"Tech support" scam explained

Fraud against those aged 50 and over is a massive problem, especially schemes that use the internet. One common internet fraud is a technical-support scheme.

In these schemes, a criminal convinces a consumer to purchase phony, worthless or malicious technical-support services for their computer. In 2018, the Federal Trade Commission received over 142,000 complaints about technical-support schemes.

The vast majority of complaints came from people over 50 years old. Aggregate reported losses were $54 million, with the most common reported loss between $100 and $1000. These numbers are just the t...