Vulnerable to exploitation

firemonkey

That was mentioned in the write up of my post ASD dx appointment. That being due to taking things very literally and at face value. Also difficulty in reading other people’s intentions. I’ve always been sceptical about that due to having coped well with phone scams.Those though are/were far more crude and obvious, and easily detectable than the one I’ve fallen for recently. This has been a wake up call to the negative side of being autistic.

Amity

Aye I would be like that too, I have been noticing my more autistic aspects during lockdown, less exposure to people generally.
When I was younger and unaware of autism and how it impacts on my perception of people I was exploited by different people in different ways.
I think not knowing how to tell an insincere person from a sincere person or  how to protect my feelings from being manipulated, led to some unfortunate situations. 

What happened recently? If you dont want to say, thats fine.

verity

Scams tend to target specific group of people  and personalities. Sometimes  there are intentional mistakes or some social engineering to filter people out. There either appeal to a sense of authority, guilt, empathy or target desires like greed and romance.

It is difficult to generalise exploitation becuase few peoples are totally invulnerable to it. I consider myself fairly streetwise but I had a few hairy moments where I almost got scammed, or put myself in a vulnerable situation. Also if you are caught of guard or you already have an expectation that can be tapped into.  I doesn't tend to be went you are on have territory and you have time to process what is happening.

A skilled confidence trickster could hoodwink almost anyone, if they had the motivation and patience to do it. 

I expect the write-up are talking about a different form of being taken advantage of something more subtle. Over time people can also be conditioned. Actually by crossing personal boundaries. So it is not always the case that it is a perfect lie that you cannot see through, it can be that you are put into awkward situations, and this normalised over time. I experienced something like this. It was not as I wasn't aware  of their character of treating people terribly after a number years but actually they can make it about someone else that you could not possibly let down and of course you feel guilty, however it is really all about them. This lead to a difficult decision to sever ties, however it was best for me an my sanity and I would cut ties with anyone who woudl expose them for what they are.

I have no idea is people on the spectrum  are more vulnerable to this or not.

I think many of us have good analytical skill and if honed it can offer a good level of scrutiny.

I tend to agree our weaknesses not withstanding we have strength the may actually protect us in different areas.

firemonkey

It was a site claiming  to predict IQ  by facial features. I emailed them to get info about their qualifications as it was definitely left field, but at the same time AI has been used for weirder things. I was told they were 3 university graduates who had been working on it for just over a year. I then sent them another email re the erraticism of estimating my sex and age. They quoted figures and said they were in the process of tweaking the algorithm. It all sounded  reasonable.  A more mathematically skilled person would have spotted the red flag after a couple of goes at it.  It was always age +95=IQ.  I'm not knowledgeable about programming, but reckon you'd have to have some programming skills to create an automatic script.

Hylian

I am sort of vulnerable to exploitation. I am too trusting when I first meet people, and don't notice the signs that they want something from me until after something bad happens. Even when I do recognize that I kind of doubt it, since I don't want to upset people if they're not doing what I think they are.

I am overall way too placid of a person and too eager to help, it gets me in trouble. I'm also the kind of kid parents told to not talk to strangers at all and to not help them find their lost puppy/cat/whatever. lol

I have managed to dodge some bullets lately which I'm happy about, though I still have also been taken advantage of a few times.

verity

AI works on feedback, and some problem are more difficult  process than others.

Also this is a statistical probability at best, they only have they information hey have.  

Predictive capability is the greatest for of proof in science. Something can only said to be correct if doing the "thing " predicts the expected outcome and this repeatable.

Exploitation would extremely difficult predict based on these inputs, and they likely only have an indirect reference to exploitation as they define it.

Bender

I'm not vulnerable to scams either, but I can and have been exploited in other ways.

Verity is spot-on: a good con artist will be able to get to anybody in the right circumstances. So will somebody who knows you well enough - it's all about spotting and exploiting a weakness, inadequacy/insecurity or desire you have. 

verity said:
I think many of us have good analytical skill and if honed it can offer a good level of scrutiny.

This is true and it often works to help me spot red flags. But I'm far from infallible: I can still be manipulated and will see the mechanism clear as day only after the fact. I'm even aware that my belief that all people who have been mistreated or wronged should be helped and need my support can be exploited and it still happens sometimes.

And sometimes I see possible red flags with people and feel guilty about it because everybody else sees them as a victim. We always need to remind ourselves that people who have been victimised are still people like anybody else, not martyrs, and they can exploit their situation or people's sympathy. It's not easy to keep a good balance between compassion and protecting yourself.