Con artists targeting aging Maryland residents steal millions of dollars. Here are the most common scams in the state. Scammers posing as IRS agents is the most frequent scam targeting Maryland's elderly residents, authorities say.
There's a strong chance your parents or grandparents have already gotten a call or two trying to scare them into forking over their money. Some thieves pose as grandchildren who have been jailed or stranded in need of cash, while another ploy is to pose an Internal Revenue Service agent demanding gift cards to settle bogus tax claims.
See below for tips on what you can do right now to protect yourself and your relatives.
The "grandparent scam," for example, tries to trick elderly residents into believing their grandchild or another loved one has been thrown in jail, kidnapped or faces some other immediate peril that requires an immediate wire transfer of money or even an iTunes gift card. Clever con artists use sophisticated technology that includes recordings of the supposedly ransomed grandchild's voice, making the calls seem frighteningly real.
In another version of the scam, someone pretends to be the loved one — accounting for the change in voice by claiming a broken nose.
The scammers were convincing enough to steal $42 million from their victims over a recent 15-month period, according to a report to the Senate Special Committee on Aging, which is looking into scams against some of the nation's most vulnerable. And $42 million is just a conservative estimate of actual losses in the grandparent scam.
"That's outrageous, isn't it?" said Kathy Stokes, the director of AARP's Fraud Prevention Program. "They were probably asking for relatively small amounts of $500."
In Maryland, the top scams targeting the elderly are:
· IRS Impersonation Scam
· Computer Tech Support Scams
· Impending Law Suit Scams
· Health-Related Scams
· Unsolicited Phone Calls
Residents of our state made 62 complaints to the Senate Special Committee on Aging Fraud Hotline in 2017, but that figure does not represent reports that might have been made to state attorneys general offices and other watchdog groups.
'IRS, IRS, IRS To, Boom, Social Security'
Con artists quickly change tactics. Scammers stole $65 million from the elderly alone through the IRS impersonation scam over a three-year period ending in 2018, but the volume of calls dropped dramatically after a series of high-profile arrests, according to the Senate Special Committee on Aging.
It's as if con artists "turned over a page in the imposter script, and overnight, it went from IRS, IRS, IRS to, boom, Social Security," Stokes said. "It just exploded."
Crafty scammers spoof 202-area-code federal-government office numbers to make the calls look like the real thing, then use a scam to perpetuate a scam, telling their targets their Social Security account has been hacked, and they need the Social Security number to reinstate it before benefits are lost, Brauer of the National Council on Aging said.
"You worry about, 'oh no, my account,'" he said.
Clever identity thieves pose as representatives of banks, credit card companies, creditors or government agencies and try to get their targets to give up sensitive information like account numbers, Social Security numbers, mothers' maiden names, passwords and other identifying information. There are some easy ways to spot a scam call, but the most important thing people can do is hang up immediately and then call back at the number on an account statement or in a phone book.
The Social Security scam now supersedes the IRS impersonation scam in frequency of calls, Stokes said.
In Maryland, victims had lost $1.8 million to the IRS impersonation scam as of Jan. 31, 2018.
A scammer duped an Annapolis resident in July 2018 by claiming to call from the Internal Revenue Service and demanding payment for taxes. To pay the bogus tax claim, the resident purchased gift cards and then called the scammer back to read the numbers, Annapolis Police said.
A day after he gave the scammers the gift card numbers, the resident said he received a phone call from someone claiming to be from the police department, who told he needed to pay more money or he would be arrested. The Caller ID displayed the Annapolis Police Department's administrative phone line, 410-268-9000. This time the resident did not purchase gift cards.
Police say this is a fraud using Caller ID spoofing. "The IRS will not call you and demand payment using gift cards. We will not call and tell you that you have a warrant and that you need to send us money or buy gift cards," says the police department.
