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26–817 PDF 2017

S. HRG. 115–175 

STOPPING SENIOR SCAMS: DEVELOPMENTS 

IN FINANCIAL FRAUD AFFECTING SENIORS 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON AGING 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

WASHINGTON, DC 

FEBRUARY 15, 2017 

Serial No. 115–1 

Printed for the use of the Special Committee on Aging 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.fdsys.gov 

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SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON AGING 

SUSAN M. COLLINS, Chairman 

ORRIN HATCH, Utah 

JEFF FLAKE, Arizona 

TIM SCOTT, South Carolina 

THOM TILLIS, North Carolina 

BOB CORKER, Tennessee 

RICHARD BURR, North Carolina 

MARCO RUBIO, Florida 

DEB FISCHER, Nebraska 

ROBERT P. CASEY JR, Pennsylvania 

BILL NELSON, Florida 

SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island 

KIRSTEN E. GILLIBRAND, New York 

RICHARD BLUMENTHAL, Connecticut 

JOE DONNELLY Indiana 

ELIZABETH WARREN, Massachusetts 

CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO, Nevada 

KEVIN KELLEY, Majority Staff Director 

KATE MEVIS, Minority Staff Director 

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CONTENTS 

Page 

Opening Statement of Chairman Susan M. Collins .............................................. 1 

Prepared Statement ......................................................................................... 36 

Statement of Ranking Member Robert P. Casey Jr. ............................................. 3 

Prepared Statement ......................................................................................... 37 

PANEL OF WITNESSES 

Phillip Hatch, IRS Impersonation Scam Victim, Portland, ME ........................... 6 

Timothy P. Camus, Deputy Inspector General for Investigations, Treasury 

Inspector General for Tax Administration, Washington, DC ........................... 7 

Lois Greisman, Associate Director, Division of Marketing Practices, Bureau 

of Consumer Protection, Federal Trade Commission,Washington, DC ........... 9 

Diane A. Menio, Executive Director, Center for Advocacy for the Rights & 

Interests of the Elderly, Philadelphia, PA ......................................................... 10 

APPENDIX 

PREPARED WITNESS STATEMENTS

Phillip Hatch, IRS Impersonation Scam Victim, Portland, ME ........................... 38 

Timothy P. Camus, Deputy Inspector General for Investigations, Treasury 

Inspector General for Tax Administration, Washington, DC ........................... 39 

Lois Greisman, Associate Director, Division of Marketing Practices, Bureau 

of Consumer Protection, Federal Trade Commission, Washington, DC .......... 52 

Diane A. Menio, Executive Director, Center for Advocacy for the Rights & 

Interests of the Elderly, Philadelphia, PA ......................................................... 74 

ADDITIONAL STATEMENTS FOR THE RECORD

Endorsement letters submitted by Senator Collins .............................................. 82 

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STOPPING SENIOR SCAMS: DEVELOPMENTS 

IN FINANCIAL FRAUD AFFECTING SENIORS 

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 2017 

U.S. SENATE, SPECIAL COMMITTEE ON AGING, Washington, DC. 

The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 2:32 p.m., in Room 

SD–562, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Susan Collins 

(Chairman of the Committee) presiding. 

Present: Senators Collins, Flake, Tillis, Rubio, Casey, Gillibrand, 

Blumenthal, Donnelly, Warren, and Cortez Masto. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR SUSAN M. COLLINS, 

CHAIRMAN 

Chairman COLLINS. Good afternoon. That was to wake all of you 

up. 

[Laughter.] 

I am pleased to welcome both new and returning members to the 

Committee, and I am delighted that my good friend Senator Casey 

will be serving as the Committee’s new Ranking Member during 

this Congress. I want to specifically welcome Senator Catherine 

Cortez Masto from the great State of Nevada to the Committee. We 

look forward to having you join our work. And, of course, it is wonderful to welcome back Senator Gillibrand who has been so committed to this issue, and the other issues that we have explored as 

well. 

Speaking of Senator Gillibrand, I understand that her son Theo 

is here today. He is doing a special class project, so he got an excused absence to be at our hearing today for the project that he is 

doing, and I know that is going to be a very interesting project. 

My apologies also that this hearing had to be delayed from when 

it was first scheduled on February 1st due to a long series of votes 

on the Senate floor. 

During this Congress, this Committee will continue its focus on 

three major issues: 

First, retirement security. We want to make sure that our seniors have sufficient resources so they do not outlive their savings 

or find that their golden years end in poverty. 

Second, biomedical research investments for diseases like Alzheimer’s and diabetes that disproportionately affect seniors. 

And, third, financial schemes and other scams targeting older 

Americans, and that is the subject of today’s hearing. 

Last summer, an 81-year-old constituent came into my office in 

Portland, Maine, with an alarming story of deception and cruelty. 

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A con artist claiming to be an IRS agent had just cheated him out 

of $8,000, and he narrowly avoided losing $15,000 more. 

After reporting the crime to the local police, my constituent, Philip Hatch, and his son came into my office. My staff gave him a copy 

of the Fraud Book that this Committee produced last year as well 

as a special postcard that we created with tips on how to avoid 

scams. Mr. Hatch told us that the tactics described in the materials 

provided were exactly those that were used by the scammer. If only 

he had received that information sooner, he might have recognized 

the scam and avoided losing his hard-earned savings. 

Mr. Hatch was very willing to testify today and to share his 

story, but health issues prevent him from traveling. Instead, he 

graciously and courageously provided a video in order to share his 

experience, and we will see that video in a moment. 

This episode demonstrates two important points. 

First, the criminals who prey on our seniors are relentless. They 

will harass seniors over and over again until they have drained 

every penny from their life savings. 

Second, this Committee’s longstanding dedication to fighting 

fraud against seniors is raising awareness and prompting enforcement actions that are making a real difference. We must redouble 

our efforts to educate seniors, their families, and their caregivers. 

The stakes are extremely high. According to the Government Accountability Office, America’s seniors lose a staggering $2.9 billion 

each year to an ever-growing array of financial exploitation 

schemes and scams. 

Today’s hearing coincides with the release of our Committee’s 

2017 Fraud Book. Like the book that we published last year, it lists 

the top 10 scams being perpetrated against seniors, along with information on how to recognize, avoid, and report them. In both 

years, the IRS Impersonation Scam was the leading offender. 

These lists reflect the calls made to our Committee’s toll-free hotline. In 2015, hotline staff fielded more than 1,100 calls. Last year, 

the hotline’s call volume doubled to more than 2,200 calls. It is 

clear that our efforts are raising public awareness, and more important, our efforts are producing real results. 

I look forward this morning to the testimony of the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration’s office on recent evolutions 

in the IRS imposter scam, such as the demand for payment in 

iTunes gift cards, to which Mr. Hatch and many others have fallen 

victim. Raising awareness about the IRS scam is particularly timely, as we are in the midst of tax filing season. 

Last May, thanks to the work of our hotline investigators, the IG 

arrested five individuals in connection with the IRS imposter scam. 

Federal authorities believe that these suspects stole almost $3 million from more than 1,200 victims. In October, 56 individuals and 

5 call centers in India were indicted in another important case. In 

addition to producing criminal charges, these efforts are making it 

more difficult for criminals to find victims. 

