Reports of six-figure scam losses among older Americans have soared since 2020. The Federal Trade Commission says adults 60 and older filed 6,769 such reports in 2025, up from 1,136 in 2020.
Here’s what to know
Adults 60 and older told the FTC they lost about $3 billion to fraud in 2025, compared with roughly $2.4 billion in 2024. According to InvestmentNews, that is about five times the amount reported in 2020.
The FTC also said the real damage was likely much larger because many scams go unreported, putting the possible total for older Americans as high as $119.5 billion depending on the underreporting model.
Among scam categories, investment fraud produced the biggest losses. People 60 and older reported $1.06 billion gone to those schemes in 2025, a 42% increase. Government impostor scams followed at $448 million, and business impostors — often pretending to be banks — were tied to another $422 million.
No initial contact method led to more reported losses than social media, which was linked to $750 million, about 12 times the 2020 figure. More than half of that amount came from investment scams, and romance scams made up 23%.
Phone-based fraud, though, hit harder on a case-by-case basis. The typical reported loss from phone contact was $3,000, compared with $599 for scams that began on social media. Among adults 80 and older, the median loss across fraud complaints rose 21% from $2,000 in 2024, the highest of any age group.
More background
That does not mean older adults were more likely than everyone else to lose money to fraud in the first place.
InvestmentNews reported that about 74% of fraud complaints involved no financial loss, and population-adjusted data showed adults 60 and older were 14% less likely than people ages 18 to 59 to report losing money.
But when older adults did lose money, the amounts were often far larger. After adjusting for population size, they were more than twice as likely as younger adults to report losses over $100,000.
Some scam types also seem to hit older victims especially hard. Compared with younger people, older adults were 48% more likely to report losing money to romance scams, 324% more likely to report a tech-support scam loss, and 112% more likely to say they lost money in a prize or sweepstakes scam.
A common impostor scam starts with a caller claiming an account has been compromised, then pressuring the victim to “protect” savings by wiring money, mailing cash, or depositing funds into a bitcoin ATM.
Many investment-fraud complaints described a social-media approach that led victims to fake crypto trading websites, with scammers mixing crypto-themed branding and tools with more traditional payment methods.
What’s being done?
In fiscal 2026, the FTC’s enforcement actions returned more than $513 million to consumers across all age groups, according to InvestmentNews. That total still falls well short of the elder-fraud losses outlined in the report.
During 2025, the FTC forwarded 680 high-loss complaints to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center. In 200 of those cases, the FBI’s Recovery Asset Team got involved; the matters included $18.7 million in reported losses, and banks froze more than $10.8 million.
The agency has been directing older adults who report major fraud losses to the Justice Department’s National Elder Fraud Hotline. The FTC said that system has connected more than 320 callers.
The FTC says it still lacks the tools it needs. One request it has made to Congress is to restore its ability to seek monetary relief under Section 13(b) of the FTC Act, after the Supreme Court narrowed that authority in 2021. The change would strengthen the agency’s ability to recover money from fraud rings.
Citing the jump in high-dollar complaints, the FTC said it needs stronger ways to step in. “The FTC is committed to protecting older Americans from scams,” Christopher Mufarrige, director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, said, per InvestmentNews, “including by taking every action necessary to shut down fraud operations.”
Where can I learn more?
These stories further show how the fraud trends in the FTC’s data can unfold in real life.
• In Illinois, a 90-year-old lost six figures to a romance scam, threatening his condo.
• A 72-year-old mother mailed cash to a fake missionary fiancé and lost $300,000.
• In New York, a 76-year-old handed over $60,000 after a fake bank text.
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