ABOUT ~ Darlene Petrie
Founder – Scam Prevention International
Darlene was raised in Edmonton, Alberta Canada but left there once she graduated high school. Not moving too far from home she has since lived in Calgary, where she worked 37 years in the helping profession. She had been nominated as an “Inspired Albertan” for her passion in helping the vulnerable. Darlene has a BA in Community Studies, is a mother of 3 adult children, grandmother of 5 and a proud great grandmother of 2 beautiful children.
Her passion for helping the vulnerable emanated because Darlene was scammed in March of 2019. She was looking up to the sky and asking God, “Why would You allow this to happen to me?” A song came on her phone by Christian artist Matthew West, called “Do Something”, which is about the homeless, the hungry, human trafficking and he says, She shook my fist up to heaven and said, “God why don’t you do something?” God’s reply to him was, “I did, I created you”. Darlene stopped in my tracks and looked up to heaven and said “OOOOOHHH, I’m supposed to be doing something about this”. Darlene founded Scam Prevention International in October 2019, not too long after being a victim of a romance scam. She spent 4 months being down on herself, feeling worthless, stupid, afraid I may lose my job because I lacked good decision-making skills as I was a manager of millions of dollars.
Now at this stage though Darlene, knew nothing about scams, nothing about romance scams, catfishing or social engineering. She knew she had a lot of researching to do. During her research she was surprised at the number of different types of scams there are. She felt overwhelmed but got to work. Darlene started posting online using infographics to bring awareness and education, she did Facebook lives, created courses, spoke at network meetings and summits. She can provide workshops on 77 different types of scams. Many people would give me great kudos, pats on the back, say this is definitely needed, great positive feedback She soon found out that pats on the back don’t pay the bills. Darlene tried to monetize Scam Prevention International only to find out what she had already learned from my 37 years in the nonprofit world, people don’t want to pay for prevention)(I started another business which does bring in the bread and butter but Scam Prevention is my passion
Company / Organization Website URL: https://scampreventioninternational.org/
Company or Guest LinkedIn URL: https://www.linkedin.com/in/darlene-petrie/
Company or Guest Twitter URL: https://twitter.com/scamprevention1
Company / Org Facebook Page URL: https://www.facebook.com/DarleneSPI/
Company/Org Messenger: https://www.messenger.com/t/2239605199468396
Darlene Petrie, Founder
Company Name: Scam Prevention International
Company Phone: (587) 432-6198
Personal Phone: (587) 432-6198
Email: Darlene@NoScam.ca