I also look forward to hearing from the Federal Trade Commission on other scams that are targeting our seniors, such as those 

involving grants, counterfeit checks, and romance schemes, which 

are particularly timely with yesterday being Valentine’s Day. 

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As our 2017 Fraud Book makes clear, while we are certainly 

making progress, far too many victims are still losing money and 

often their retirement savings. Law enforcement, consumer advocates, Area Agencies on Aging, AARP, and financial institutions 

play vital roles, but alert citizens are still our first and best line 

of defense. I am proud of our Committee’s work on this crucial 

issue to help seniors become more aware and more informed and 

to put criminals on notice that they will be stopped and brought 

to justice. 

I now am very pleased to turn to our new Ranking Member, Senator Casey, for his opening statement. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR ROBERT P. CASEY JR., 

RANKING MEMBER 

Senator CASEY. Chairman Collins, thank you very much for your 

leadership and for convening this hearing, the first hearing of the 

Committee on Aging, the Special Committee on Aging, for the 

115th Congress to discuss senior scams, as she just outlined. 

Also, I want to thank her for working with me to address issues 

impacting older Americans even before the start of this Congress. 

I would also like to welcome new members of the Committee. I 

know right now we have Senator Cortez Masto here—we are grateful that she is with us—and, of course, Senator Gillibrand who has 

been with the Committee for a number of years. We are grateful 

for that help, especially on these critically important issues for our 

families. 

The Aging Committee has historically been a committee that fosters both collaboration and bipartisanship on issues facing older 

Americans, and that was again abundantly clear by the voice vote 

we held off of the Senate floor 2 weeks ago to approve the Committee budget and the Committee rules. And I think I was late for 

that hearing, but—— 

Chairman COLLINS. I was not going to mention that. 

Senator CASEY [continuing]. Somehow my voice got recorded. But 

I want to thank the Chairman for that. 

It is my sincere hope that that will continue, and I am sure that 

it will. The future of key programs for older Americans like Medicare, Medicaid, and others is also critically important to the agenda 

of this Committee. We have a responsibility, I believe, to protect 

these vital programs for older Americans. 

Today we have the opportunity to hear from experts who will 

give us testimony on the challenging issue of combating fraud and 

scams, which, of course, target older Americans—in effect, older 

Americans as well as their families. Experts testifying today include Diane Menio from Pennsylvania, from a senior advocacy organization that I have worked with over many years, CARIE, and 

I will talk more about Diane in a moment. But I want to thank her 

and her organization’s work for what you have done for years to 

help those who are potential victims of these kinds of scams. 

I am also pleased to have joined Senator Collins in releasing a 

Committee report detailing the top 10 scams targeting our Nation’s 

seniors that you saw a moment ago. The report is based upon the 

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mittee’s Fraud Hotline over the past year. It will inform the work 

of this Committee going forward. 

I was also happy to join with the Chairman in reintroducing the Senior$afe Act last week. This important legislation both encourages financial institutions to disclose suspected exploitation of seniors when they see it and protects them from being sued for making these reports if they have appropriately trained their staffs and 

made good-faith reports. 

In the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, more than one in six 

residents is 65 years or older. In 2015, 22,000 cases of suspected 

elder abuse and neglect were reported to the Pennsylvania Department of Aging’s protective services program. 

That is why last spring I held a field hearing in Wilkes-Barre, 

Pennsylvania, to hear directly from constituents—both those affected by scams and those trying to prevent these scams. Just by 

way of example, a constituent from Kingston Township told the 

heartbreaking story of a scam artist attempting to steal the identity and use the credit cards of her husband of 43 years after his 

death. The Luzerne County District Attorney highlighted the most 

common type of scam happening today, at least in that area: the 

sweepstakes or lottery scam. Victims are promised lottery winnings 

if they just pay often sizable so-called taxes and fees up front. The 

district attorney recalled one older victim being scammed out of 

$85,000 in the hope of retrieving $1 million in fake lottery 

winnings. 

While experts struggle to estimate the total financial impact of 

scams targeting seniors, mainly because it is so underreported, 

they know that it adds up to nearly $3 billion a year in lost savings—and potentially billions more. It is not just money that is lost 

in these scams. It is older Americans’ sense of security and financial independence. It is outrageous that people who have worked 

very hard all their lives are being targeted for their nest eggs when 

they are at their most vulnerable. And it is wrong that seniors still 

feel afraid to report these schemes. They should not be embarrassed or ashamed. They should know that we have their backs 

and we are here to help them fight back. 

That is why enforcement is such a critical part of this discussion. 

While it may not be easy to track down these increasingly sophisticated scammers and their domestic and international networks and 

hold them accountable, we must do so for the safety and security 

of our parents and grandparents. 

Recently, Senator Collins and I applauded the Federal Trade 

Commission and the Justice Department settlement with Western 

Union in which the company admitted to criminal anti-money-laundering violations that have disproportionately affected aging Americans. This settlement, $586 million in the settlement, will be used 

to compensate victims of fraud where Western Union agents were 

complicit in the scams. 

But there is more work to do. We will continue to use the spotlight of this Committee to both help consumers understand the 

threat and highlight the need for action. It is for this reason that 

I will continue to fight to ensure that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has the resources that it needs. The CFPB houses 

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tion with seniors and educating seniors about how to prevent becoming the victim of fraud. Until recently, this office was led by 

former Pennsylvania Secretary of Aging, Nora Dowd Eisenhower, 

who is in the first row at our hearing today. 

We also need to help keep up the fight to ensure that the Affordable Care Act fraud and abuse provisions are in place. We know 

that the Government has realized a record-breaking $10.7 billion 

in recovery of health care fraud in the last 3 years, having new 

tools that increased Federal sentencing guidelines for health care 

fraud and on from there. 

We also know that proposals that I will oppose, like block-granting Medicaid, could present States with real challenges when it 

comes to addressing waste, fraud, and abuse in programs. 

Finally, in order to continue the good work of the witnesses here 

today, as well as others, and to support our colleagues in other 

parts of the Government, the Social Security Administration and 

other departments, in maintaining a skilled workforce, I am seriously concerned about the impact of the Federal hiring freeze and 

how that will affect middle-class families. 

So I look forward to hearing from our witnesses, and I again 

want to thank our Chairman for gathering us today on this important topic. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you very much, Senator Casey. 

I want to welcome another new member of our Committee, Senator Marco Rubio. Senator Rubio represents the State with the 

highest percentage of senior citizens. I represent the State with the 

oldest median age. That is because a lot of my seniors go to Florida, though they tend to spend exactly 6 months and 1 day there. 

I am not quite sure, but I have a feeling it has to do with taxes. 

But it is great to have you as a member of the Committee. 

And I want to welcome back Senator Warren, who was here 

briefly and I am sure will be returning as well. We will now turn 

to our panel of witnesses. 

First, we are going to view a brief video from Mr. Philip Hatch. 

He is from Portland, Maine, and he will share his personal experience dealing with the IRS impersonators that I mentioned in my 

opening statement. 

Next we will hear from Tim Camus. He is the Deputy Inspector 

General for Investigations at the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Inspector General for Tax Administration. That may be one 

of the longest titles of any witness that we have ever had. But his 

office has done extraordinary work, and I want to thank him. 

