes or more. So I'm gonna stop there Any more questions? I'm I'm sorry. I I can't hear whoever it is that speaking Yes, yes, indeed the it was it was a comment that the show's hustle and leverage are both very good ones Any other questions or should we move into the okay? We got one there the The nomenclature is is not a hundred percent agreed upon I mean I tend to consider those fraud But but there's still oh, sorry the the question was how do you draw distinction between? Between these types of con games where you're trying to trap someone in dishonesty and things like medical scams You know different people have different opinions on this my personal opinion is That most medical scams are are simply fraud right you're selling something that isn't what you claim you're selling You know you you claim that you can psychically pull someone's organs out of their body without cutting them Open and fix it and put them back and if you actually can't do that Then when they pay you you're not really giving them what you claim to be giving them I mean, it's it's still it's still a crime. It's still a very devastating crime in many cases I certainly don't mean to minimize it and yeah I mean the nomenclature is really a matter of opinion in in that case so All right, I'm gonna I'm gonna turn the floor over to Apollo Who has who has kindly agreed to give us a demonstration? So are we how closely can how closely can we zoom in on the tabletop? Well, yeah, the question is can we get can we get the if we do it on the table can we get it on the camera? Looks like you this is as far as you can get right. Okay. Can you hear me? All right here? All right There's a simple movie if you can't hear me in the back. Just raise your hand so I can see about where you are Okay, I'm gonna talk to you. Can you hear me all right? Yes, I'm taking the race and it's gonna say we got plenty of mics if you need one The only thing is could you hold it for me? I'd be happy to hear what he was talking about with the three-card Monty There's one move that they use for the slides now. There's a move called a hype Since he had the cards here. I just want you guys to be able to see that now It's hard for you to be able to telegraph it here So I'm gonna hold these up and exaggerate the movement so you're gonna be able to see a gap now Are you're gonna give away the move? Yes, I give away the move crap I wouldn't agree to this but Afterwards if you guys want to see this with it fooling you even after you've been educated you can still do it again You won't be able to see it for instance I've learned that some of the moves that are necessary for the three-card Monty, but if I were watching a group I would never gamble just like what he said because that frame that he was talking about With the wire the stick and the shade the steer all those positions If you can't win it even if you know the move and you can't see the move the move basically works like this It's called the hype you have one card you're going to show the other cards the same So you'd say that you can win on the red you lose on the black The exaggerated move is a throw over of the top card while they apparently think that the second card is going down So when they throw down like this, they're actually throwing the card on top I want to try to do that where you can see here So you can see the two movements the bottom card here the top card on the top So as I would throw down I throw across from the top movement to do that It's a toss that motion looks the same As whether I do the toss here or here Now if we can try to get in a little bit Let's see. I'm going to try to do this against without my badge on there So you can see just this position here Now if this goes down and these obviously have a bend So the way that you fix this for three-card Monty you bend it in the horizontal position here Then they put what's called wings on it Now the wings stop it from being seen on the corner So these edges here are flat on the table and this bump in the center when it's thrown down Also stops it from the wind whenever you're working outside and they're about to kick the box So when you're throwing the card you're holding it in this position as you throw down You're throwing the second position card Like I said, I know it's very hard for you guys to see if you guys want to see it up close afterwards Be happy to do it for you guys one-on-one. I hope that adds a little clarity. Thanks Thank you very much. All right. Yeah. Thank you, Apollo All right, and um, I guess uh, I forgot which room we're going to be hanging out in afterwards. Uh, was it one oh One oh five one oh five we're hanging out in room one oh five afterwards for a few minutes If if you want to come in and talk to us more more close up And have a uh, have a great time. Thank you for all coming. I hope you enjoyed it