In 2020, U.S. residents lost over $ 106 million and filed over 160,000 reports of fraud related to COVID-19 and $ 1,200 stimulus checks.
The Ascent research project, from financial company The Motley Fool, analyzed data from the US Federal Trade Commission to determine the economic damage from fraud during the coronavirus pandemic.
The State of California suffered the largest losses from COVID-19 fraud at $ 15.6 million.
The second place was taken by the state of New York with damage of $ 6.8 million.
The third place was taken by the state of Florida, where the damage due to fraud is $ 5.4 million
In addition, more than 20 US states suffered damage ranging from $ 1 million to $ 4 million.
At the same time, the states of Alaska, Wyoming and Vermont took the last places in the number of losses incurred. Thus, the state of Vermont suffered losses of $ 79,000, the state of Wyoming – $ 50,000, the state of Alaska – $ 35,000.
The most common examples of COVID-19 fraud in the United States:
– offers for at-home COVID-19 test kits or vaccinations;
– stimulus payments that are stolen through identity theft;
– robocalls offering scam services, such as inexpensive health insurance or work-from-home jobs.
Thus, the victims reported 9,677 cases of telephone fraud, which resulted in a total loss of $ 14.7 million.
Internet fraud caused $ 17.8 million in damage.
There were 8,032 credit card fraud cases, resulting in a loss of $ 11.98 million.
Money wires resulted in the biggest losses and consumers lost $24.64 million this way.
It is reported that with new incentive payments to support the population during the pandemic in the United States, the number of fraud crimes will increase.
