A growing number of older adults are losing large sums of money to impersonation scams, according to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). The number of people 60 and over who said they lost $10,000 or more to this form of fraud quadrupled between 2020 and 2024, while the number who lost more than $100,000 increased eightfold, the FTC said. In this form of fraud, scammers impersonate government agencies or businesses, contact consumers to alert them to a fake problem involving their accounts or their identity, and try to persuade them to transfer money to “keep it safe.” The scammers try to create a sense of urgency by telling consumers that their accounts are being used by someone else, that their Social Security number or other information is being used to commit crimes, or that their online accounts have been hacked. After persuading consumers to transfer their money, deposit cash into bitcoin ATMs, or hand cash or gold to couriers, the scammers steal those assets. “While younger people report losing money to these imposters too, reports of losses in the tens and hundreds of thousands of dollars are much more likely to be filed by older adults, and those numbers have soared,” the FTC said in a Consumer Protection Data Spotlight.