‘What a fool I was’: Reported scams reach record high of $15.9 billion, and estimates reach upwards of $500 billion annually

When Simon’s wife of 43 years passed away, it felt a bit like he’d died too.

In his overwhelming grief, Simon sought companionship online, like so many other lonely widows and widowers. Almost immediately he met Emily. But over the next few months, Emily, who Simon realized too late was a fake, stole $800,000 from him.

And that was just the beginning.

Simon was stuck paying back $185,000 he had borrowed, and tens of thousands of dollars in additional taxes on money he had withdrawn and lost. He tried to report the crime to his local police and the FBI, he said, but nothing came of it. Instead, he was contacted by yet another scammer — offering to connect him with the Secret Service to recoup his losses in exchange for even more money.

Like Simon, virtually every American has been targeted by scammers in some way, exclusive new polling data shows. Scams in the U.S. have surged to a record high, causing billions in losses for Americans.

But the U.S. still lags behind some other countries in tackling the problem, holding financial and social media companies responsible and regulating the cryptocurrency scammers rely on, an investigation by The Associated Press and FRONTLINE found. And although both the Trump administration and Congress are pursuing new options, victims still have little recourse and sometimes end up losing even more.

In interviews with almost five dozen victims, AP and FRONTLINE found that many faced ridicule and stigma from friends and family, mounting pressure from banks and lenders, additional taxes, dismissive law enforcement and neglect from a government they believed would protect them.

“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 that provides support for victims of online scams. “It’s a travesty.”

While victims say they seldom get any answers from authorities, AP/FRONTLINE found these crimes can be traceable. With the help of leaked documents and cryptowallet addresses, AP/FRONTLINE tracked Emily and Simon’s stolen funds to a notorious scam compound halfway around the world in Myanmar with thousands of victims.

Simon was stunned to see Emily’s fake profile and hundreds of pages of conversations he thought were encrypted.

“What a fool I was,” he said.

Today, much of the Myanmar compound where his scam originated lies in rubble, destroyed by local authorities. Yet many of the illicit operations simply moved, new sites opened immediately, and Simon is no closer to getting his money back.

He asked not to be identified by his full name because he is too ashamed to tell most of his family about the crime. Local police and the FBI declined to comment on the case.

“(The police) told me right away that, you know, ‘You have to kiss that money goodbye,’” he said, fighting back tears. “Already I experienced something very bad and now I have to pay for the consequences on top of it, and see my money evaporate all over again. You lose two ways.”

As scams surge, fees and taxes pile on

The size of the global scam industry is staggering.

Americans reported a record $15.9 billion in losses last year to the Federal Trade Commission, a 25% increase from 2024. And such estimates are likely a massive undercount because most scam victims are too embarrassed to report their crimes.

The FTC estimates that real losses in 2024 were close to $200 billion; that’s $550 million every day just in the U.S.

The ballooning costs are fueled by huge advances in artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency. AI allows scammers to work at a previously unimaginable scale and level of sophistication, and cryptocurrency, often used in investment scams, is a form of digital cash that can be hard to trace to its real owners.

No one is immune, the AP/FRONTLINE investigation found. Ninety-eight percent of Americans suspect they have been targeted by scammers, many every day, according to a poll conducted by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Three in 10 said they have personally lost money or information to scams.

AP/FRONTLINE interviewed 58 people in the United States who lost money to cyberscams, aged 32 to 90, across all races and income levels. They said they lost several thousand dollars to $4 million each and included doctors, IT professionals, academics with advanced degrees and people just trying to make ends meet.

All said they felt alone and confused afterward. When they did report the crimes to law enforcement, many felt abandoned by a lack of support. Several victims said they contemplated suicide. Two attempted it.

The only one to get any money back won a rare settlement from her bank, not from her scammer.

Instead, scam victims sometimes owe additional money through bank fees and tax bills. The IRS often demands that retirees, including scam victims, pay taxes on any funds they withdrew from tax-deferred accounts like their retirement savings.

Before 2018, victims of theft or fraud could sometimes deduct losses incurred from their taxable income. But under a provision of the Trump administration’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, made permanent in 2025, personal losses from many common scams are not eligible for tax breaks. That means victims can owe taxes after money was stolen from them.

Retired nurse Susan Bivins said she was tricked........

© Fortune