World Elder Abuse Day: Tips to Protect Seniors

Scams targeting seniors are increasing every year, and the losses are substantial. The Federal Trade Commission reports that when those aged 60 and older are more scammed, the losses are significant, and the number of older adults reporting losses of $100,000 or more has increased more than three times since 2020. This number could be even higher, as many people don’t file a report with the authorities after being scammed.

In recognition of World Elder Abuse Awareness Day, we wanted to offer examples of common scams against the elderly and provide advice on how to protect seniors from scams and financial abuse.

Examples Of Financial Exploitation Scams Targeting Seniors

While some scams involve people acting from thousands of miles away, the Department of Justice reports that many financial exploitation scams happen much closer to home and involve someone the victim trusts. Elder abuse prevention starts with being aware of these scams and what to watch for.

The Deed Transfer Scam

Someone convinces a relative to add them to the deed of their house. This could be an adult son or daughter living in the home, or a spouse from a second marriage wanting to add their own children to the deed. The victim signs a property transfer document without realizing they have given up their full ownership of the property.

The Relative Identity Theft Scam

While identity theft often involves strangers, sometimes it happens when someone’s child or grandchild takes out loans or credit cards in their name. The victim finds out when they receive credit card bills or requests for payment with their name on them.

Power Of Attorney Abuse

A senior citizen with cognitive issues gives their power of attorney to an adult child or friend who misuses their authority to extract funds. Some seniors have granted their power of attorney to a nefarious relative without realizing it, because they were asked to sign some documents and didn’t ask or understand why they were doing so.

Friends and Acquaintances

A retiree may ask a friend or acquaintance for help with certain activities, such as using the computer or running errands. In some situations, a retiree offers room and board to a friend in exchange for companionship and assistance with various tasks. The “friend” takes this opportunity to steal from the victim’s bank accounts and possibly gain power of attorney over them.

Financial Advisor Scams

An investment advisor, an accountant, or a tax preparer offers to invest a senior citizen’s money on their behalf. Instead, the scammer steals their funds and might even take control of their home, while creating phony documents to convince the victim that the money is invested and earning a positive return.

Common Internet Scams That Target Seniors

The Internet and social media allow scammers to collect all kinds of personal information about someone that they can use to scam them. The use of Artificial Intelligence is increasingly used by scammers to create very convincing letters, emails, and to impersonate the voice of someone the victim knows. Here are a few examples of common scams against the elderly:

The Grandparent Scam

The FBI warns that grandparent scams are becoming one of the more prevalent types of senior citizen scams. In fact, the Department of Justice recently charged 25 Canadians with running a multimillion-dollar grandparent scam that defrauded American seniors in multiple states.

It starts when a scammer calls a senior citizen, posing as their grandchild, and requests money because of an “emergency” such as being in a traffic accident, or they were arrested and need bail. In some cases, the scammer claims to be an attorney representing the grandchild.

The scammer tells the grandparent not to tell anyone. They might claim there’s some sort of gag order imposed by a judge, or they’re too embarrassed. The grandparent transfers a large sum of money to the scammer’s account or is asked to give a large amount of cash to someone posing as a bail bondsman or a courier.

Tech-Support Scams

The FBI warns that between January and June 2023, there were 19,000 complaints of tech-support scams reported to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center, with victim losses estimated at more than $542 million. Many of these victims were senior citizens.

With a tech-support scam, someone poses as a tech-support person from a legitimate company, such as a software company. They contact the victim through a phone call, text, email, or a pop-up window on the victim’s computer. The scammer claims the victim’s computer has been compromised, and they tell the victim to download and install software. The scammer pulls information from the computer to hack into the victim’s online accounts, engage in identity theft, or lock up the computer and demand a ransom.

Financial Institution Imposters

A scammer poses as a representative of a financial institution, such as a bank or an investment company, and tells the victim their financial accounts have been hacked. The scammer might ask for the victim’s passwords or to grant access to their computer or financial accounts.

Some scammers tell the victim to transfer their money to keep it safe, either through wire transfer, cryptocurrencies, or handing cash to a courier. They tell the victim not to tell anyone about this and to lie to their bank about why they’re transferring funds.

