Congratulations! You have won SR100,000! All you have to do is call this number to receive your prize. How many times have these messages pestered you via your e-mail, mobile phone and even home phone, prompting you to fantasize about a life of riches and endless money? Most people realize these messages are hoaxes that trick people into spending money to chase after these dream prizes. However, the younger generation may be less mature and skeptical and they often fall into enticing traps set by scammers. High school student Fatima Farhan received an SMS notifying her she had won a huge cash prize and when she repeatedly called the number listed in the SMS to collect her prize, her mobile phone account was charged a significant amount of money. “I was both surprised and ecstatic when I read the message that I had been chosen to win such a huge amount of money. I daydreamed of all the things I would buy with my prize money. I immediately called the number listed but after a long waiting period, no one took my call. I stubbornly called again and again but was met with no results. I was extremely disappointed when I later discover that by repeatedly calling the number, I had wasted the money I had saved up to help my family pay for my younger brother's school fees for next year.” The negative effects of such scams are more far reaching and detrimental than what meets the eye. After Fatima's unfortunate experience, she sunk into a state of brooding, unhappiness, and dissatisfaction with the financial status of her family. Young men and women who fall prey to these cunning scams become obsessed with winning and they may abandon logic and chase the illusion of riches that seem to be a phone call or text message away. The “call and win” scam that relies on naive people to send costly SMS messages or make expensive phone calls have become disturbingly widespread in the Kingdom and despite the many individuals being scammed out of their hard-earned money, the perpetrators continue to operate with impunity. “In recent weeks my son Majid started suddenly asking for more money than usual and he told us it was for school supplies and extracurricular activities. His demands gradually grew more and more and he seemed insatiable. He had even convinced his younger brothers and sisters to give him their daily allowances. I suspected something fishy until finally Majid confided that he had received a message on his mobile phone that said he had won a BMW and all he had to do was send text messages to a certain telephone number and he was sure to win,” said Majid's distressed mother. “What is dangerous about these messages is that one can easily become obsessed and addicted. Majid was willing to take his siblings' share of their money and place a heavy financial burden on the whole family just to win. Even stranger is that his younger siblings were also hypnotized by the promise of a new BMW that their eldest brother would drive them around in,” added Umm Majid. “I learned my lesson the hard way. After losing hundreds of riyals by sending costly SMS messages to gain a fancy car or a mansion or a cash prize, I no longer believe in such fake promises. I am more bitter but wiser so now I instantly hit the delete button as soon as I read ‘You have won',” said Fawaz Al-Hammad. “Such deceptive messages play with the emotions of people. They should come under the label of organized crime and those who pump out such messages to the public should be held accountable and punished. These messages could cost families an immeasurable amount of their hard-earned money. Adolescents are unsuspecting and within minutes they can spend hundreds of riyals trying to get a hold of this mirage of a dream prize, and thus getting their family into financial trouble,” said Seham Al-Wayli, an economist. “Each person must understand that no one can win an immense amount of money just like that, out of the blue, and without working hard and toiling for it. The youth should be more wary of such messages and should only participate in contests that are organized by their schools or by an official governmental body,” added Al-Wayli. Islamic education and jurisprudence teacher Sahar Al-Safadi was contacted by the Saudi Gazette to comment on the phenomenon. “The vast majority of people are unaware of the Islamic ruling on paying a fixed amount of money to enter a contest that may or may not bring any returns. From an Islamic standpoint, making a call that costs money to earn a prize that relies on pure luck is exactly like gambling and is prohibited. Similarly buying lottery tickets are forbidden. The companies who promote such messages are gaining millions of riyals from the pockets of innocent consumers. In Islam, no profit or financial gain is permissible without working or trading or entering a lawful business transaction,” he said. “Think about it logically, if 1 million people throughout the Arab world believe such tricks and send an SMS to a given company that extricates only SR5 from each person's mobile phone bill, the company has just made SR5 million. Without exaggeration, in one day I received about 15 different messages that I had supposedly won some sort of a prize,” said Al-Safadi. __
