Americans lost a record-breaking $16.6 billion to internet scams last year, according to the FBI's annual Internet Crime Report. That represents a massive 33% increase from the previous year.
The biggest explosion in scams came from cryptocurrency-related fraud, with Americans losing almost $10 billion through these schemes.
Adults over 60 were the most common victims, reporting nearly $5 billion in losses last year.
This year marks 25 years since the FBI opened its Internet Crime Complaint Center. When it first began operations, the center would receive about 2,000 complaints a month about scams. Today, that number has grown to approximately 2,000 complaints every single day.
To protect your money, experts recommend monitoring your accounts regularly, refusing to give out personal information over the phone to unknown callers, and remembering that if a proposal sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
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