Scams and Older Consumers: Looking at the Data

The FTC recently sent a report to Capitol Hill legislators titled " Protecting Older Consumers 2018-2019 ." The report suggests steps that must be take to help safeguard seniors from fraud. Interestingly, the research determined that older men and women were the least likely of any age group to report losing money to scams. The overwhelming majority of fraud reports filed with the FTC's Consumer Sentinel Network by people 60 and over did not indicate any monetary loss. What's more, consumers in that age demographic spotted fraud and reported it before losing any money at nearly double the rate of people between the ages of 20 and 59. From the data, we can infer that even if they were able to spot scams before losing money, senior consumers have heeded the law enforcement call to report fraud. However, when older consumers did experience consumer fraud, their reported financial losses were greater than what younger consumers reported. Consequently, sharing information with older consumers about scams is still very important.