FTC reports Americans lost a record $3.5 billion in 2025 to impersonation scams
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has revealed that Americans lost $3.5 billion to imposter scams in 2025, the highest amount on record and nearly three times the level reported 5 years earlier.
Scammer targets victim. Image by Cybernews
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has revealed that Americans lost $3.5 billion to imposter scams in 2025, the highest amount on record and nearly three times the level reported 5 years earlier.
- The FTC says Americans lost a record $3.5 billion to imposter scams in 2025, nearly triple the level from five years ago.
- Imposter scams involve fraudsters posing as trusted organisations such as banks, companies, or government agencies.
- Bank and government impersonation accounted for the largest losses, with social media playing a major role in how scams began.
- Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram were linked to the highest reported losses among social platforms, according to FTC data.
Key Takeaways by nexos.ai, reviewed by Cybernews staff.
An imposter scam is a type of fraud in which scammers pretend to be someone gullible people know and trust, like a bank or a well-known brand or organization, to trick them into sending money, sharing personal information, or handing over login credentials.
Last year, this type of scam cost a lot of Americans a lot of emotional pain and misery.
According to the FTC, victims reported approximately $1 billion to business impersonators, more specifically, bank impersonators. Compared to 2024, this is an increase of 15%, when losses were around $866 million.
Roughly $920 million was handed over to government impersonators, a significant rise compared to 2024, when government impersonators stole $789 million from victims.
“Consumers derive enormous benefits from competitive markets built on truthful information. But fraud undermines that foundation, impeding the market process and preventing markets from operating efficiently,” Christopher Mufarrige, Director of the Bureau of Consumer Protection, says in a response.
In April, the FTC reported that Americans lost over $2.1 billion to scams in 2025 that, in most instances, started on social media.
About 30% of people who reported losses last year said that it started via social media, an eightfold increase since 2020.
People reported more money lost to scams that started on Facebook than on any other social media platform. According to FTC researchers, Facebook caused $749 million in damages, with WhatsApp ($425 million) and Instagram ($234 million) ranking a distant second and third.
Other social media platforms, including Telegram, TikTok, LinkedIn, and X, were responsible for a total of $330 million in damages.
This is most likely just the tip of the iceberg, because many victims never report that they have been scammed. The FTC encourages them to file a report when they’ve been scammed and to read consumer alerts to be up to date on the latest developments.
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