Next we will welcome back to the Committee Lois Greisman, who 

is the Associate Director of the Division of Marketing Practices at 

the Bureau of Consumer Protection at the Federal Trade Commission, better known as the FTC. 

And Senator Casey has already introduced our final witness for 

the day, Diane Menio, and we are very happy to have her here, too. 

Menio. Did I get it right that time? Thank you. 

I want to thank you all for joining us, and we will now start with 

the video. 

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STATEMENT OF PHILIP HATCH, IRS IMPERSONATION SCAM 

VICTIM, PORTLAND, ME (BY VIDEO) 

Mr. HATCH. My name is Philip Hatch. I am 81 years old and I 

am from Portland, Maine, born and raised. 

I received a telephone call. I answered the phone, and the man 

said he was a representative from the Internal Revenue Service. I 

said, ‘‘What can I do to help you?’’ He said, ‘‘Well, we have gone 

through the records, and there has been a mistake here on your returns, and you owe us $5,988 and some odd cents.’’ So I said, ‘‘Fine. 

Tell me who I make the check out to and where do I mail it?’’ He 

said, ‘‘Well, we cannot do that. We have a warrant out for your arrest, and the marshals will be in your house within an hour.’’ And 

I said, ‘‘Well, what would you like me to do to help resolve this?’’ 

They said, ‘‘You can go to CVS and get those iTunes cards, and just 

when you come back you can read the numbers off to us.’’ I said, 

‘‘That does not sound like a very professional way to do it.’’ He 

said, ‘‘Well, it is either that or the marshals are coming. If we can 

do this, we can tell them not to come.’’ 

So I did. I went and got these little iTunes cards, came back, 

read the numbers off them, and they said, ‘‘Okay. Now, you cannot 

tell anybody about this.’’ I said, ‘‘What do you mean I can’t tell anybody about this? I am going to tell my guy that makes up my tax 

returns. I am a little mad at him.’’ You know, I said, ‘‘He made a 

mistake.’’ He said, ‘‘Well, no, do not do that. Everything will be 

taken care of.’’ 

This started at 4:00 in the afternoon and went until 8 o’clock at 

night. They called me the next day, and they said there was mistake. I said, ‘‘What do you mean a mistake?’’ ‘‘It wasn’t $5,900 

something dollars; it was $23,000.’’ They had somebody call me on 

the regular phone—I am still on my cell phone—who said that he 

was a Portland police officer and that they had a local warrant out 

for my arrest. So I put my son on the phone, and he goes, ‘‘Who 

is this?’’ And they said, ‘‘Well, who is this?’’ And he goes—he gave 

him a phony name and said he was an FBI agent. And they said, 

‘‘Whoops.’’ And they hung up, and that was the end of it. But I had 

already sent in $8,000 to these people. 

Being in the military and being—working for the Government, 

you know, when the Government calls up, you say, ‘‘Aye, aye, sir. 

What do you need? Can I help you? Okay.’’ And maybe if I had not 

had that background, I would not have been so cooperative. But I 

got—I was mad, upset that I was taken in. Just give me 5 minutes 

in a room alone with those people and I would be happy. 

All I can say is just be wary, you know? You know, just be careful. And when it comes to someone going after your money, just 

say, ‘‘Listen, I will think about it tonight and you can get back to 

me tomorrow,’’ and then contact someone and find out. That is the 

best advice I could do. 

Chairman COLLINS. As you can see, this is really outrageous and 

illustrates the lengths to which these criminals will go. And a lot 

of times, they do target people who are either isolated or have been 

in the military—we did a whole hearing on scams that are directed 

at those who have been in the military—and they will stop at nothing. They kept Mr. Hatch on the phone for 4 hours, from 4:00 p.m. 

to 8:00 p.m., getting him to go from place to place to buy the 

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iTunes card, which is a new variation that we are seeing on the 

IRS imposter scam. And it frightens people when they get a call 

from someone claiming to be from the IRS. It frightens all of us to 

get that kind of call. And it has become so sophisticated that these 

con artists can spoof the number so it looks like—if they have caller ID, it will say ‘‘U.S. Treasury.’’ So that makes them think that 

it is for real. And it just shows that they will stop at nothing. 

I would now like to call on our first witness who is actually here 

with us, Mr. Camus, for his testimony. 

STATEMENT OF TIMOTHY P. CAMUS, DEPUTY INSPECTOR 

GENERAL FOR INVESTIGATIONS, TREASURY INSPECTOR 

GENERAL FOR TAX ADMINISTRATION, WASHINGTON, DC 

Mr. CAMUS. Thank you, Senator. Chairman Collins, Ranking 

Member Casey, and members of the Committee, thank you for the 

opportunity to testify on the topic of financial frauds affecting seniors. 

Over the past 3 years, TIGTA has conducted numerous investigations on the issue of IRS-related frauds and scams. Telephone impersonation scams, sweepstakes or lottery scams, and email and 

phishing scams are among the top 10 fraud schemes used by criminals to target senior citizens. I will highlight two major IRS-related 

scams we have been investigating. 

The first is a telephone impersonation scam in which more than 

1.8 million Americans reported to us that they have received unsolicited telephone calls from individuals falsely claiming to be IRS 

employees. 

The second is the so-called sweepstakes or lottery scam, which 

has reemerged as a significant threat to the integrity of tax administration. 

The telephone impersonation scam continues to be one of 

TIGTA’s top priorities. No one is immune from receiving these 

calls. I have received calls myself. 

TIGTA has made numerous arrests in connection with this scam, 

and we have a number of significant investigations that are still 

underway. For example, this Committee made a direct referral to 

TIGTA involving a senior citizen located in Florida who was so 

frightened by the impersonators that, following their directions, he 

immediately drove to his local Walmart while remaining on the 

phone with him. During the drive, he crashed his vehicle and continued on foot in order to obtain a MoneyGram payment as demanded by the impersonators. 

TIGTA special agents worked diligently on this referral and ultimately identified five suspects in Miami, Florida. These suspects 

were arrested by TIGTA special agents for wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud. 

In October 2016, after an extensive 3-year joint investigation, the 

Department of Justice obtained an indictment on 56 individuals, 24 

of whom were located in the United States, and 5 call centers located in India. The investigation identified approximately $272 million of total fraud and thousands of victims involving multiple 

fraud schemes. This is the largest single law enforcement action to 

date involving the IRS impersonation scam, and the operation’s 

success is a result of excellent cross-agency collaboration and the 

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efforts of hundreds of TIGTA employees who participated in this 

investigation. 

In addition, TIGTA has taken numerous other steps to fight this 

crime. For example, we created a strategy designed to shut down 

the impersonators’ callback numbers. We have also developed an 

outstanding working relationship with the Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission to combat this 

scam. We have worked with the AARP and the Veterans Administration on public warning messages. 

TIGTA has also employed a public awareness campaign. We have 

recorded five videos that received over 71,000 views, and we have 

provided approximately 100 print and media interviews resulting 

in over 4,400 news stories in both large and small media markets, 

resulting in an estimated 113 million views. 

We also worked with the private sector such as Walmart and 

Apple, who were used in this massive fraud. These companies are 

now helping us to warn consumers about the scam. 