The Government Imposter Scam

A scammer contacts a victim, claiming to represent the Federal Reserve, the FBI, or some other agency. The scammer might even send an email or a letter that appears to be official government correspondence. The scammer creates an excuse for the victim to transfer money, such as claiming the victim has been scammed or their accounts have been compromised.

The Romance Scam

Americans lost more than $1.2 billion to romance scams in 2024, according to the FTC. Romance scammers create fake profiles on social media, dating apps, and video gaming sites to find their victims. They flood the victim with attention and pretend to fall in love, but say they can’t meet in person because they live or work in another country. They might also claim to be in the U.S. military.

Once the victim bites on that emotional hook, the scammer reels them in by offering help with investing, such as cryptocurrencies. They might ask for financial help for various “emergencies” or to send money for a plane ticket so they can come visit the victim. The scammer keeps this up for as long as possible, offering all kinds of excuses why they need money but can’t meet in person.

How to Avoid Financial Elder Abuse

Giving someone else the power of attorney or even partial control over your finances can alleviate the burden of having to manage these affairs yourself, especially if you become incapacitated. Unfortunately, it can also be a chance for someone to take advantage of you. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has advice on protecting older adults from fraud and elder abuse prevention, but here are some key points to consider:

Act Before You Need to

A stroke, a fall, or some other health issue could happen at any time, so it’s important to get your affairs in order while you still have full control over your health, finances, and lifestyle.

Choose Your Power of Attorney Carefully

Take the time to think about the best choice for this job. It should be someone you can trust, such as a friend, family member, or attorney. You might choose more than one person so they can watch over each other.

Have a Trusted Contact

A trusted contact is someone you choose for your bank and other financial institutions to contact if they suspect that fraud is taking place. It could be someone who has your power of attorney, or someone else, and you can choose how much information the bank will share with this person. Your trusted contact won’t have access to your money, but they could help your bank determine if you’re being scammed and notify the authorities. You might have more than one trusted contact, in case your first choice can’t be reached or is stealing from you.

Get Organized

Have all your important legal and financial documents organized and kept in a safe place that you can easily access in an emergency. This would include your account and statements from your bank and any other financial institutions, including your insurance providers, Social Security benefits, credit cards, and debts. Give copies to those you trust and make sure they know where to find them. This will be important if you need to act quickly to secure your accounts.

How Seniors Can Avoid Being Scammed

One of the most important things for someone to avoid being scammed is to avoid revealing personal information (such as your Social Security number, your date of birth, or any account numbers) until you’ve verified that the request is legitimate. Take the time to investigate, avoid making a rushed decision, and rely on people you can trust to keep you safe.

Don’t Keep It a Secret

If someone asks you to send money and not tell anyone, that’s a huge red flag and a sign that it’s probably a scam. Scammers might ask you to transfer money from your bank, but to lie about your reasons for doing so. Don’t listen to them.

Watch for Unusual Payment Methods

Scammers might ask you to hand a large amount of cash to someone you don’t know, to send money using gift cards, to transfer money through a retail store, or to use cryptocurrencies. Any of these methods would most likely be a scam.

Take Your Time

Scammers create a sense of urgency to get people to act without thinking. If someone wants you to send money in a hurry, grant access to your computer or your accounts, stop and think about this before you act. Take the time to verify and investigate.

Investigate

If someone claims to be your banker or broker, someone from the government, or law enforcement, write down their information and a callback number. You can then hang up and call back using a number that you know is legitimate. You can look up the number online, call directory assistance, or check your records to make sure.

Verify

If someone claims to be a family member, such as a grandchild, or says they’re calling on the grandchild’s behalf, you could call the grandchild at their known number or call other family members to find out what’s going on.

Watch out for Phony Emails

Scammers might send you an email that claims to be from your bank, credit card, the government, etc. and they ask you to click on a link, download an attachment, or install software onto your phone or computer. Don’t do any of these things unless you can make sure that it’s legit. If the email claims to be from your bank or credit card company, you can call your bank or credit card to verify if it’s legit.

How Vision Bank Protects Our Customers

At Vision Bank we take your financial security seriously. We have dozens of articles on our blog about security best practices and how to avoid scams. We make it easy for our customers to report lost or stolen debit cards. Our online banking portal uses timeout features, encryption technology, and multifactor authentication to keep your accounts secure. For your physical security, we use deposit holds, card control processing, deposit holds, and callbacks on wire transfers to verify the transaction.