Scams in the U.S. Have Hit Record Levels. Most Victims Get Little Help—and Some Lose Even More

When Simon’s wife of 43 years died, the grief felt like his own death. Seeking connection online, the southeastern New York widower quickly met “Emily.” Over the following months, the woman he believed was real drained $800,000 from his retirement savings. The losses did not end there.

Simon was left repaying $185,000 he had borrowed and facing tens of thousands more in taxes on the withdrawn funds. Local police and the FBI offered little assistance, he said. Soon another scammer contacted him, claiming ties to the Secret Service and offering recovery—for more money. Simon asked to be identified only by his first name; the shame has kept him from telling most of his family.

His experience is far from unique. Americans reported a record $15.9 billion in losses to the Federal Trade Commission last year—a 25 percent jump from 2024. The agency estimates actual losses in 2024 approached $200 billion, or roughly $550 million a day. Exclusive AP-NORC polling shows 98 percent of Americans suspect they have been targeted; three in 10 say they have lost money or personal information. Advances in artificial intelligence and the rise of hard-to-trace cryptocurrency have supercharged the industry.

An investigation by The Associated Press and FRONTLINE found that the United States still lags behind several other countries in holding financial institutions and technology platforms accountable and in regulating the cryptocurrency channels scammers exploit. While the Trump administration and Congress have launched initiatives, victims rarely recover funds and often face additional financial and emotional harm.

After the Scam: Fees, Taxes, and Isolation

AP and FRONTLINE interviewed nearly 60 victims across the country—ages 32 to 90, of every race and income level—who lost anywhere from a few thousand dollars to $4 million. Doctors, IT professionals, academics, and ordinary workers described the same aftermath: ridicule or silence from family and friends, pressure from banks and lenders, unexpected tax bills, dismissive law enforcement, and a sense that the government had abandoned them. Several contemplated suicide; two attempted it. Only one recovered any money—and that came from a rare bank settlement, not the scammers.

“What happens after the scam might even be worse than the scam itself,” said Erin West, a former prosecutor and founder of the nonprofit Operation Shamrock, which supports online-scam victims. “It’s a travesty.”

Under a provision of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (made permanent in 2025), personal losses from many common scams are no longer deductible. Retirees who withdraw from tax-deferred accounts to send money to scammers can still owe income tax on those withdrawals. Retired nurse Susan Bivins said she was tricked into sending more than $200,000 to someone posing as a federal agent. After the FBI and local police offered no help, the IRS sent an $80,000 tax bill. She sold her home, moved into a one-bedroom apartment, and is still paying the debt by selling handmade quilts.

“I wanted to drive off a cliff,” she said. “I didn’t know how I was going to live.”

Banks sometimes treat victims as negligent or even complicit. Debra Fox of Arvada, Colorado, lost $58,000 in a romance scam. A bank representative told her she would be held responsible for any fraudulent activity linked to her accounts and would have to cover legal fees. Her local branch declined to comment.

Alice Lin, 83, of Alhambra, California, was the sole interviewee who recovered funds. After her husband’s death, she formed what she thought was an online friendship with a fellow widower. He persuaded her to move roughly $720,000 of their lifetime savings into cryptocurrency platforms. When the transfers grew unusually large, her family recognized the fraud. Lin sued JPMorgan Chase under California’s financial-elder-abuse statute. The bank settled for an undisclosed amount, citing the cost of litigation. It said it had multiple layers of protection and had questioned the transactions. Blockchain analysis by TRM Labs showed the network that targeted Lin took in at least $800 million between early 2022 and late 2024.

 Global Approaches and U.S. Gaps

Other countries have imposed clearer shared responsibility. In the United Kingdom, financial firms generally must reimburse customers tricked into authorized push-payment fraud, creating strong incentives for prevention. The European Union is expanding liability for institutions that fail to implement adequate safeguards and requires platforms to act quickly on reported scam content under the Digital Services Act. Australia can fine or compel compensation from banks, telecoms, and digital platforms that fall short. Singapore’s Shared Responsibility Framework and Protection from Scams Act allow temporary restrictions on transfers and place bank and e-commerce staff inside a national anti-scam center with police.

U.S. law generally reimburses only unauthorized transactions, not those customers are social-engineered into approving. Section 230 continues to shield social-media companies from most liability for third-party content, including scams. Cryptocurrency rules remain lighter than in China (which bans related businesses) or the EU (which requires licensing and disclosures). The GENIUS Act, signed by President Trump, regulates certain stablecoins but does not require restitution of stolen funds—a gap noted by consumer advocates and some prosecutors.

Even when funds can be located, recovery is rare. After Brian Glick of Ballston Lake, New York, lost $575,000, he documented thousands of screenshots, filed complaints with the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3), the SEC, and state authorities, and continued talking to his scammer to gather evidence. When the FBI asked Tether to freeze related assets, the company said the funds had already been moved and commingled with unrelated balances. Tether has cooperated with law enforcement on other cases and, with partners, reports freezing more than $450 million in illicit funds since 2024. Glick received nothing.

 Federal Response Still Fragmented

Congress is considering more than a dozen bills, including one to create a centralized ReportScams.gov portal and another requiring disclosures for AI-generated deepfakes. The Justice Department launched a Scam Center Strike Force targeting Southeast Asian operations and reported restraining $832 million in cryptocurrency; specifics on restitution remain limited. An executive order directed prioritization of prosecutions and a plan for victim recovery. The FBI’s Operation Level Up has interrupted roughly 8,500 potential victims over nearly two years. Yet the bureau receives nearly 3,000 internet-crime complaints a day through IC3 and investigates only about 10–12 percent of them, according to former officials.

A Government Accountability Office review found at least 13 federal agencies touching pieces of the problem, with no government-wide loss estimate, no common definition of scams, and no national strategy. Funding has not kept pace with the volume of cases. Victims who turn to online “recovery” services often lose still more; one Arizona woman paid three fake firms $23,000 after losing $400,000, then faced a $20,000 tax bill and had to sell her home.

Simon’s money was traced, with the help of leaked documents and wallet addresses, to a major scam compound in Myanmar. Local authorities later destroyed much of the site; operations simply relocated. He remains unreimbursed.

“Already I experienced something very bad, and now I have to pay for the consequences on top of it,” he said. “You lose two ways.”