As a result of all of these efforts, the impersonation scam’s impact on the public has been significantly reduced. Today there are 

92 percent fewer reported calls each week and 93 percent fewer victims reported to us that they paid the scammers money. However, 

the problem has not gone away entirely, and the volume is starting 

to come back. 

For example, we received on average 1,000 reported calls per 

week in early January, and our data for last week shows we received over 4,600 calls for the week. I believe sustained investigative efforts and ongoing outreach to ensure people do not become 

victims in the first place is critical to our success in fighting this 

scam. 

Another fraud scheme, the lottery scam, has continued to target 

and victimize senior citizens. Its premise is simple: The scammers 

contact victims to advise them that they have won a lottery or 

sweepstakes, but first they need to pay a non-existent Federal tax 

or fee in order to receive the prize. Over the last few years, TIGTA 

has conducted investigations that have identified over 30 individuals who are responsible for defrauding victims out of millions of 

dollars. We have obtained some prosecutions, and we are working 

on others to address this crime. 

In summary, we at TIGTA take seriously our mandate to protect 

American taxpayers and the integrity of the Internal Revenue 

Service. As such, we plan to provide continuing investigative coverage in this area, and we look forward to our continued collaboration and discussions on ways we can fight these types of frauds and 

scams in the future. 

Chairman Collins, Ranking Member Casey, and members of the 

Committee, thank you so much for your support and for the opportunity to share my views. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you very much. 

Ms. Greisman. 

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STATEMENT OF LOIS GREISMAN, ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR, DIVISION OF MARKETING PRACTICES, BUREAU OF CONSUMER 

PROTECTION, FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION, WASHINGTON, 

DC 

Ms. GREISMAN. Thank you, Chairman Collins, Ranking Member 

Casey, and members of the Committee. I am very happy to appear 

before you again to discuss the FTC’s broad efforts to protect seniors against fraud, which is a critical part of its consumer protection mission. 

These efforts are driven through the FTC’s law enforcement 

work, its coordination with U.S. and international partners, and, 

with a tremendous emphasis, its education and outreach initiatives. 

First, just a quick overview. As you know, the population of older 

Americans is growing rapidly. By 2030, more than one-fifth of U.S. 

residents will be over age 65. 

Now, throughout our law enforcement work, we train a deliberate eye on whether fraudsters are targeting specific consumer 

populations and, in particular, whether they are targeting seniors. 

We do see that certain types of fraud, such as Medicare imposter 

scams, deceptive pitches for medical alert devices, brain training 

programs to treat cognitive impairments such as Alzheimer’s, or 

supplements to address or eliminate joint pain, all may well be directed specifically to seniors. In other areas, such as the technical 

support scam, where scammers impersonate, for example, Dell or 

Microsoft and lead you to believe that your computer is in dire 

straits and that only they have the remedy to fix it, we do think 

seniors may be disproportionately impacted. And with TIGTA, and 

as Deputy Inspector Camus has just indicated, we have strong 

partners in our work and particularly in combating the IRS imposter scam. 

But as a practical matter, scammers care little about their victims’ age. As a result, we see seniors impacted across the entire 

spectrum of our consumer protection work, from investment in 

business opportunity frauds to bogus health care products to time 

share resales frauds. I want to take a moment to highlight, as 

Ranking Member Casey referred to, the recent $586 million settlement with Western Union. A good many iterations of fraud flowed 

through Western Union’s money transfer system, but we know, 

based on the investigation, that lottery scams, so-called emergency 

scams such as the grandparents scam, and the online dating or romance scams were well represented among the complaints the company received, and we know that these types of scams often target 

and impact older consumers. 

In addition to the more than half-billion-dollar settlement, the 

FTC’s order requires Western Union to implement a comprehensive 

anti-fraud program that, among other things, will require suspension or termination of problematic agents under certain requirements. And as you mentioned, the Department of Justice entered 

into a deferred prosecution agreement with the company at the 

same time. 

Not only has the FTC proceeded against money transfers, this 

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sumers in the U.S. into paying hundreds or even thousands of dollars for taxes they did not owe. These telemarketers, as we heard 

from Mr. Hatch, often pretended to be from the IRS or in this case 

from another Government agency that had grant money to dole 

out, and told consumers to pay via MoneyGram or Western Union. 

The defendants with whom we settled were the U.S.-based entities that orchestrated having runners literally driving up and down 

the Florida coast to various retail stores to collect the money transfers before consumers realized they had been scammed and could 

take some action. 

And as you know, FTC law enforcement regularly collaborates 

with our partners here, State and Federal, as well as internationally, and for these purposes, I want to simply note that we and our 

colleagues have spent considerable time working with law enforcement and other stakeholders here and in India to curb illegal telemarketing hitting the U.S. 

Finally, we continue to improve upon and build out our Pass It 

On education effort. I am sure you are familiar with this. We have 

shared it with you many times. It is aimed at active adults, and 

this is our signature initiative. It reaches seniors in social clubs, libraries, senior centers, veterans facilities, and we recently added a 

new video about how an imposter scam harmed a retired teacher. 

We also recently posted another new video about the Pass It On 

campaign itself, highlighting how important it is for an older consumer to be the one who helps friends and families to avoid being 

victimized. We continue to use these resources and to promote 

them with our State and Federal partners. 

In sum, through aggressive law enforcement, strategic policy initiatives, and innovative consumer education, we will continue to 

tackle scammers that exploit older consumers. 

I look forward to your questions. Thank you. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you very much. 

Ms. Menio. 

STATEMENT OF DIANE A. MENIO, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR ADVOCACY FOR THE RIGHTS & INTERESTS OF THE 

ELDERLY, PHILADELPHIA, PA 

Ms. MENIO. Good afternoon. My name is Diane Menio, and I am 

the executive director of the Center for Advocacy for the Rights & 

Interests of the Elderly. I just thought I would say the full name 

so that you would know why we have a girl’s name for a name. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. 

Ms. MENIO. Thank you, Senator Casey, Chairwoman Collins, and 

members of the Committee for your interest in financial exploitation, fraud, and scams against the elderly and for the opportunity 

to present testimony today. 

Two weeks ago, Charlotte Kitler from Nanticoke, Pennsylvania, 

a volunteer in our Pennsylvania Senior Medicare Patrol program, 

accompanied me here to the hearing. Unfortunately, she could not 

make it today, but I know she is here in spirit. She was very excited to be at the Senate. And she works very hard with us. 

Today I am going to talk about health care fraud. I am also going 

to talk about abuse, scams, and financial exploitation targeting the 

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11 

elderly and how CARIE is working to protect seniors across the 

State of Pennsylvania. 

Founded in 1977, CARIE is a nonprofit organization dedicated to 

improving the quality of life for frail older adults. CARIE works to 

protect the rights of older adults and promote awareness of their 

special needs and concerns. In addition, we provide a range of services to help older victims of crime, abuse, and financial exploitation, including a program that helps elder victims through the 

court process and assists with victim impact statements and Crime 

Victim’s Compensation. In addition, CARIE coordinates Pennsylvania’s Senior Medicare Patrol program to help fight Medicare and 

Medicaid fraud. We have more than 75 retired Medicare beneficiaries who provide that peer education about health care fraud 

and share information about how to prevent being victimized. 

While we talk about the great toll that financial exploitation 

exacts on its victims, it is important to note that the problem of 

exploitation impacts many people whether their net worth is in the 

millions, the thousands, or even the hundreds. 

