About a year ago, KevinMD published an article that I wrote about avoiding online scams when one is highly visible in media as a patient advocate. During that year, I’ve come to recognize that I should have taken more of my own advice on the subject.
I have also learned that the technology supporting online criminals has expanded at a far faster rate than I’d anticipated. AI-based search engines can now generate a great deal of exploitable data on people like me, and indeed on almost anyone who has published previously in any field.
The occasion for my personal debacle was an effort to publish my memoir (Journeys of a Commoner). Although I’ve published many clinical papers over the past thirty years, this venture was my fourth effort to extract and share some very personal lessons from the eighty-two years of my long life, as a sort of “Internet Village Elder.”
When I completed my most recent draft, I went looking for a publication company that specializes in assisting authors to polish and advertise their work on Amazon. Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP) recommends several that are legitimate. I unfortunately found my way to one of the “other guys” who initially looked cheaper.
Real physician voices, twice a week
Free, and one click to unsubscribe.
That was my first big mistake.
Still, I have to give credit where it is due. For $2,800 in two installments, their “team” (actually, most likely only one individual operating out of India, Pakistan, or the Philippines) completed several iterations of formatting and setup for my manuscript, and put up the book on Amazon KDP, formatted inexpensively for Kindle and at higher prices in paperback and hard cover. The publish-on-demand service at KDP is now shipping very nicely finished copies. Whether I will ever break even on my cost of publication is still uncertain.
My second big mistake was being taken in by a “book deal” offered by the scammer after publication on Amazon. For $7,500, he would have 2,500 copies of the book printed and distributed by Books-A-Million, with a money-back guarantee: If the printing didn’t at least break even after nine months, my investment would be refunded.
In the initial euphoria of having my book published, I bit the hook and sent money by wire transfer to a New York bank account. Only after I later looked deeper into the details of the publication agreement did something seem odd. The business address of this “publication company” in New York City was in a very upscale building that specializes in banks and holding companies. Only after digging out a list of building tenants, did it become clear that the “publication company” doesn’t live there. Likewise, the website and email address in the agreement proved to be bogus. I also learned that no major bookstore chain cuts distribution deals that require authors to pre-pay for printing their books.
I had been had.
This wasn’t the end of my travails, though it doesn’t have to be a problem for other new authors who are reading this article. Within a week of publication, I began receiving email inquiries from individuals representing themselves as book club staffers. For a minimal fee, the club would “feature” my book to its members. It seems there is always a “minimal fee” in these things.
In reality, no legitimate book club needs to solicit new authors. There are thousands of us standing in line every week. And no legitimate representative of such a book club sends out unsolicited inquiries from a gmail.com address. This is what is called an “impersonation scheme.” If you are a new book author, you don’t need to be taken in by such scams.
Finally, a few more words are due concerning other ways that scammers can exploit online data to victimize highly visible writers. Impersonation schemes involving book clubs are not the only variation on this theme. So-called “independent recruiters” for major companies are rather often also scammers.
I was recently contacted by one of these characters on LinkedIn. He represented himself as an independent recruiter for a major firm, and accurately outlined my background in these terms:
“I noticed your extensive experience in health care policy and strategic advisory, particularly your work in pain management policy, public health regulation, and health care research. Your background strongly aligns with our current opportunity for a Senior Health Care Policy Advisor. Your expertise in health care policy analysis, industry advocacy, strategic research, and cross-sector initiatives makes you a highly relevant candidate we would like to connect with.”
This inquiry was, of course, very flattering. However, having recently been more than once bitten and twice shy, I immediately researched the company that he claimed to represent. They turned out to be a large venture capital firm, operating solely from headquarters on the U.S. West Coast. Like a lot of other firms, their focus is currently artificial intelligence, not medicine. They have no physical operations in the state where I live that might support a “position” such as he described. And they most definitely don’t prefer to use end-to-end encrypted applications like WhatsApp or Signal as their preferred communications channel. No legitimate business enterprise does. I blocked this individual on LinkedIn and reported them to technical support.
There is a bottom line for this narrative. If a business proposal or publication service sounds “a little too good to be true,” then it is very likely just that, and the proposing individual is very likely a scammer. But the same search tools that allow scammers to find new marks also work in reverse. You and I can check out the legitimacy and reputation of organizations that the scammers claim to represent. And we are well advised to do so before sharing financial account data or account passwords with people we don’t know well.
Richard A. Lawhern is a nationally recognized health care educator and patient advocate who has spent nearly three decades researching pain management and addiction policy. His extensive body of work, including over 300 published papers and interviews, reflects a deep critique of U.S. health care agencies and their approaches to chronic pain treatment. Now retired from formal academic and hospital affiliations, Richard continues to engage with professional and public audiences through platforms such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and his contributions to KevinMD. His advocacy extends to online communities like Protect People in Pain, where he works to elevate the voices of patients navigating restrictive opioid policies. Among his many publications is a guideline on opioid use for chronic non-cancer pain, reflecting his commitment to evidence-based reform in pain medicine.
