Scams targeting older adults have become a full-blown industry - organized, data-driven, and increasingly powered by AI. The FTC estimates Americans lost between $31 billion and $195 billion to fraud in 2024 alone, with older adults losing three times more per incident than younger victims. At Ankota, we work every day with the home care agencies and adult day centers that serve these vulnerable seniors, and we think this conversation belongs in our community.
Most people picture a scammer as some lone operator typing in a basement. The reality looks more like a corporate org chart. According to a recent episode of the Freakonomics Radio podcast - "Here's Why You Are Constantly Fighting Off Scammers" - today's fraud operations have HR departments, marketing teams, legal counsel, and quota-driven employees. They run A/B tests on their messaging. They have app developers who can build convincing fake investment platforms. And they have budgets large enough to buy stolen personal data at scale.
Kati Daffan, former assistant director at the FTC's Division of Marketing Practices, put it plainly: "It is absolutely an industry. A very complex, always evolving, very competitive industry."
The numbers are staggering. The FTC estimates that in 2024, fraud stole somewhere between $31.3 billion and $195.9 billion from Americans - the wide range reflecting how dramatically underreported these crimes are. The U.S. government separately estimates that scammers in Southeast Asia alone stole $10 billion from Americans last year. We're not talking about nuisance emails. We're talking about an organised global economy built on taking money from people.
Marti DeLiema, assistant professor of social work at the University of Minnesota and a leading researcher on fraud victimization, is careful not to traffic in the myth that older adults are simply "less sophisticated" or more trusting. The data is more nuanced than that. Middle-aged adults actually report fraud victimization at the highest frequency. But when older adults are victimized, the financial damage is significantly worse - roughly three times higher per incident. The FTC's most recent data shows adults 80 and older reporting median losses around $1,400, compared to around $400-500 for adults under 50.
Part of that gap is simple: older adults tend to have more assets to lose. Part of it is the specific scam types that disproportionately target them - tech support scams, grandparent impersonation scams, and romance-to-investment fraud. And part of it, DeLiema says, is that by the time an older adult realizes something is wrong, the losses have already compounded.
What makes this especially painful from a care perspective is the psychological aftermath. DeLiema, who comes to this work as a gerontologist, describes fraud as a "betrayal trauma" - one that frequently leads to shame, social withdrawal, and in serious cases, suicidal ideation. The financial loss is only part of the story.
Here are two personal anecdotes from Ken Accardi, Ankota's founder and CEO:
I've always thought of myself as someone who's pretty savvy about this stuff. I've been working in tech for decades. But a while back, our flight on American Airlines got canceled, and I needed to reach their AAdvantage desk. I Googled it, and without paying close enough attention, I clicked the first link that came up - which turned out not to be American Airlines at all. It was a scammer site. By the time I figured out what was happening, they already had enough of my information that - out of spite - they canceled our actual flight. We were lucky. My wife has high status with American, and we were able to get the airline to reinstate our reservation. But the lesson stuck with me: if this almost bit someone like me, it can bite anyone. A scam site ranking above the real airline in search results is plenty scary.
Around the same time, I came across an offer for a free Steinway piano - and it appeared to be coming from an address literally a block from our house in Boston. That felt real. I was interested. I pushed to actually go see the piano, and they kept deflecting - it's in a warehouse, we can ship it, just pay $500 for delivery. That's when I Googled "free piano scam" and realized immediately what was happening. The local angle was completely fabricated to make it feel credible. The same episode of Freakonomics that inspired this article opens with host Stephen Dubner getting the exact same piano scam - so I'm in good company. But it reminded me how convincing the setup can be when someone has done their homework on what would resonate with you specifically.
For the older adults that home care agencies and adult day programs serve, the two most dangerous categories are probably the grandparent scam and the romance scam. The grandparent scam - "Your grandson is in jail, send $10,000 now" - weaponizes love and urgency simultaneously. The romance scam targets something even deeper: loneliness. These aren't random. Scammers profile their targets and choose the emotional lever most likely to work.
AI has made both worse. Voice cloning technology can now replicate a grandchild's voice with only a few seconds of audio, making the grandparent scam nearly impossible to distinguish from a real emergency call. DeLiema was direct about this: "A.I. has made it so that all of our old consumer-education rules of thumb - we've had to throw out the window." If you want a broader look at where AI in home care is and isn't useful right now, we've written about that in "AI in Home Care: What's Actually Working (And What's Still Hype)".
If you want a fun way to start a conversation about elder fraud with an older family member or client, rent the 2024 film Thelma, starring June Squibb. Squibb plays a 93-year-old grandmother who gets scammed out of $10,000 by someone pretending to be her grandson over the phone. When the police tell her there's nothing they can do, she hops on her friend's motorized scooter and goes after the scammers herself - Mission Impossible style.
The film was written and directed by Josh Margolin, who based it on something that actually happened to his own grandmother. It's funny and heartwarming, but it's also unusually honest about how these scams work and why older adults are targeted. And it raises a question that echoes throughout the Freakonomics episode: why do we keep putting the burden of protection on the victims?
In real life, of course, it almost never goes like it does for Thelma. Most victims never recover their money. Many never report it at all - out of shame, or because they believe they were at fault.
One point from the Freakonomics episode that deserves more attention: the scamming ecosystem depends on platforms that, at minimum, look the other way. Leaked internal documents from Meta reportedly showed that 10 percent of their revenue came from ads for scams and banned items. Meta reportedly serves its users approximately 15 billion scam ads per day.
DeLiema didn't mince words: "The technical capabilities of taking those fake profiles down is there. I think what we saw with the recent Meta leak about the profits that they make from these scam ads really shows that they're making a calculated choice."