Every day CARIE peer volunteers like Charlotte talk to individuals who have been victims of these horrendous crimes and look for 

solutions to provide guidance to prevent scams from occurring in 

the first place. 

Additionally, we send out ScamWire alerts that help to identify 

new threats to the aging community that seek to involve elders in 

fraud through mailings, email, community meetings, and phone 

calls. I would like to share just a few stories about cases we hear 

every day. 

Seventy-one-year-old Mary from Philadelphia was contacted by 

an individual representing himself as a spokesman for Publishers 

Clearing House. Mary was told that she had won several hundred 

thousand dollars but had to pay the taxes on the prize. She initially sent them $200. Then she was contacted again, and they told 

her that she misunderstood and she needed to send another $2,850 

in cash via the United States Postal Service. Mary finally thought 

better of what she did and filed a police report. She initially admitted to the first mailing, but then after talking to our victim advocate revealed the second amount that she sent. And she told us 

that she was very embarrassed and that is why she had not reported it right away, and that is why she was only willing to talk 

about the $200 at first because she felt that that was not so bad. 

But the extra money made her very embarrassed. So she did, after 

talking to our victim advocate, talk to the police about that, gave 

them the information that she was given, the address and the 

phone number of the person that had called her. But, of course, 

they could not find that person anymore. Unfortunately, she could 

not get the money back from the Crime Victim’s Assistance Fund 

because there is a time limit involved with that. We just really 

need to offer some of these people more security and more ability 

to resist these crimes. 

Gloria, who is 88 and from Delaware County in Pennsylvania, received a phone call from a person claiming to be her grandson. 

When she questioned why he did not sound like himself, he said 

he was in an auto accident and the airbag hit his face. So she was 

scammed out of—it ended up being about $7,000 with the iTunes 

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12 

cards. Older people do not even know what iTunes card is about, 

but they are told to go and get these. So this was, again, one that 

the 2-year period had expired. 

On an encouraging note, Mrs. Smith, who is a homebound beneficiary and lives in central Pennsylvania, called us to thank us and 

to let us know that she received our ScamWire alert in the morning, which was included in her home-delivered meal package. That 

same afternoon, she received a phone call from a scammer and 

wanted us to know that she knew not to give out any personal information because of the alert. It is stories like these that keep us 

at it every day. We have seen many similar cases. You will see 

many more examples in my testimony, and I could even give you 

more. 

The need to prevent financial exploitation is a national imperative. We know that adults and their families must talk about and 

plan for possible incapacity as well. For those showing early signs 

of dementia, this is particularly important, as they may eventually 

lose all capacity to make decisions. Financial capacity is often the 

first to go. 

We do try to work toward positive change. My time is running 

out, so I am going to conclude here. We are very pleased at the bipartisan attention to elder fraud that the Committee is working on 

and the Senior$afe Act which builds on lessons learned from organizations like ours. 

Thank you again, and we are very pleased to work with you on 

this issue and are here for anything you need. Thank you. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you so much for your testimony. 

Mr. Camus, you mentioned the direct referral from our Committee’s hotline to your office that resulted in the arrest of five suspects who allegedly were responsible for almost $3 million in 

schemes that defrauded more than 1,200 victims, and this truly 

was an appalling case that we passed on to you. The senior citizen 

was so upset that he crashed his car on the way to the local 

Walmart to get the debit card. And he was convinced that he was 

going to be arrested immediately, so he leaves the scene of the 

crash and walks the rest of the way to Walmart. 

We were able to determine that the money was sent and picked 

up in Minnesota and provided your office with that information, 

and I really appreciated that you acted on it. 

Could you please give us an update on that case since the arrest 

last May? 

Mr. CAMUS. Yes, Senator, I would be proud to. One of the subjects has pled guilty, and he has been sentenced to 2 years in prison, and he has been ordered to pay $98,000 in restitution to multiple victims. The other defendants are going through the various 

stages of the legal system right now, but we anticipate they, too, 

will be brought to justice here in the very near future. 

Chairman COLLINS. That is great news to hear. 

Ms. Greisman, I am also really pleased to hear the FTC has 

stepped up its efforts, and you mentioned the agreement or the settlement with Western Union that had been made. And I am interested in whether or not that $586 million is going to end up compensating any of the victims. Were you able to trace the money 

that had been lost? And will some of the victims be compensated? 

LAP51NQ082 with DISTILLER

13 

Ms. GREISMAN. Thank you, Chairman. That is precisely the goal 

of the settlement. The Department of Justice, pursuant to the two 

agreements, the two settlements, will be the claims administrator, 

and they will take it upon them to do their best job to try to reach 

out to victims and provide redress. 

Chairman COLLINS. That is so important because in the vast majority of these cases, once the money has been wired, it is gone forever, and it is very difficult to trace. And that is why I really appreciated not only the settlement with Western Union that is going 

to lead to some restitution, but the quick work of the Inspector 

General’s Office for Tax Administration that really stopped a fraud 

in progress. That is the kind of cooperation we need across Government. 

One of the things that truly frustrates me about these con artists 

is that they are very clever and they are always changing their tactics to stay ahead of the consumer education efforts that we organize, as well as law enforcement. And I think we are all making 

a difference, but the fact is that the calls to our hotline doubled 

last year to more than 2,200. I am going to bring up a chart which 

demonstrates why scammers—it is a little hard to read, it is a little 

busy there—but why they are continuously changing their strategies. Let me explain it since it is a bit busy, as I said. 

Between November 2014 and early 2016, the losses per month in 

the IRS impersonation scam averaged approximately $1 million. 

That is $1 million lost per month. However, starting in the spring 

of 2016, the losses per month increased to $2 to $4 million, and I 

can see Mr. Camus nodding his head in agreement. And it stayed 

at about that level through the end of last year. 

What happened during that time is the scammers made a change 

and they are no longer using the Walmart debit card as much. 

They have gone to the iTunes card, which struck me as very 

strange because I thought you used those to buy records. But perhaps I am out of it. 

But, Mr. Camus, I would like you to comment on whether the 

change in tactics plus the relentlessness that we have heard about 

from Mr. Hatch where they call again and again and the next day 

with more demands, has that made scammers more successful in 

terms of the money they are bringing in, even if the number of victims has declined? 

Mr. CAMUS. Yes, we noted in April, Senator, April 2016, that 

there was a shift to the iTunes card as a method of payment. They 

also redoubled their efforts on their auto-dialer program, so they 

are able to make hundreds of thousands of telephone calls in a very 

short order. 

To your point exactly, when the scam first started, it was individuals calling one on one. And then when they shifted to the autodialer technology, they were able to blanket individuals with hundreds of thousands of calls, leaving a callback number. 

At about the same time, they shifted to the iTunes card, and 

what we learned in our investigation was the iTunes card makes 

it very easy for them to flip the money. They are no longer paying 

middlemen to convert payments into money orders. They are now 

selling the iTunes cards on a third-party market and then pockLAP51NQ082 with DISTILLER

14 

eting the money immediately. And, also, it is very difficult for law 

enforcement to trace that transaction. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. 

Senator Casey. 

Senator CASEY. Thanks very much. 

