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Comment by ASalazarMX | Hacker News Reader

Once I had the fortune of seeing the three cups and a ball scam live, on the street. One guy does the trick, another encourages the victim, and a third one watches the crowd disguised as a random onlooker. If something makes the onlooker nervous, he will signal the others and they will grab their things and disappear in less seconds than your hand has fingers.

This sudden quit seems similar, specially with the withdrawal of funds to an "unknown address", as if they closed shop and disappeared.

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How does the scam work ? You got me curious...

Ball gets placed under one of three cups. Cups get mixed around and people guess where the ball is for money. The ball isn’t under any of them though. The scammer palmed it.

I guess people let their guards down when the plant in the audience gets it right and win some money, they pay less attention to the scammer's sleight of hand.

Each round is double or nothing. The victim wins the first few rounds, but he starts losing after the scammer starts hiding the ball instead of putting it under a cup. The victim keeps doubling on, thinking they will eventually win, but it never happens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGAfimeeCD8

Aka "three card monte". People get tricked because they don't realize it's a team of people, not just one.

And if you notice the trick? Well, they out number you. You probably won't win in a fight either.

In my case, they got spooked after my wife and I moved to the side, discreetly trying to see how the guy was hiding the ball. The false onlooker tried to block our view, and when we moved a little further to the right, he signaled the others and they flew. They moved so fast that if one of them had punched me for ruining their game, I wouldn't have known what hit me.

Maybe they were ready to go anyway, but since they work in tourist traps, they probably avoid violence to attract as little attention as possible.

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