The FTC has started going after the enablers, not just the scammers. A recent case against payment processor Paddle alleged the company had been warned its clients were running scams - and chose to onboard them anyway, offering discounted fees in exchange for volume. Paddle settled for $5 million and a permanent ban from processing payments for certain telemarketers.
The U.K. and Australia are pushing further - requiring platforms and telecom companies to share legal responsibility for stopping scam messages before they reach consumers. The U.S. is, by most accounts, behind the curve on this.
The honest answer is that individual vigilance only goes so far. Mark Frank, professor of communications at the University at Buffalo, who studies lying and deception, put it clearly: "Part of the reason why cons work is that we want them to work. We want to believe we're getting the deal."
That said, DeLiema offers a practical framework: treat every unsolicited communication with scepticism, and independently verify information through channels you initiate yourself - not through phone numbers or links provided in the suspicious message. Don't call the number in the text. Don't click the link in the email. Go directly to the official website or call the number on the back of your card.
For care organizations serving older adults, this creates a real opportunity - and it's one of the places where running multiple care services actually pays off. An agency that operates both a home care service and an adult day program sees the same client across two different settings each week: the home care aide spots the unopened bills and the whispered phone calls, and the day program staff notice the new "friend" and the sudden secrecy around money. That's two independent windows into early warning signs that a single-service competitor simply can't match. Home care aides, adult day program staff, and self-direction care coordinators are often among the first people to notice when something seems off. Awareness training around common scam patterns isn't just good care practice; it can be financially protective for the people in your charge. (If you want a broader operator perspective on how diversified service lines compound in other ways too, the Ankota Home Care Growth Best Practices guide unpacks that in more detail.)
The technology side is also starting to help. Both Apple and Android now offer AI-powered call screening. Some phone companies are deploying AI systems specifically designed to engage and exhaust scammers' time. Anti-fraud AI is improving faster than most people realize - though, as DeLiema noted, "we're going to have A.I.s fighting A.I.s in this space very soon."
This article draws heavily from the Freakonomics Radio episode "Here's Why You Are Constantly Fighting Off Scammers," hosted by Stephen J. Dubner. The episode features three researchers and practitioners who have devoted serious work to understanding and fighting fraud:
It's an excellent listen. We recommend it to anyone who works with older adults or cares about keeping vulnerable people safe.
The seniors most at risk from fraud are often the same people relying on home care agencies, adult day programs, and in-home support services to stay safe and independent. If you're running one of those organizations, the technology you use to manage care can also support better communication with families - reducing the isolation that makes older adults more vulnerable in the first place.
If you're building or growing a care organization and want to see how Ankota supports home care agencies, adult day programs, and the broader care ecosystem, we'd love to show you what we've built. Contact us to schedule a conversation.
The FTC estimates that older adults lost at least $10.1 billion to fraud in 2024 under conservative assumptions - and potentially far more when accounting for underreporting. Adults 80 and over typically lose around $1,400 per incident on average, roughly three times what younger victims lose.
What types of scams most commonly target older adults?Tech support scams, grandparent impersonation scams, and romance-to-investment fraud (sometimes called "pig butchering") disproportionately affect older adults. Investment fraud also hits a surprising demographic - financially literate, upper-middle-class adults - because you need money to be a target of investment fraud.
How is AI making elder fraud worse?Voice cloning technology can now replicate a family member's voice from just a few seconds of audio, making phone impersonation scams nearly indistinguishable from a real emergency call. AI also allows scammers to write convincing, error-free messages at scale, eliminating one of the traditional red flags consumers were told to watch for.
What should caregivers and care organizations do to protect older adults from fraud?Train staff to notice warning signs - clients who seem anxious about money, mention new online relationships, or are behaving secretively about finances. Encourage open conversations about scam tactics. Help clients understand they should never act on financial requests made over unsolicited calls or messages, even if the caller seems familiar.
Why don't older adults report scams when they happen?Research consistently shows that shame is the primary barrier. Many victims blame themselves more than the scammers - a reflection, as University of Minnesota researcher Marti DeLiema notes, of a culture that still holds victims responsible. Underreporting also means the true scale of the problem is almost certainly larger than any official estimate. If a client or family member has been targeted, the FTC's reportfraud.ftc.gov is the official channel.
Is there anything being done at the regulatory level to stop fraud?The FTC pursues both scammers and the payment processors and platforms that enable them. The U.K. and Australia have gone further, requiring platforms and telecom companies to share legal responsibility for stopping scam messages. U.S. regulation is less aggressive, though enforcement actions are increasing.
What's the "grandparent scam" and how does it work?A caller impersonates a grandchild (or a lawyer or official acting on their behalf), claiming the grandchild is in trouble - arrested, in a hospital, in an accident - and urgently needs money. Scammers use fear and time pressure to prevent the victim from verifying the story. AI voice cloning now makes the caller sound exactly like the grandchild.
What is "pig butchering" fraud?Pig butchering is a long-con investment scam where the fraudster builds a relationship with the victim over weeks or months - often starting with a "wrong number" text - before introducing a fake cryptocurrency investment opportunity. Victims watch their fake balance grow, then find they can't withdraw when they try. The name refers to the practice of fattening a target before the slaughter.
Ankota's mission is to enable the Heroes who keep older and disabled people living at home to focus on care because we take care of the tech. If you need software for home care, EVV, I/DD Services, Self-Direction FMS, Adult Day Care centers, or Caregiver Recruiting, please Contact Ankota. And if you're ready to see how the most innovative agencies are using AI to empower their caregivers and automate the rest, meet your new companion at www.kota.care.