Remember the Nigerian prince who emailed our grandmas desperately needing Ethel or Rose to move a large sum of money out of the country? Decades later, scammers have upped their savvy, and as March is Fraud Prevention Month, it’s an important reminder to protect our older loved ones from more convincing scams.

Older people are especially vulnerable to fraud because they may not be familiar with the advancing technologies that scammers exploit. These con artists are adept at preying on common older adults’ fears such as safety and financial concerns. Help educate your family and friends on these signs to detect a scam.

• Urgency is a familiar theme. The email, text or phone call will ask for immediate action usually needing money or personal information.
• Scammers often warn the victim not to consult others.
• Their claims are not verifiable.
• Frauds will send a link to a specific site. Clicking on that link can lead to a victim’s personal data being siphoned.

Financial scams are common enough to have their own genres.

• The grandparent scam involves a person posing to be a grandchild with claims of being arrested and needing bail money.
• A phishing scam is a communication that appears to be from a legitimate company, and they will ask the victim to log in to an account and provide personal information.
• With charity scams, the caller pretends to represent a fake nonprofit and asks for donations.
• An investment scam invites the victim to invest in a business venture with false claims of ridiculously large returns.

To help older friends or relatives stay safe from scams, ensure them you’re available if they’re ever worried about a call, text or email. Most importantly, warn them not to give money or sensitive information to anyone until they’ve double checked the facts.