How to Spot and Stop Financial Scams

The number of Americans at least 60 years old who filed a report that they had been a victim of a financial scam has increased fourfold since 2020. And the total amount of losses for people who were scammed out of at least $100,000 has grown from $55 million in 2020 to $445 million in 2025.

Sadly, the losses are likely much higher, as these statistics are only for people who filed a report with the Federal Trade Commission.

I have some advice on how to reduce your risk of being victimized by a financial fraudster. For those of you with elderly parents, I hope you will find a gentle and respectful way to share my advice. Even better, maybe it opens the door to a new family system: if a parent receives an email, phone call, text, or letter telling them a financial account has been hacked, make it a family policy that the first thing they will do is NOTHING. And the second thing they will do is contact you for advice.

Okay, the most important thing to know is how tricky and talented the scammers are. They have become extremely good at pretending they are legitimate contacts at places we do business. They pose as being from the fraud unit at a bank, or investment account, or they might even say they are from a popular business (Amazon, for example) and have spotted suspicious activity.

Scammers are even posing as government employees and alerting a target that their Social Security number is being used for some criminal activity, such as drug smuggling.

And it works because it triggers our fear, and we want to alleviate that feeling. So we become susceptible to believing the fraudster and follow their “advice.” That usually involves agreeing to send them money or to share key financial data so they can then hack our accounts and steal the money.

Here’s how to make yourself a lousy target for financial fraud:

• If you are contacted by anyone telling you there’s a problem with a bank/investment/online account, slow down. Do Nothing. Don’t tell that person on the other end of the line anything, or don’t return an email or text.  Slow down. Deep breath. And calmly tell yourself: “This could be a scam, let me carefully check things out.”
• Check your account, using your contact information. If someone tells you there is a problem with your bank account, don’t rely on any email or phone number they tell you to use. Absolutely not! Instead, log into your account, or pull up a recent statement: that’s the only contact information you should trust. Call the general line and ask for the fraud department.
• And don’t even trust someone who says they are from the FTC. Yep, the scammers have been known to pose as FTC employees who say they are trying to protect you from fraud.
• Add your phone number to The National Do Not Call Registry. This free service removes your phone number from telemarketing lists. Scammers may still have a way of getting to you, but removing your contact info from telemarketing lists makes their job just that much harder. You can also report fraudulent calls at the same website.

And if you are a victim of fraud, please let go of any sense of blame or shame. The scammers have become so very convincing. You did nothing wrong, other than have the bad luck of being a human being, and as human beings, fear can make us do plenty of things in the moment that are not in our best interests.

A first step if you have been scammed is to file a fraud report with the FTC. That won’t get you your money back, but it may help catch the scammers if the government can find patterns of what is happening.