In today's environment of Internet-based scams, anyone who doesn't do the minimum due diligence gets no sympathy from me.
My mom was close to retirement when I bought her a PC with all the trimmings, including setting up her cable Internet service. Since I was in HI and she in NC, I knew she'd need my help but would have difficulty over the phone (it took me almost an hour to walk her through unplugging her mouse and plugging in a trackball).
So, I installed pcAnywhere so I could remote into her PC and fix problems and install updates.
Now that she was cruising the Information Super-Highway, I constantly reminded her how to avoid scams, and to ask if she was ever concerned.
One day she got a call from "her bank" trying to get her to verify her checking information by reading them info from a check. She kept them on the line for 2 hours! She kept asking obvious questions, and when told to get her checkbook, she couldn't find it.

Right after that, she called the local FBI office as I'd told her and filed a report. The scammer called back the same week. My mom ran him in circles for so long, he started calling her stupid and slinging all sorts of insults!

If an elderly woman with zero IT experience can be taught to protect herself from scammers, I don't believe a college-educated IT "expert" is unable to do the same.
It's arrogance and hubris which is in play. If you think you're smarter/better than scammers, you'll pretend it can't happen to you.
I'm not the slightest bit surprised to hear this is not the first time OMIGOD has been taken to the cleaners. If you have to touch a glowing, red burner on a stovetop to know it's hot, and you've been burned before, obviously you're a slow learner.
The first time I made a purchase or bid on an auction on eBay, I read whatever I could find on protecting myself from scams and how to tell a bogus ad from a real on. The same was true on Craig's List, Amazon, Newegg, Gun Broker, etc. The ONLY time I was taken was for $60 for a Kydex holster. I was traveling back and forth to NC because My mom was in a care center after a series of strokes. I finally sat down after a month or more and realized I hadn't received a shipping email. When I contacted the seller, they said they were back ordered due to high demand. This was during the Sandy Hook aftermath when every gun store in the country was sold out of everything. They gave a date it should ship, and I accepted that. Two months later, nothing. Tried them again, and couldn't contact them. Turns out, they closed the online storefront without delivery thousands of orders. I only ordered with them because an ad was being shared on FB through reputable gun-related accounts.
After searching the BBB for the company, I learned they had 100+ complaints and were no longer active. Since it was 3 months or more since the order, my credit card company couldn't do a charge-back. Just what I needed on top of the stuff I was dealing with in NC.
I still don't know for sure it was a scam. It may have very well been a legit business that ran into cash flow problems and decided stiffing paying customers was their best option. Although, I do know scammers take the time and effort to set up LLCs for a phony business, take orders (and payments), then run off with the cash only to do it again and again. By ripping off each customer for less than $100, they can be pretty sure no single customer is going to make a effort to find and sue them.
So, yes these things can and do happen everyday. But that doesn't mean you can be sloppy and lazy and shrug it off as, "That's life".
"Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me." if you can't be bothered to search for readily available information at your fingertips, you deserve what you get. One of the easiest is to just Google the name of the retailer and the word "scam". Anyone reporting a scam that matches should appear. Often, if it's a well established company, you can find individual blogs reviewing the company in great detail.
There's no magic shield to protect against scammers, but that doesn't mean you should make it easy for them.

I'm trying to not make this insulting -- just objectively truthful. Sometimes the truth hurts.