Military service members, veterans, and their families often fall victim to scams at a higher rate than the public.
According to the Department of Agriculture, Trade, and Consumer Protection (DATCP), the unique issues and culture of these groups often result in them getting exploited for their money, property, and identities.
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) reported over 193,000 reports of fraud, identity theft, and other issues from military consumers in 2022. Roughly 153,000 of them were filed by retirees and veterans, which cost the groups over $414 million to fraud.
The most common types of fraud that year were imposter scams, online shopping scams, investment-related fraud, and fake prizes.
Imposter scams happen when a scammer pretends to be a trustworthy source to get information or money and resulted in $164.5 million lost in 2022. In addition, there were nearly 38,000 reports of identity theft.
Identity theft is a raging issue for active duty servicemembers as they are roughly “three times more likely to report theft directly from their bank accounts than the general public”.
With July being Military Consumer Protection Month, the DATCP wants to make its support clear.
More information and resources can be found at the DATCP’s Consumer Protection page at ConsumerProtection.wi.gov.
