PENNSYLVANIA, USA — Imposters, online shopping, prizes, sweepstakes and lotteries, investments, and job opportunities:
Those round out of the top 5 scams reported to the Federal Trade Commission last year.
Americans lost more money than ever before to these schemes, more than $8 billion.
These are just the scams being reported, so the true cost is likely much higher.
Investment scams are getting trickier
There's one type of fraud that is on the rise and that's investment scams.
Financial losses in investment scams more than doubled over the past year.
With inflation and stock market swings, people are looking for ways to make money, and scammers are taking it.
These scams give off plenty of red flags, like promising you can earn a lot of money quickly with little to no effort.
Even in the world of social media marketing, that's highly unlikely.
People between the ages of 20 and 29 are most likely to fall for the scam.
However, the people who lost the most money tend to be people over 65.
These scams are becoming more sophisticated by the day.
At this point, any text or phone call you get about a bill or account should make you suspicious.
Just log into your account yourself or call a company to confirm because if you do become a victim it is often really hard to get any of your money back - and the odds are not in your favor.
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