The "grandparent scam" is one of several in the arsenal con artists use in a $37 billion annual industry that targets about 5 million older Americans each year, according to government data
Overall, the top 10 scams on elderly Americans are:
- IRS impersonation scams
- Robocalls / unsolicited phone calls
- Sweepstakes / Jamaican lottery scam
- "Can you hear me?" scam
- Grandparent scam
- Computer scam
- Romance scam
- Elder financial abuse
- Identity theft
- Government grant scam
'Simple, Yet Very Devious'
Aging Americans are con artists' targets of choice, partly because they're seen by scammers as vulnerable, but primarily because of a perception "they're sitting on piles of money," said Randy Brauer of the National Council on Aging.
The "grandparent scam" is "simple, yet very devious" in that it "exploits that relationship a grandparent has with a grandchild," Brauer said.
Several of his colleagues' parents or grandparents have received these calls, Bauer said, and they were able to keep scammers on the line while verifying the safety and whereabouts of a younger relative supposedly in a bind.
It may seem like common sense that "if your kids is really in trouble, they're not going to get an iTunes gift card to get out of jail," Brauer said, but the ruse works when con artists press the point and pass gift cards off as the quickest way to get the child out of harm's way or as an official form of government tender.
The terrified grandparent may think, "this is the new digital age; this is how I'm supposed to do this," he said.
The Federal Trade Commission fielded almost 15,000 complaints about the scam in 2016, but the true number of older Americans preyed upon is unknown. The problem with reporting, Stokes says, is that victims risk heaping on more emotional abuse if they report it. That comes from decades of society treating elderly people reeled in by scammers as feeble and incompetent rather than as crime victims.
Mom And Dad, Can We Talk?
Stokes has a script for her own mother in the event she gets a call about the grandparent scam — or any one of several that try to emotionally rattle elderly Americans into giving up Social Security or Medicare account numbers by telling them their benefits are in peril.
"I'm having tea with Officer Brady," Stokes instructed her mother to say. "I can't talk right now."
What Stokes has done is good advice for anyone looking after elderly relatives, though convincing her mom to admit she needed a plan wasn't an easy sell. Stokes's mom is armed with more knowledge about fraud than most aging Americans by virtue of her daughter's job. "But sometimes she won't listen to me," Stokes said.
"Maybe your mom isn't going to listen because she's being obstinate — go to the Fraud Watch Network, get that tipsheet, print that out and tell them, 'If you don't believe me, read this,'" she advised. "Maybe that will help you break through."
Though delicate and difficult, no one looking after an aging parent or grandparent should put off the conversation, Stokes said.
"Growing up, my mom and dad told me not to talk to strangers," she said. "It's time for us to remind our parents to be suspicious and engage their inner skeptic."
______________
What you can do right now to protect yourself and your relatives:
- Be leery about anyone calling on the phone about any emergency. Get a phone number to call back and verify the whereabouts and safety of the person the call is about.
- Never give out Social Security, Medicare or financial account information over the phone.
- In general, avoid answering calls from numbers you don't recognize.
- Don't confirm any personal information. Avoid saying "yes" to any question, as calls may be recorded and the answer can be used as consent for a purchase you didn't request.
- Don't press any numbers to stop calls. That will likely increase the number of robocalls you get, signaling to the scammers they've reached an active number.
- Change your voicemail message so it doesn't reveal your name or other personal information. If you want a legitimate caller to know they've reached you, go ahead and put your phone number on the message.
- Don't return calls that claim to be from the IRS, the Social Security Administration, your bank or a local police or sheriff's department. If you think the message is legitimate, don't return the number left on a voicemail. Instead, look up the legitimate phone number.
- Register both your landline and your cellphone numbers on the Do Not Call Registry
- Report robocalls and other unwanted calls with the FTC, by phone at (888) 382-1222 or (877) 382-4357.
- The FCC also has tips on how to stop unwanted and illegal robocalls.
Maryland State Government
Lydia L. Williams - Program Manager
Guardianship, Legal Services and Elder Abuse Programs
Maryland Department on Aging
301 W. Preston Street, Room 1007
Baltimore, MD 21201
410-767-4665 Direct
410-333-7943 Fax
www.aging.maryland.gov
