AARP New Hampshire Works to Combat the Shame Around Fraud

Jill Martin of Dover has seen first-hand how fraud can undermine someone’s self-esteem.

Martin is a long-distance caregiver for her mother, who lives in Michigan, and oversees her finances. About two years ago, she got an alert that a debit account her mother uses—for lunch with friends, hair appointments and other small expenses—was empty. It had been drained of roughly $1,600 in a series of small international transactions, all traced to a location in Mexico.

Martin, an AARP New Hampshire volunteer, says it’s still not clear when or how the card number was stolen. But it dented her mother’s sense of independence and confidence.

“She felt guilty, she felt vulnerable. She felt that she should have known,” Martin says. “It was a very, very hard thing to go through.”

AARP New Hampshire has been collecting stories from Granite State residents like Martin who have dealt with incidents of fraud. It’s part of a broader AARP effort to fight such crimes — by offering fraud prevention resources, advocating for more state consumer protections and encouraging more people to report scams if they’ve been targeted.

“So many people are embarrassed to report that they have been a victim of a scam, but we are working to change that narrative,” says Christina FitzPatrick, AARP New Hampshire’s state director.

Advocates and law enforcement officials say it’s important to report cases of fraud, even if the chances of recovering the money are small, so investigators can learn about emerging tactics and warn the public.

Nationally, U.S. consumers 60 and over reported more than $3.4 billion in fraud losses in 2023, according to the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center. For older New Hampshire consumers, the losses topped $11 million.

Officials say the true numbers are far higher because many cases of fraud are not reported.

Last summer, criminals stole $250,000 from Susan Simpson, a retired administrative assistant from Nashua. Imposters claiming to be from her credit card company told her that her identity had been stolen and instructed her to transfer funds to a more “secure” account. At the time, she had a nagging feeling that something was “not right” about the situation, recalls Simpson, 70, a retired administrative assistant.

“I just believed that they were trying to help me, and that I was actually the victim of identity theft,” she says. “I acted all out of fear.”

Simpson says she wanted to share her story—as hard as that is—to help combat the shame and educate the public about fraud.

She encourages others to talk to trusted friends and family members if someone they don’t know is asking for money. And “if they’re saying that your identity is being threatened, go to the police,” she advises.

In her own case, she reported the fraud to the FBI, the Federal Trade Commission and her credit card company.

For Martin, the financial fix was fairly easy; she switched her mother to a credit card with a low limit to use for personal spending and worked with the bank to set up text alerts on a new account for any activity over $1. But the damage to her mother’s self-confidence remains.

“We still don’t talk about it,” Martin says.

To learn more about preventing fraud, visit aarp.org/fraudwatchnetwork. If you think you’ve been targeted, you can call the AARP Fraud Watch Network Helpline at 877-908-3360. It’s free and open to anyone.

—Michelle Cerulli McAdams