Diane, I am going to start with you, and not simply because you 

are a Pennsylvanian but most especially because of your long work. 

I mentioned as well in my opening comments the acronym, and I 

want to put the words behind the acronym. Diane, you have 

worked for, we will call it, a couple of years—— 

Ms. MENIO. Yes, just a few. 

Senator CASEY. Just a few. I guess I can say decades. 

Ms. MENIO. It is 28 years. 

[Laughter.] 

Senator CASEY. For the Center for Advocacy for the Rights & Interests of the Elderly, so-called CARIE. So we are grateful for that 

work. One question I had was: How do you coordinate in your work 

with both State authorities and Federal authorities? Sometimes the 

most difficult challenge in any investigation is the coordination of 

it. How do you do that? And is there anything we should know 

about those issues? 

Ms. MENIO. Yes, it sure is challenging sometimes. But in Pennsylvania, we actually have a network of elder abuse task forces 

that operate in various counties across the State. In Philadelphia, 

our task force is specifically focused on financial exploitation, and 

so we have bankers and others at the table. 

I think that is one of the best ways to coordinate, is to actually 

know these people, to be able to sit around the table and talk about 

the problem. Sometimes we do case reviews, so, you know, you get 

to talk about how this case got played out through the system and 

it helps us. 

Last year, you know, I know the Committee had a hearing about 

the drug mules that were being used, and one of the calls about 

that came into our office about a gentleman who was from Pennsylvania and jailed in Japan. And we were frustrated by that because 

we started calling everybody we could think of, and we found no 

help for that family. But, eventually, he did get out. 

But when we were at our task force meeting, we talked about 

that case, and someone from Homeland Security was there, and we 

shared—they gave us their card and said, ‘‘Can we share this’’— 

you know, ‘‘Can you share the information about the family?’’ And 

so we talked to the family, and we were able to connect them with 

Homeland Security. 

So it is that kind of collaborative work, I think, that is very important because we have to know one another. And reaching out 

to community groups that are in the community that actually work 

with older adults, working with law enforcement—I mean, we do 

this in our health care fraud program as well. It is very important 

that we can get to the OIG’s office, that the FBI is involved, all 

these other groups so that we can get to the bottom of this. It is 

not always the same agency. So we try to work in collaboration as 

much as we can. 

Senator CASEY. I want to ask as well about the—you mentioned 

health care fraud. The so-called Senior Medicare Patrol, I know you 

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have worked very hard with that patrol. We are having a big debate here about the Affordable Care Act, and this is one area 

where there is a very strong set of numbers that aligns with the 

progress that has been made over the last couple years in combating Medicare fraud. 

To the extent that you can give an opinion on what happens with 

regard to the ACA, if it were to be repealed, say if it were repealed 

and not replaced—I know that is a big subject of debate, but just 

give us your sense of the impact of the Medicare fraud patrol? 

Ms. MENIO. Well, there are a number of issues that I think that 

have impacted health care fraud, you know, uncovering health care 

fraud, but also just Medicare and other provisions as well that we 

think are very important, looking at nursing homes and a number 

of other issues. But one of the things the Affordable Care Act did— 

and it is sort of related to your last question—is it allowed agencies 

like CMS, Medicaid, Department of Veterans Affairs, Social Security Administration, and others to data-share, to help them identify 

criminals who are defrauding. Sometimes, you know, we will get a 

call—we had a lady in Philadelphia who was a podiatrist, and she 

went into Chinatown. She was part of that community. And she 

started basically getting people’s Medicare numbers and billing. It 

turned out she was billing like hundreds of thousands of dollars— 

it actually was in the millions. At one point she was vacationing 

in Paris when those bills were submitted. 

It is really important, you know, because we had a couple complaints from these beneficiaries, and that is probably not going to 

rise to the level of a major investigation. But once you start looking 

at the data, you can see what is happening. And so that is extremely critical. So it is important to see because these criminals 

are going across programs. They are similar to the other scammers. 

They are setting up business where it is opportunistic business. 

The other thing that I think is important is that they have created—the Affordable Care Act created a Medicare fraud strike 

force, and I think that costs about $350 million, and so far it has 

recovered more than $10 billion. So there is real good economic advantage to doing this work, because when they do find these 

scammers, as I said, a lot of them are very large scale. The one I 

talked about was probably small compared to some of the large 

scale. I know in Florida, for instance, there were these groups, 

these storefronts set up to basically pay Medicare beneficiaries for 

their Medicare numbers. And so it made these beneficiaries 

complicit in the fraud. They certainly did not understand what was 

happening. They were getting $10 or $20 or something like that, 

but they did not understand what was going on. 

So we really need to continue to do this work to make sure that 

we are combating this stuff. And just sometimes to us, when we 

are getting the complaints, it seems all too easy, and sometimes 

the solution seems easy, too. So we really need to make sure that 

we are looking at how we can make these systems work, and I 

think the more this—what was provided for in the Affordable Care 

Act has created some results, and we need to continue doing that. 

Senator CASEY. I appreciate that. I am out of time, but will come 

back. Thanks. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. 

LAP51NQ082 with DISTILLER

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Senator Rubio. 

Senator RUBIO. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

I want to continue to build on what you just mentioned about the 

storefronts, and it is a topic that a lot of people are not aware of. 

What we have in Florida, what we in South Florida in particular 

today is an outrageous crisis of Medicare fraud, and let me describe 

it. And I say this to you as a Cuban American with both deep regret and sometimes shame about this reality. We have literally 50 

to 100 individuals, mostly recent arrivals from Cuba, who arrive 

into the United States, somehow figure out a way to set up a Medicare company. Usually it is a storefront, often just a P.O. box. They 

then acquire Medicare numbers from a runner, from somebody who 

works at a hospital, and they begin to bill those Medicare numbers 

for no services provided. And I am talking about to the tunes of 

hundreds of thousands of dollars. 

I have been flat out told by law enforcement in Florida, in South 

Florida in particular, that if they do not get greedy and are just 

willing to steal $200,000 to $300,000 a month, they are probably 

not going to get caught. They are stealing to the tunes of millions 

of dollars. 

If you look at the list of the top most wanted Medicare fraudsters 

in America, they are almost entirely from South Florida and almost 

entirely recent arrivals from the island of Cuba. And when we are 

about to arrest them—they know they are coming—they leave to 

Cuba with millions of dollars. It is an outrage. It is grotesque. It 

has been extensively covered by the press in South Florida. And 

people may think that seniors are not victims, they are just used. 

They are victims. Number one, it is helping to further exacerbate 

the financial troubles of Medicare, and in many cases—you are absolutely right—seniors are being told there is nothing wrong with 

this, it is legal, just come in, all you got to do is sit down for an 

interview, give us your Medicare number, and before you know it, 

it is their account that is being billed for all this amount. And 

sometimes they get wrapped up in it. 

So I hope that we will have a chance to focus on it. We had a 

chance to discuss it. When I tell people this, they do not believe it 

can—this is organized crime. In every other sense, it is organized 

crime, and they are brazen about it. And they laugh about it, because they know they can just leave and are protected if they leave 

the country. 

