Inheritance scams have targeted 15% of adults

Payment and financial scams were examined in a recent Visa report. The report revealed that while the number of individual scam reports from June to December 2023 decreased, the total money lost increased, indicating that scammers are using more effective and costly schemes to target victims.

The report highlighted top consumer scams:

“Pig butchering” scams: These scams take advantage of holidays like Valentine’s Day and New Year’s Eve, using social media and dating sites to lure victims into fake online relationships and persuade them to invest in fraudulent cryptocurrency trading platforms. Leveraging AI to create more convincing schemes, pig butchering scams have resulted in billions of dollars in losses for consumers. The report states that 10% of surveyed adults have fallen victim to pig butchering scams.

Inheritance scams: Victims are informed of an inheritance from a long-lost relative, often from a seemingly legitimate law firm or professional entity. Warning signs include secrecy, urgency, requests for personal information, and an initial payment requirement to secure future gains. Fifteen percent of U.S. adults surveyed have been targeted in inheritance scams.

Humanitarian relief scams: These scams exploit tragic events by soliciting donations on social media to defraud unsuspecting donors.

Triangulation fraud: Fraudsters create fake online stores offering popular products at low prices to steal payment information. Legitimate merchants fulfill the order, but the payment information is already compromised. Triangulation scams have cost merchants up to $1 billion in a single month.

The report also outlines organizational fraud trends impacting the ecosystem:

• Supply chains and third-party services are increasingly targeted with campaigns to maximize the impact of a single breach.
• Fraudsters are increasingly using Artificial Intelligence (AI) to identify vulnerabilities in banks’ fraud controls.
• Purchase Return Authorization (PRA) fraud attacks rose by 83% over the previous five-month period, resulting in potential fraud losses of approximately $115,000 per successful attack for banks.
• Ransomware incidents surged by 300% from June to December 2023 compared to the same period in 2022. Visa predicts that ransomware attackers will continue targeting critical infrastructure, including financial institutions.
• Visa has developed processes to prevent and mitigate payment ecosystem attacks through the integration of people and technologies. Visa collaborates with all payment ecosystem stakeholders to identify at-risk data and notify impacted parties.

For the full report, click here.