Elder financial abuse is now the costliest category of fraud in the United States, and the gap between it and everything else is widening. In 2025, more than 201,000 victims aged 60 and older reported losses exceeding $7.7 billion to the FBI, a 37 percent increase over the prior year. The average reported loss was above $38,000. For most families, that is not an inconvenience. That is a retirement.
Many of the households we work with in the Sacramento region are caring for aging parents while still saving for their own retirement. This article is written for them, and for the parents themselves.
What the 2025 data actually shows
The FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center publishes an annual report that breaks losses down by age. The 2025 edition found that adults 60 and over filed about 20 percent of all complaints but accounted for roughly 37 percent of all reported losses. Older victims lose disproportionately more per incident than any other age group.
The breakdown by scheme is instructive, because it does not match the popular image of the problem:
- Investment fraud, much of it involving cryptocurrency and fake trading platforms, caused about $3.5 billion in losses among victims 60 and over. It is the single largest category by a wide margin.
- Technical and customer support scams accounted for roughly $1 billion.
- Confidence and romance schemes accounted for about $584 million.
- Government impersonation accounted for roughly $413 million.
The Federal Trade Commission’s December 2025 report to Congress adds a troubling detail. Losses reported by older adults who lost more than $100,000 in a single episode rose roughly eight-fold, from $55 million in 2020 to $445 million in 2024. The catastrophic cases are growing faster than the ordinary ones.
Why older adults are targeted
It is worth dispensing with the assumption that victims are confused or careless. The people losing the largest sums are frequently sharp, financially literate, and managing their own affairs competently.
Older adults are targeted because they are more likely to hold significant liquid assets, to own their homes outright, to answer unknown phone numbers, and to have the time for the long, patient conversations that modern investment fraud requires. The schemes that produce the largest losses now unfold over weeks or months. A stranger builds a genuine-feeling relationship first and introduces the money later. That is a social engineering problem, not a cognitive one.
This distinction matters for families, because most elder financial abuse succeeds through patient persuasion rather than confusion, and approaching a parent as though the issue is declining judgment tends to end the conversation before it starts.
Which of these is a scam?
Recognizing the pattern matters more than memorizing any particular scheme. Open each scenario below to see the answer and the specific red flag it turns on. One of the five is not a scam.
1. A caller says he is from the Social Security Administration. Your mother’s number has been suspended because of suspicious activity, and he needs to verify her details.
2. Your father’s bank calls to say a charge was flagged and his card is frozen. The caller asks for no information and tells him to call the number printed on the back of his card.
3. A technician says your parent’s computer is infected, asks to connect remotely to remove the virus, and then requests payment in gift cards.
4. Someone your mother met online six months ago, and has never met in person, tells her about a trading platform that has been very good to him and offers to walk her through opening an account.
5. A grandson calls late at night from another state. He is in legal trouble, he is embarrassed, and he asks her not to tell his parents while a courier comes to collect cash.
Warning signs of elder financial abuse
Family members are usually the first to notice something, often well before any institution does. The signals worth attending to include:
- New secrecy or defensiveness about money, particularly from someone who was previously open about it
- Withdrawals, wire transfers, or account activity that does not match long-established habits
- A new acquaintance, caregiver, or online friend who has become unusually involved in financial matters
- Unopened mail, unpaid bills, or lapsed insurance in a household that has always been organized
- Sudden changes to a will, a deed, a beneficiary designation, or a power of attorney
- Purchases of gift cards in unusual quantities
Not one of these proves anything on its own. Two or three appearing together deserve a conversation.
Safeguards that make elder financial abuse harder
Freeze credit at all three bureaus
A security freeze is free by federal law and can be lifted temporarily whenever credit is genuinely needed. It has to be placed separately with Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion. For someone who is not actively borrowing, a permanent freeze carries essentially no cost and blocks the most common form of identity theft.
Name a trusted contact on every account
Brokerages and many banks allow a trusted contact to be designated on an account. That person cannot trade or withdraw. They can be called when the firm observes something concerning, and firms may place a temporary hold on a disbursement when exploitation is suspected. This is one of the highest-value steps available, it takes a few minutes, and it is badly underused.
Set up read-only visibility
Many institutions permit view-only access for a family member, or account alerts sent to a second email address for transactions above a set threshold. This preserves a parent’s full autonomy while removing the isolation that these schemes depend on.
Agree on a family verification rule
Decide together, in advance, that no financial request arriving by phone, text, or email will ever be acted on the same day, and that a code word or a call back to a known number is required. Making this a household policy rather than a judgment call removes the pressure that urgency is designed to create.
Put durable documents in place while they are easy to sign
A durable power of attorney and updated beneficiary designations are far simpler to execute during good health than during a crisis. California also maintains an Adult Protective Services system in every county, and financial institutions in the state have mandated reporting obligations when they suspect financial abuse of an elder or dependent adult.
If you suspect it is happening now
Move quickly, because recovery odds fall sharply with time. Contact the bank or brokerage immediately and request a recall on any wire transfer. File a report with the FBI at the IC3 elder fraud portal, and report identity theft at IdentityTheft.gov. The Department of Justice operates a National Elder Fraud Hotline at 833-372-8311, staffed Monday through Friday, which will help with the reporting process itself.
Resist the urge to lead with blame. Shame is the reason the majority of these cases are never reported at all, and an unreported case is one that frequently continues.
Where an advisor fits
A significant part of this work is simply having a second set of eyes on the accounts and a standing relationship in which an unusual request can be questioned without anyone taking offense. We help families put trusted contacts in place, review beneficiary designations and powers of attorney, and establish the verification habits described above before they are needed. We also serve as a place to call when something feels wrong and a client wants an opinion before acting.
The relevant primary sources are worth reading directly: the FBI publishes its 2025 Internet Crime Report, and the Federal Trade Commission publishes its annual report to Congress on protecting older consumers.
If you would like help reviewing how your parents’ accounts are structured, or your own, we invite you to schedule a free 30-minute call. There is no cost and no obligation.
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Rooney Wealth Management LLC is an investment adviser registered with the state of California. This article is for educational purposes only and is not tax, legal, or investment advice. Please consult your tax or financial professional regarding your specific situation.
