By Samuel Stein

It is the spring of 1741 . A man dressed in elegant church attire walks into a tavern in Princeton , New Jersey , and is recognized by the local Magistrate , John Stockton , as the famous Reverend John Rowland . The encounter would serve as a test run for the famous confidence “ con ” artist Tom Bell , who , over a 20-year career , used many different names and personas to defraud people across the colonies , using charm and an understanding of the local culture to play his victims out of possessions . By leveraging fancy clothes and other symbols of power and wealth , Bell pretended to be a gentleman , breaking into the inner circles of elites and exposing the fragility of trusting a man simply because of his dress and speech . Cybercriminals today use the same strategies that Bell and untold other shysters and scammers have used for centuries to identify and fleece their victims , but they ’ ve adapted their tactics for new technologies .

In the 18th and 19th centuries , conmen posed as revivalists to gain goodwill and trust . Posing as traveling preachers to bilk the pious , men like John Maffit and Elijah Skaggs rode into towns dressed to impress . Their eloquent speeches induced people to donate to them and not to God . To this day , the employees of religious organizations invoke trust in God to avoid routine audits and other verification checks . Before the advent of the telegraph network , slow communication and vast

The 2010 Gulf oil rig explosion prompted a Chicago company , InferAgis , to create a fake device that claimed to rectify the damages of spilled oil . People ’ s kindness was exploited , with InferAgis racking up nearly $ 20 million in profit from sympathy funds before the device was deemed useless .

28 FINANCIAL HISTORY | Winter 2025 | www . MoAF . org