Outsmarting the Scam Artist

A helpful AARP study entitled "Outsmarting the Scam Artists" suggests that different demographic groups are more likely to fall victim to certain types of scams. For example, fraudulent claims about unique investment opportunities most often affect college-educated white men in their sixties. These scams often claim the chance to invest in oil drilling or gold mining. Lottery scams, where foreign lottery winnings are claimed with a need to send a small fee to collect, are most likely to affect women in their seventies who live alone and often have less education and financial literacy.