Scammers are continually devising new sweepstakes, gift card, medication, and romance schemes to trick seniors out of money or into sharing sensitive information. The Government Accountability Office estimates that older Americans lose $2.9 billion through financial fraud each year. And those are just the scams that get reported. The vast majority of them—whether because it’s a small amount of money or the victims feel ashamed and don’t want anyone to know—go unreported.
Here, experts offer some critical steps you can take to help keep vulnerable older adults from being cheated out of their savings.
Commiserate, don’t condescend
Acknowledging that scams happen across demographics, and using that as a way in to talk to older loved ones, can help make the conversation productive, not condescending. Amy Nofziger, director of fraud victim support for the AARP, says that sharing knowledge rather than lecturing is the best way in. “Just saying ‘Oh, my gosh, Mom, I just read this article about an email scam, do you want me to help set your email box up so anybody who is in your contacts is a high priority?’” is a great place to start, she says. “Or, ‘I don’t recommend looking at your spam email Mom, I would just delete it.’”
Use technology to your advantage
There’s some evidence that online scammers target younger people, while older adults are more likely to answer the phone, opening the door to telephone scams. “A really…
