Retired con artist explains how to avoid a COVID-19 scam, and why seniors are the biggest target

Image credit: HomeEquity Bank
Image credit: HomeEquity Bank

Ninety-one per cent of older Canadians believe they are the most vulnerable group that scammers target, according to a new Ipsos survey. The world’s most famous con man turned fraud expert says nothing is better than education to put a stop to it.

Frank Abagnale, who was portrayed by Leonardo DiCaprio in the movie Catch Me If You Can, is part of a video campaign, spearheaded by HomeEquity Bank, to teach Canadians how to identify a scam and how to avoid falling victim to one.

Ipsos said 52 per cent of older Canadians polled (55 and older) say they’ve been the target of a scam and 72 per cent of those surveyed say there has been an increase in COVID-19 related scams since the start of the pandemic.

The poll added that one in three Canadians admitted to falling victim to a scam, and Abagnale hopes that the new video series will help Canadians understand how to spot a scam and not be the victim.

Ipsos surveyed 1,000 people aged 18 and over across the country online. The survey was conducted on behalf of HomeEquity Bank, which wanted to better understand older Canadians’ attitudes towards scams, and fraud.

Yahoo Finance Canada talked to Abagnale to get his tips for skirting the scammers.

The following interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Q: What are scammers looking for and who do they target?

A: Last year, the AARP, the American Association of Retired People in the United States, commissioned me to write a book about all the scams and they wanted me to cover every single scam. Both millennials, seniors financial scams, Bitcoin, etc. And so I wrote Scam Me If You Can.

When doing the research for the book what was most amazing to me is I found that millennials are often scammed more often than seniors, but seniors lose more money because they have more money.

During COVID we have seen, for example in the United States, an increase of 350 per cent of all of these scams. Basically, first of all, you have all of these people sitting at home, all of these people on their computer spending a great deal of time and scam artists follow the headline so whatever is going on at that moment that's the scams they come up with.

And when you research them and you look back, you find that basically they're all the same and they've been around for more than 50 years. [The scammers] just changed the pitch.

So now, [with] COVID they're selling you vaccines, telling you they have treatments or selling... whatever it is that they can sell, of course, they'd never deliver. And people are a little anxious and people are a little desperate and they're a little scared and they play on the fear and, and so on.