My mother is a senior—this is why I want to ask you this question—and she has been the target in the past. And I just recalled 

this as we were having a conversation. After she suffered a stroke 

in 2011, she is largely home-ridden except she goes to therapy and 

so forth. She gets a call about taxes she owes, and I know enough 

about my mom and her finances to know she has not made a lot 

of money ever, but certainly in the last couple years she has not 

been employed. She relies almost exclusively on Social Security and 

small savings. 

So we get this number, and we tried to—even though I am in 

this position of public service, first of all, I did not even know who 

to call about it at the time. Number two, it is a caller ID, so there 

is nothing I can do about it. But even if I had been able to lure 

them into an extensive conversation, I am not sure if I should have 

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gone to local government or the FBI. There was a little bit of confusion about who to take it to. That is number one. 

The second is her caregiver. She has people that come during the 

day and watch her a little bit, you know, for some time to make 

sure she is taking her meds. They are often the people answering 

it. So we have to figure out a way to educate them as well. 

And the third, quite frankly, especially in Florida, for a lot of a 

seniors is a language barrier. My mother speaks English, but her 

first language is Spanish. That is where she watches the soap operas every night, which I do not fully understand these soap operas 

and why they are so popular, but she watches them on the Spanish 

language networks, and a lot of the people that are being targeted 

for this are also being targeted because of the language barrier. 

So I guess in all of that is embedded the following questions: 

What can we do to improve the awareness of caregivers who might 

be the people answering the phones when these calls are coming? 

What can we do to facilitate for them exactly to know who to—like 

do we recommend that they actually talk to these people, engage 

them, and try to play detective? Or do we just tell them to hang 

up and do not deal with them? And the third is: What can we do 

or should we do to ensure that communities, particularly enclaves 

of seniors that perhaps are getting the majority of their news and 

information in a second language like Spanish, that we are doing 

enough to inform them about these scams and these things that 

are occurring? 

Ms. MENIO. Yeah, I think that the public education is critical. I 

do think that another issue you might be interested in in the future is looking at why people become subject to scams. You know, 

we talk about people with dementia, but there is also an issue 

around financial capacity. Someone may be able to function very 

well in their life, but their ability to manage finances goes down. 

And one of the reasons older adults are targeted so often is because 

they are the ones who are at home and answer the phone. And 

they might be lonely. And these guys, not only do they come up 

with the latest best scams, but they also know how to engage people and become their friends. So it is very challenging—I say that 

because it is very challenging, even when we are doing the education, to get people to pull back from this. 

When you talk about the caregivers, the caregivers certainly 

should be educated about this as well, because they are on the 

front lines and they will see this happening. I will, though, caution 

that sometimes we do see caregivers being the exploiters as well. 

So it is really important for families to be vigilant about this. 

We certainly also deal with people with limited English as well. 

One time we did a presentation in Chinatown, and I think it was 

simultaneously translated into about eight different languages so 

that people could get that information. So we try to do as much as 

we can to reach people and to also train gatekeepers in those communities so that, you know, if it is a Spanish-speaking community, 

we can train people in that community to take that message to individuals, those people who are going into the home, for instance, 

who are working in the housing sites. We have housing coordinators who are working with people individually. 

LAP51NQ082 with DISTILLER

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So that is where—and we have had scams—we had a scam by 

somebody telling them they were the cable company. It happened 

in senior housing throughout the city. And so we were able through 

that—and one of them was at a housing site where most of the people speak Spanish, and that is where we actually were able to tackle the problem because they got it—— 

Senator RUBIO. And I know I am out of time. Just a suggestion. 

We may want to talk to the two primary Spanish language networks about public service announcements as part of their FCC license. I think it would be really useful, especially for the programming that is geared towards an older audience. 

Ms. MENIO. And we have been able to get those on our local 

Spanish language stations. 

Senator RUBIO. Good. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you very much, Senator Rubio. As 

you were talking, I was thinking that we should get this postcard 

translated into Spanish as well so that—— 

Senator RUBIO. Do you want me to do it? I will do it. I can translate it. 

[Laughter.] 

I even know how to do the accents. 

Chairman COLLINS. I have no doubt of that. 

Senator RUBIO. We will call you ‘‘Susana.’’ 

Chairman COLLINS. And I love the idea of including it with 

Meals on Wheels because that would reach a lot of homebound seniors. So that is something we can look at also. 

Senator Gillibrand. 

Senator GILLIBRAND. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and 

thank you, Mr. Ranking Member. This is such a vital hearing. You 

know, I have traveled around New York State asking community 

centers and senior centers, you know, ‘‘Have you been affected?’’ 

And, overwhelmingly, almost every hand in the room is raised, because someone has gotten the IRS scam, someone has gotten the 

grandparent scam, somebody has gotten the sweepstakes scam. 

And it is heartbreaking, and some of these seniors have lost tens 

of thousands of dollars. And there is no protection for them, so I 

have three sets of questions. 

First, what should we do as the Senate Committee to—all of you 

have said, yes, there must be public education. How must there be 

public education? What legislation should we write about how to 

educate all seniors about these scams? Specifically, how do we 

reach all seniors in this country? 

Number two, every one of these scams has public participation 

on some level. The CVS counter that sells the iTunes card, the Target that sells the iTunes card, the credit union, the bank—thank 

goodness one New York woman, she went to her bank to take out 

$5,000 to pay the IRS scam, and someone sitting outside waiting 

for her to bring the money, and the teller so smartly says, ‘‘Ma’am, 

you look so nervous. Are you okay?’’ And she is like, ‘‘No. I have 

got the IRS on the phone, and I have to give them the money right 

now.’’ The woman was smart enough to say, ‘‘Give me the phone,’’ 

hung it up, said that the IRS will never call you. 

Should we not be having conversations directly with any place 

you can purchase an iTunes card? Shouldn’t there be a notice that 

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is on every cash register, if someone buys an iTunes card, please 

confirm it is to purchase an iTunes card for music, or for a video 

game, it is not to give to the IRS? Why aren’t we posting at every 

vendor that sells iTunes? Every bank, every teller should be 

trained on this. I do not think we are doing enough to prevent 

these horrible crimes from happening. 

And all of you have said these are significant criminal networks. 

I have heard some are run by the Russian mob, for God’s sakes. 

Like if we knew massive criminal networks were targeting our seniors, our families, I would think we would be doing much more 

than we are doing. But for some reason, we are not taking this as 

seriously as we should. It is, oh, these seniors are being duped, the 

money is gone. Well, if we had some huge mob cartel bringing 

drugs into this country, we would have Federal action. We would 

be sending money to address it. And I do not feel like we are doing 

that. 

And the degree of the scam is much bigger than we have even 

disclosed. We only have what has been reported. But we know 40 

percent is not even reported because it is so embarrassing. This 

happened to my aunt. She got the IRS scam. She sent the money. 

She never told my mother who does all her finances. She was so 

embarrassed. So we are not even getting the full report. 

So from each of you, I would like to know what you recommend 

to us to prevent this from warning various parties that are involved in these scams unwittingly, the people who sell the iTunes 

cards, the banks. I have a senior who went to her bank and took 

out an advance. And you know what the bank is doing to her now? 

Charging her interest because she cannot pay the money back because it is gone. And no relief from her bank. So this is a problem. 

So from each of you, direct recommendations for us. 

