Hacker News Reader

It's at least partially fear. Fear can get people to do crazy things. Combine this with the fact that many people are totally tech illiterate (think about some of the elderly who call their grandkids every time they need to check their email). I don't think it's very hard to see how something like this can happen.

View on HN

If you're on Hacker News, I'll bet that 99% of your country's population is less tech literate than you. It's too easy for us to enter that mindset of, "how could X ever be? It's so obvious!"

My wife reminds me of this regularly =)

This one has nothing to do with tech though. It's just someone cold calling you, claiming to be from the government and asking for Apple gift cards. You don't need to be a tech wizard to understand that something is clearly amiss.

That's true. I'm conflating tech literacy with some term I don't know. It's the drive to be skeptical and challenge information against a logical framework one has of the world.

I would say that it is a part of what "tech literacy" is. I've also got family members who lack it entirely. It's rather bizarre to see someone affected so wholly by new information without knowing how to even challenge that information. "If X is true then why do we not see Y occur?" will usually be met with a shut-down in conversation and a bring-up of hostility.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com