Nothing has brought me more love, joy and peace than being a good husband and good daddy.
— Frank Abagnale
There are many ways to manipulate chip cards. For example, a number of years ago when American Express issued the first chip card, criminals would take a small hammer with a little device and bang the chip to destroy it without hurting the physical appearance of the card.
Had I been older, I would've never been able to pull it off because I would've analyzed it to death. When I was 16, there was no such thing as 'what if.'
When I was 28 years old, I thought it would be great to have a movie about my life. I was egotistical and self-centered.
A real man loves and respects his wife and is not only a good father but a man that his kids want to call 'Daddy.'
Unlike most divorces, where the children were usually the first to know, my parents were very good about keeping that a secret.
I teach ethics at the FBI academy, which is ironic.
I have never witnessed, nor will I live long enough to witness, a more simplistic crime than me stealing your identity.
You should know, whether you live in the U.S. or in the U.K., that your identity has already been stolen.
I went to the library and learned how checks work. I found out that routing numbers are like zip codes: the checks are sent to the bank that correlates to the routing number. If I manipulate those numbers to a bank far away, it would take longer to get back to the bank, which gave me more time to write more bad checks.
I learned early that class is universally admired.
Every form of payment has some risk associated with it.
Most people don't recognize me, but they know my name. TSA people rarely recognize my name, ironically, and they are the security people.
You get to a point in your life where you go, 'I don't remember what I did.'
Had I been older - maybe 25 or 30 - I would have never tried half the things I did because I would have rationalized everything and never did it.
I didn't like taking money from individuals.
I'm so different from the egotistical, self-centred person I was when I did those things. And to watch someone acting out your memories on the screen is like reliving it. Like someone taking you back and showing you what you did.
Only one thing makes a man a man. He loves his wife, is faithful to her, and puts his wife and kids as the most important things in life.
A lot of times, when I met somebody and took them out on a date, I obviously didn't tell them my background, because I didn't think I'd see them but once or twice.
A lot of people say I was brilliant. I wasn't. I was an opportunist: a young entrepreneur who saw things and took advantage.
I always knew I'd get caught sooner or later. And I knew I would end up going to prison.
I know that people are fascinated by what I did as a teenager, but what I did was immoral, illegal, unethical, and something that I am not proud of - nor will I ever be proud of.
By the time I had reached the age of 16, in the 10th grade, my parents, after 22 years of marriage, one day decided to get a divorce.
I'm glad I'm a draw. People know that, not only am I the guy that did it, I spent 40 years on the other side.
Every breach you look at occurred because somebody inside did something they weren't supposed to do. Sometimes there's an accomplice, but most of the time, it's innocent.
You have to believe in what you do. Take something you truly believe in and go about it in an honest way.
If you look at any successful professional - a salesperson, a marketer, a real estate agent, a trader - they all have the same qualities as the con man. The only difference is that one side uses their talents in the right direction and the con man is taking the easy way out.
I kept a notebook, a surreptitious journal in which I jotted down phrases, technical data, miscellaneous information, names, dates, places, telephone numbers, thoughts, and a collection of other data I thought was necessary or might prove helpful.
I don't do online banking.
I don't believe that a piece of paper will excuse my actions. In the end, only my actions will.
It's amazing how much information we share in social media, then we wonder why people steal our identity.
I think I was so successful, not because I was brilliant, but because I was so young. I had no fear of consequences.
We're coming down to an extremely unethical society. Very few colleges offer courses in ethics, and very few companies have a code of conduct or code of ethics.
My father was never really the con-man type that the film shows him to be: he was straight as an arrow, though he did have problems with the IRS.
I went from 198 pounds to 109 while I was in prison in France, and I had to tie my clothes on with rope.
Everything I have today was because of the love of a woman.
We all grow up. Hopefully, we get wiser. Age brings wisdom, and fatherhood changes one's life completely.
You can sit in a room and create anything you want on a laptop. That's why the real con men are gone.
I make my home in Tulsa.
Too many of us are vulnerable, and I look forward to working with AARP to advise people about the safest ways to conduct their financial transactions and manage social media.
It is amazing the information we give away. We make it easier and easier for criminals.
You fight technology with technology, so you have to stay one step ahead of the criminal. It's very much a chess game - they make a move, you have to make a move.
It's about taking the time to research and think things out. Honest people and criminals do the same thing; just the direction, good or bad, is different.
Almost any fault, sin or crime is considered more leniently if there's a touch of class involved.
I was always accepted at par value. I wore the uniform of a Pan Am pilot; therefore, I must be a Pan Am pilot.
If I check into a hotel, a lot of times, they know who I am.
If I wanted to lay down a baby con, I could say I was the product of a broken home. But I'd only be bum-rapping my parents.
I didn't sit outside the bank and plan. I just went in and ad libbed because I was so young. But I was smart enough to know I would absolutely get caught.
If I had walked into a dry cleaning store, and I had looked over, and the register drawer was open with money inside, I wouldn't have taken it.
People care about others in their immediate network.
