NH seniors continue to fall prey to scammers as schemes proliferate

Victim of a phone scam? The New Hampshire Department of Justice’s Consumer Protection Hotline is open weekdays from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. and can be reached by calling 1-888-468-4454 or (603)-271-3641.

By Shawne K. Wickham

They pose as bankers, government agents, IT experts, lottery officials, romantic partners — even relatives — with one goal: Stealing your money.

Despite ongoing news stories and warnings from law enforcement agencies, more than 100,000 Americans fell for scams last year — and two-thirds of them were seniors.

New FBI statistics show more than 400 New Hampshire residents 60 and older fell victim to scams in 2023 at a loss of more than $11 million.

Why is this happening?

Kristen Setera, spokesperson for the FBI’s Boston division, which includes New Hampshire, said seniors are targeted for several reasons. “They’re often more polite and trusting,” she said. “They may be lonely and spend a great deal of time alone.”

But she went on, “We also think they’re a ripe group for targeting because they’re financially stable and own their own homes.”

Bryan Townsend, senior assistant attorney general, said that while not only seniors fall victim to a variety of scams, “They’re targeted first and foremost because they have the most assets.”

“They’re a generation that saved well, that planned well, they have a variety of investment accounts that they can tap into, and scammers know that,” he said.

Townsend, who is the lead prosecutor for the Department of Justice’s elder abuse and financial exploitation unit, said the number of people engaging in this kind of criminal conduct is on the rise, both within the United States and internationally. In some ways, we’re making it easier for them.

“The more that our lives become automated, and we purchase things online, and our lives become online, our personal identifying information gets shared, and ultimately gets stolen and gets compromised,” he said.

As the population ages, scammers are changing how they approach potential victims, the FBI’s Setera said.

“The younger seniors, the Baby Boomers, have more computer skills than the older seniors, which means criminals are modifying their targeting techniques,” she said. “While the traditional scam artists and bad actors will use telephone calls and mass mailings, now there are burgeoning online scams like phishing and email scamming.”

Scammers often insist on confidentiality in their dealings with their targets, and do research online to find out details about their targets to be more convincing, Setera said.

One-fourth are tech scams

According to the FBI’s annual report on elder fraud, tech support fraud was the No. 1 scam perpetrated on seniors last year, while investment scams were the most costly for that group. Nationally, total losses topped $3.4 billion, an 11% increase from those reported in 2022.

In New Hampshire, 97 out of the 408 cases reported last year involved tech support scams. Romance or confidence scams led to the highest loss amounts here, a total of $2.45 million, followed by nearly $1.8 million from tech support scams.

As staggering as those numbers are, experts say these crimes go vastly underreported to state and federal authorities.

“I think a lot of seniors are less likely to report the crime out of shame and fear and embarrassment,” the FBI’s Setera said.

The DOJ’s Townsend has seen that reluctance by victims to report in cases he has prosecuted. But he said, “It’s not about being stupid at all. It’s about individuals preying on some sort of vulnerability that the victim has.”

“Whether that vulnerability is a sense of fear in the case of a grandparent scam, a sense of loneliness in the case of a romance scam, or a sense of desperation in the case of a lottery scam, it’s always feeding off some sense of vulnerability. And once they find it, they target that,” Townsend said.

One ongoing scam involves what the FBI calls “government impersonation,” in which someone poses as a police officer, IRS agent or another official, and insists the individual must pay a fine or risk arrest. “No one’s ever going to call and threaten you with arrest if you don’t send money,” Setera said. “That’s not the way any law enforcement agency operates.”’

In New Hampshire last year, 100 cases of reported fraud involved the use of cryptocurrency or cryptocurrency wallets to steal the victims’ money.

Townsend explained how that works: “What typically happens is the scammers will instruct a victim to go to a nearby convenience store that has a cryptocurrency ATM, to insert cash in the cryptocurrency ATM which then converts it to cryptocurrency, and then send it to a crypto wallet which the scammer controls.”

In some cases, scammers take cash directly from their victims and then use a crypto ATM to send it internationally, Townsend said.

Sting operation

The AG’s office recently announced the arrest of a Massachusetts woman who allegedly acted as a courier in a tech support scam that involved at least three victims.

Rachel Chen, 25, of North Andover, Mass., was indicted by a Merrimack County Grand Jury in June for conspiracy to commit theft by deception and attempted theft by deception, both Class A felonies. Authorities allege that Chen went to an Allenstown home on instructions from an “unknown co-conspirator” and obtained a package that she believed contained $22,000 in cash.

Instead it was a sting operation, and Chen was arrested.

The case arose after an Allenstown man became suspicious when a stranger contacted him to proffer technical support.

”This individual had been told that this computer was infected and his bank accounts were compromised, and that he needed to pay money to keep his money safe,” Townsend said. “The instructions were that …a bank employee would be coming to the house to collect the money and ultimately keep it safe.”

The man called Allenstown police who, in coordination with the AG’s office, conducted the sting operation that led to Chen’s arrest, Townsend said. Investigators have since identified two other victims, one in Nashua and another in Vermont, he said.

It’s sometimes difficult to understand how someone could fall for such a scheme. But Townsend said, “Unless you’re involved, unless you’re panicking about this significant loss of assets, you can’t really understand the panic and fear that happens. So I think that tends to cloud the judgment a little bit.”

Setera said families should be having ongoing conversations about the kinds of scams out there, and reminding older relatives not to divulge personal information online or over the phone.

Townsend advises having “a trusted person that you can rely on, whether it’s a family member or a good friend, or even someone at your local police department, who you can connect with and give a quick call to if something just doesn’t seem right.”

If you have been targeted, authorities say, it’s important to contact law enforcement quickly.

Consumers can call the Attorney General’s Consumer Protection Hotline: 603-271-3641. In addition, report scams to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3), online at: ic3.gov.

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NH seniors continue to fall prey to scammers as schemes proliferate