Why Scams Work: The Psychology Behind Urgency, Fear, and Trust - Part 4: Trust
How criminals use normal human decision-making to influence our choices—and what we can do about it.
A 7-part series about why urgency, fear, authority, trust, scarcity, and emotional connection can derail good decision-making—and why understanding the psychology of scams matters.
Part 4 - Trust: “This looks familiar.”
Trust and authority overlap, but they aren't quite the same thing.
Authority says, I have a position you recognize.
Trust says, This feels legitimate.
That feeling can come from familiarity, professional appearance, recognizable language, an existing relationship, or details that appear to demonstrate knowledge about us.
The systematic review done by Norris, Brookes, and Dowell found that fraudulent communications can establish trust through signals such as official-looking notices and branding. It also highlighted evidence that messages combining strong source credibility with convincing arguments can be especially persuasive. Springer
Earlier phishing research provides another clue as to why using trust tactics work. Vishwanath and colleagues found that people often process phishing messages using relatively simple cues rather than deeply analyzing every element of the communication. ScienceDirect
Imagine carefully authenticating every email, text message, phone call, website, social media interaction, and online transaction before doing anything. Daily life would become nearly impossible.
Trust is useful and scammers succeed by borrowing it.
In this 7-part series, I examine each one of these persuasion principles in the context of cybersecurity awareness. Tomorrow, I will take a look at scarcity.
Selected scholarly research
Norris, G., Brookes, A., & Dowell, D. (2019). The Psychology of Internet Fraud Victimisation: A Systematic Review. Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology, 34, 231–245. This is an especially useful foundation for the article because it synthesizes research on message, experiential, and individual factors rather than portraying victimization as a simple personal failing. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11896-019-09334-5
Vishwanath, A., Herath, T., Chen, R., Wang, J., & Rao, H. R. (2011). Why do people get phished? Testing individual differences in phishing vulnerability within an integrated, information processing model. Decision Support Systems, 51(3), 576–586. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dss.2011.03.002
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