[ponker]

You can change your last name to Rockefeller, and some get away with it [1], but usually you'd be exposed because not only would you not have the right clothes, manners, alma maters, accent, etc... but most of all, you wouldn't know the right people. "Oh you're a Rockefeller, eh? So I'll see you at the Wickliffe's garden party in Martha's Vineyard this June?"

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Gerhartsreiter

[bravura]

Although I agree with your general sentiment, it seems that Christian Gerhartsreiter got quite far (e.g. member of the Algonquin club), and wasn't discovered because of poor manners or a declasse accent or the wrong clothes, but for parental child abduction.

[ponker]

Yep. He even married a McKinsey partner back when that was an admirable career.