Did you know that IRS scams ranked #1 among all the senior scams reported to the Senate Aging Committee’s Fraud Hotline last year? And robocalls or unwanted calls ranked second, despite the use of the national Do Not Call Registry? In their recent report, Fighting Fraud: Senate Aging Committee Identifies Top 10 Scams Targeting Our Nation’s Seniors, the United States Senate Committee on Aging identifies these top 10 scams and provides an in-depth overview of the scam and scammers tactics with some case examples. It also reports on current actions being taken to combat the scams, their successes and tips for seniors on how to avoid these scams and where to report them.
The 10 top scams covered in the report are:
- IRS Impersonation Scams
- Robocalls and Unsolicited Phone Calls
- Sweepstakes Scams/Jamaican Lottery Scam
- “Can You Hear Me?” Scams
- Grandparent Scams
- Computer Tech Support Scam
- Romance Scams
- Elder Financial Abuse
- Identity Theft
- Government Grant Scams
For more information, read the full report. To report such scams, you can call the Senate Aging Committee’s Fraud Hotline at 1-855-303-9470. For any Medicare-related fraud, you can call our California Senior Medicare Patrol at 1-855-613-7080.