You have received one of those messages: Dear Parent, your child has just been rushed to the hospital, please send XXX amount to this number to cater for hospital bills. Or something like: Nimekutumia pesa bahati mbaya, tafadhali nirudishie.

In the era of the ubiquitous phone, these are just some of the few ways fraudsters try to make money. Fraudsters prey on the emotions of their victims, their worst fears, or their greatest desire. They feed you a string of lies, working you out carefully and confidently till you fall into their trap. For the many unsuspecting victims, you only realize you have been conned long after the action has taken place.

It is said that prevention is better than cure. When it comes to being conned, this philosophy is true. Chasing after your lost money is way more hectic than flagging danger way before you are trapped.

From dialing *100*100# to prevent Sim Swap, setting aside 0722 000000 as the only number that Safaricom can use to call you, or using the 707 platform to register or block a number under your name and ID number, Safaricom PLC has put in place a number of measures to ensure its customers are protected from falling victim to fraudsters.

The knowledge of what and how fraudsters operate, however, is an important tool in ensuring people are no longer being conned. As the world continues to evolve, so do conmen. Today, con artists have come up with different and newer tricks to scam people. We can no longer depend on previous outdated information to help us prevent these new scams. If you can recognize a scam, you can reject it and later report it to prevent others from being frauded by the same person.

The Safaricom Newsroom sat down with Sally Mwenesi, a Senior Fraud Analyst at Safaricom, to look at the new ways scammers are using these days and how we can protect ourselves against being conned.