How Could You be so Gullible? Scams and Over-Trust in Organizations

Hervé Laroche (), Véronique Steyer and Christelle Théron
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Hervé Laroche: ESCP-EAP - ESCP-EAP - Ecole Supérieure de Commerce de Paris
Véronique Steyer: CRG I3 - Centre de recherche en gestion i3 - X - École polytechnique - IP Paris - Institut Polytechnique de Paris - Université Paris-Saclay - I3 - Institut interdisciplinaire de l’innovation - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
Christelle Théron: TSM - Toulouse School of Management Research - UT Capitole - Université Toulouse Capitole - UT - Université de Toulouse - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - TSM - Toulouse School of Management - UT Capitole - Université Toulouse Capitole - UT - Université de Toulouse

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Abstract: Trust is a key ingredient of business activities. Scams are spectacular betrayals of trust. When the victim is a powerful organization that does not look vulnerable at first sight, we can suspect that this organization has developed an excessive trust, or over-trust. In this article, we take over-trust as the result of the intentional production of gullibility by the scammer. The analysis of a historically famous scam case, the Elf "Great Sniffer Hoax," suggests that the victim is made gullible by the scammer through a range of seduction and protection maneuvers that prevent the victim from developing doubts and suspicions. An integrated framework of the production of gullibility in organizations is proposed in order to further our understanding of over-trust. We discuss how these insights might be extended, beyond the case of scams, to more ordinary contexts of business activities.

Keywords: Case study; Gullibility; Scams; Secrecy; Trust; Étude de cas; Gullibilité; Escroqueries; Confidentialité; Confiance (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Published in Journal of Business Ethics, inPress, ⟨10.1007/s10551-018-3941-z⟩

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:journl:hal-02367650

DOI: 10.1007/s10551-018-3941-z

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