Americans Lost $10.3 Billion To Internet Scams In 2022, Phishing Tops List: FBI

A report issued by the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) found Americans lost $10.3 billion in various online scams last year.

As per the Internet Crimes 2022 report estimates, IC3 received 2,175 complaints on a daily average last year and 651,800 plus average daily complaints from 2016 to 2021.

IC3 has recorded more than 7.3 million complaints since its inception in 2000, the report said.

Talking about individual states, California recorded the highest number of people who fell prey to internet scams. Precisely, 80,766 people from the Sunshine state collectively lost over $2 billion. Next was Florida where 42,792 people lost more than 844 million. Texas featured third on the list of the top 10 states by the number of victims. Over 38,000 people from the Lone Star state lost over $763 million.

People from Arizona recorded losses of $241 million, the least amount of money lost by victims of internet scams, compared to other states on the top 10 list. Virginia recorded 11,882 victims, the least in comparison to others on the list. Compared to all states and territories, the least number of victims of fraud was 29 in the Northern Mariana Islands. As for losses, people from American Samoa feature last on the list with people having lost $127,716 to virtual scams.

According to IC3 data, the most number of victims fell prey to phishing scams, which is a type of online fraud that operates by tricking people into providing sensitive data such as passwords and credit card numbers. It claimed 300,497 victims last year. Data breach and non-payment scams also rounded up on the list of top three most common internet crimes in 2022.

Investment fraud ranked first in terms of victim loss, where 30,529 people collectively lost $3.3 billion. Business Email Compromise (BEC) and tech support rounded up the top three crime types where victims lost the most amount of money.

Victims under age 20 totaled 15,782 as per the IC3 report and they collectively lost $210 million. The most money was lost by victims over the age of 60, with 88,262 people losing $3.1 million.

In the first 11 months of the past year, over $10.2 billion were looted from American citizens. Out of the amount, $3 billion was scammed through call centers and the rest through other means.

The FBI projected that call centers operating from India could have looted $12 billion from non-tech-savvy Americans by 2022 end if necessary measures were not implemented.

Fearing that Indian call centers were duping wealthy senior Americans of their earnings, the FBI appointed a permanent representative at the US embassy in the country's capital, New Delhi, to work closely with Indian task forces. These officials broke up several phishing gangs and recover money sent via wire transactions and digital currencies to fraudulent organizations based in the country.

Losses incurred by Americans in 2021 to online scams were estimated at $5.9 billion, a 70 percent increase from 2020. Imposter scams, online shopping scams, prizes, sweepstakes and lotteries, along with business and job opportunities, and internet services were the top five fraud categories in 2021.