Fraud & Scams
Financial fraud, phishing, identity theft, scam alerts, data breaches, and how to protect yourself and your accounts.
Latest in Fraud & Scams
A SIM-swap scam can drain your bank account in minutes by hijacking your phone number — a free carrier “port-out PIN” shuts the door
One morning in early 2023, a cryptocurrency investor in the Washington, D.C., area watched their phone signal vanish. Within minutes, a criminal ring had convinced...
A retiree moved her life savings to a “safe account” on a caller’s orders — and lost all $740,000 to scammers posing as her bank and a federal agent
The first call came with a simple warning: your bank account has been compromised. A recently retired woman did what most people would do. She...
A free fraud alert at the three credit bureaus forces lenders to verify your identity before opening anything — and it’s easier than a full freeze
Someone applies for a store credit card using your name, your Social Security number, and an address you have never lived at. Under normal circumstances,...
Comcast is paying $117.5 million to customers caught in a 2023 data breach — claim $50 with no proof, or up to $10,000 with receipts, by August 14
Nearly 36 million Xfinity customers had their personal data stolen over four days in October 2023, and Comcast is now writing checks to settle the...
AI can clone a relative’s voice from seconds of audio for a fake emergency call — agree on a family code word so you can verify it’s real
The call comes at 11 p.m. A panicked voice on the line sounds exactly like your daughter, down to the slight rasp she gets when...
Switch on real-time transaction alerts and a card lock in your bank’s app — you’ll catch fraud in seconds instead of on next month’s statement
In late May 2026, fraud investigators continue to see the same pattern play out: a thief tests a stolen debit card with a small charge,...
Anyone who got a Fidelity data-breach notice in 2024 can claim up to $5,000 from a settlement — the deadline to file is July 27
Roughly 120,000 Fidelity Investments customers learned in late 2024 that their personal data had been stolen. If you were one of them, a class action...
Check washing is surging — thieves fish envelopes out of USPS mailboxes and rewrite the payee, so pay digitally or use gel-ink pens
In one case that illustrates the human cost, a Rhode Island man stood in federal court earlier this year and admitted he had used a...
Freezing your credit at all three bureaus is free and stops scammers from opening loans in your name — yet most Americans have never set one up
The Federal Trade Commission received more than one million identity theft reports in 2023 alone, according to its Consumer Sentinel Network Data Book. A significant...
Anyone whose mortgage was serviced by Lakeview Loan could claim up to $5,000 from a data-breach settlement — the deadline to file is June 22
If Lakeview Loan Servicing, LLC handled your mortgage between late October and early December 2021, your personal and financial data may have been exposed in...
Fake QR codes slapped on parking meters are quietly draining drivers’ bank accounts — police in dozens of cities now warn to pay only through the official app
You walk up to a parking meter, spot a QR code on the housing, and scan it. The page that loads looks like a city...
A fake “online task” job is now America’s fastest-growing scam — it pays small sums for rating products, then demands a deposit to release the money you “earned”
The text message shows up on a Tuesday afternoon, from a number you don’t recognize. A recruiter, supposedly from a well-known company, is offering easy...
Panda Express, GrubHub, Google, and Discover are all paying class-action claims this spring — some up to $5,000 with proof of loss, about $100 with none
Four class-action settlements tied to Panda Express, GrubHub, Google, and Discover are paying out claims in spring 2026, and millions of Americans may be eligible...
Crypto scammers stole a record $11.3 billion last year — and most victims were reeled in by a single “wrong number” text that slowly turned into a fake romance
The text that cost one Massachusetts resident their life savings arrived on a Tuesday afternoon. “Hey, are we still on for dinner tonight?” it read,...
A con man got 18 years for stealing $6.6 million from elderly victims — in cash and gold bars they were tricked into handing couriers at their own front door
Atharva Shailesh Sathawane knocked on elderly Americans’ doors at least 33 times over a span of roughly four months. Each time, the person on the...
Americans lost billions to scams last year — but banks reimbursed only a fraction of Zelle and wire-transfer fraud, leaving most victims to swallow the loss themselves
When the phone rang, the caller ID showed her bank’s name. The voice on the line said he was from the fraud department, that someone...
Scam victims are now getting hit a second time — con artists posing as government agents promise to recover the money you already lost, for an upfront “fee”
The first scam cost you money. The second one starts with a phone call that sounds like the answer to everything: a person claiming to...
Romance scams climbed 22% last year — and the median victim sent a stranger they never met $2,020 before a single bank ever flagged the transfers
Somewhere in the United States right now, someone is wiring a few hundred dollars to a person they have never met, convinced they are helping...
AI voice-cloning scams drained $893 million from Americans last year — the fastest-growing fraud the FBI tracks, and it takes only seconds of audio to fake a relative’s call
The phone rings at 2 a.m. On the other end, your daughter is sobbing. She says she has been in a car accident and needs...
Fidelity is flagging a $15 billion fraud wave hitting Americans’ savings — scammers send 100,000 spoof texts a day, and AI clones a voice in 3 seconds
The text message looked routine: a $4.15 unpaid toll, a link to settle it, and a warning about a $50 late fee. Scenarios like this...