Mr. CAMUS. Thank you so much, Senator. You are right on target 

with what we are trying to do. We agree that once the money is 

gone, it is gone, as the Senator pointed out. Public education is the 

number one way to combat this. Criminals will continue to go for 

the vulnerable, in this case senior citizens, as long as they get 

money. 

Senator GILLIBRAND. Specifically, what kind of public education 

and in what form? 

Mr. CAMUS. We send our special agents out, and we look forward 

to invites for town hall meetings, especially at senior centers, and 

we have had very good feedback on those. So we think we can penetrate into that segment by actually participating with Members of 

Congress at various town hall events, and we would be proud to 

have a special agent come and speak to this very issue. So that is 

just one idea I would have. 

As far as the vendors, right now we are working on a project 

with Walmart to do exactly as you describe, that is, post placards 

and train their cashiers, and when somebody comes through with 

a handful of iTunes cards, that there is some sort of a dialogue that 

goes on prior to that purchase being consummated: ‘‘There is a 

scam going on. Are you aware of the scam? Have you been told that 

these iTunes cards are for taxes? If you have, it is a scam.’’ 

We have been successful with MoneyGram, for example, that 

when individuals go on to the MoneyGram kiosk in a CVS, one of 

LAP51NQ082 with DISTILLER

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the warnings that pops up early in the transaction is: ‘‘If you have 

been told to pay your taxes with a MoneyGram, you are being 

scammed. Please stop the transaction.’’ 

So we totally agree with you that we have to leverage the retailers and get them to cooperate, and in some cases we have. A recent 

shift that we have seen is primarily Walmart was being used as 

the retailer, and now our data is telling us within just this past 

month that it is now being shifted to Target. So just yesterday, I 

had one of my executives reach out to Target, and we are going to 

insist that Target work with us the same way Walmart did. 

But for us as a small agency, a small law enforcement agency, 

we think that every person that we protect is a victory. That is how 

we view this. It is not just a law enforcement aspect. It is every 

single person that does not become a victim is a victory. But how 

do we collectively—to your point, how do we collectively come together and make a bigger impact? 

So certainly working with the FTC is something that we have 

really enjoyed doing, but there is still more that could be done. But 

I just want to give you the assurance that we are doing a lot behind the scenes. 

Ms. GREISMAN. Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity to address the points you raise. It is very serious, and I do not want to 

have you think in any way that this is not a top priority for the 

Federal Trade Commission. 

In terms of prevention, I would urge each of you, if you do not 

already use our Pass It On materials—put them up again—these 

are tested. This is, we think, a very effective way to reach seniors 

where they are and to provide them with the tools they need so 

that they are the ones positioned to assist friends and family members not to be victimized. There is a specific piece on IRS imposter 

scams. 

The intermediaries, there are two things we do. One, we sue 

them. That is what the settlement with Western Union is about. 

We had a settlement years before with MoneyGram. Through 

amendments to the telemarketing sales rule, we made illegal wire 

transfers in connection with telemarketing, and we also prohibited 

other types of reloadable cards being used. So law enforcement is 

front and center in terms of the intermediaries. 

Also, as Deputy Inspector Camus referred to, we have lots of conversations with Apple, with Walmart, with the trade associations 

for relevant industry members. The Western Union settlement, like 

the MoneyGram, imposes specific requirements to make it more 

likely that the company will intercept and prevent the transfer of 

money, because as we have all discussed, once it is gone, it is gone. 

And that is exactly why the scammers are using those types of payment instruments. 

So that is where we are. We will continue to work with industry 

members to get better signage, to get other analytical tools in place 

so that they can identify where the bad actors are and how the 

transfers are going forward. Thank you. 

Ms. MENIO. I cannot agree more with what you said, but I do 

want to put a plug in for the Senior$afe Act, which is one thing 

that you can do. One of the biggest problems we have had with financial institutions is making these reports. 

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In my written testimony, you will see a story about a lady who 

was bilked out of $800,000. That was basically everything she had. 

She was in her 80s, and she thought she was winning the lottery. 

And so she kept paying money and did not tell her family until it 

was way too late. And I think it was finally—she and her husband 

had invested their money with an investment firm for, you know, 

all their adult life, and her husband had died, and that was their 

money in the bank. And no one made a report, and eventually the 

money got transferred to another bank, and she continued to buy 

these Walmart cards and everything to pay this thing. And, finally, 

that second bank made a report, but that was after $800,000 was 

lost. 

So we need to do something to make them feel better. I mean, 

you know, we keep pulling out the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act and 

saying, ‘‘You can do this. You are covered.’’ But they still are not 

doing it. And sometimes—I can tell you what happens—in some of 

the cases that work out well, it is the teller who is making the report. They are not necessarily authorized by the guys at the top, 

but it is the teller who is coming in and they are seeing all these 

withdrawals taken. So that gets to your point of training the people 

who see it happening, the people who are—the tellers at the 

bank—although we have fewer and fewer of those these days—and 

the people who are at the stores. 

The other thing is that we need to encourage age-friendly services in those institutions. We need to have fraud technology. There 

is a lot of technology out there these days. I remember sitting in 

a meeting with the bankers and saying, well, you know, if I am out 

of town and I use my credit card—like I was somewhere, in Chicago I think, and suddenly my card got shut off. Well, you know, 

it was legitimate charges, but they shut off my card because they 

were monitoring it. I said, Why can’t you do that for some of these 

cases? And they are very shy about doing that. They will not do 

it. 

But those technologies really need to be used for this. They need 

to come into action. And the age-friendly services are also important, to make sure that they have protections, like encouraging 

them to plan for incapacity, offering age-friendly account features, 

like having someone who has access to your account. Maybe they 

cannot take money out, but the daughter, for instance, can get in 

and monitor online to make sure nothing is going wrong. 

And so all of those kinds of things I think can be done. I hope 

that we can do more to combat this, and we need to—you know, 

when you talk about education, sometimes it really is just as easy 

as putting up a sign at the cash register so the person managing 

that cash register sees somebody buying—an older person, somebody who is 80, 82 years old, buying all these iTunes cards, that 

is a flag. I cannot imagine why you would not report that. So we 

need to do exactly what you are saying. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. 

Senator CORTEZ MASTO. 

Senator CORTEZ MASTO. Thank you. I am very excited to be a 

member of this Committee, so thank you very much. And thank 

you to all of you for what you do. 

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I was fortunate to be able to work with the FTC as the Attorney 

General of Nevada and had great partnership, and many of you we 

have worked with on so many different levels. This area was important for me as Attorney General. That is why I created a unit 

in my office to address elder abuse, neglect, and exploitation. Every 

single one of the scams that you identify here happens in Nevada, 

and we had some great partners. 

I want to talk on a couple of levels, though. The first one is the 

public education, because to me this is the first step in prevention, 

and it is so hard to do. It really is. There are many of us that are 

trying to do our outreach and get out and talk to folks, but it has 

to be on a constant basis. You cannot just say I am throwing this 

out there, we will it overnight, and that is done. The education occurs all the time. All the time. 

I have been—I always say this—just about to every senior center 

in Nevada to reach out to our seniors. But it is not just reaching 

out to seniors. It is reaching out to their caregivers. It is reaching 

out to family. It is reaching out to service providers. So for my purposes—and this is what I am going to ask with your help—I had 

put on conferences in the State of Nevada, just bringing people in 

for the training, for the public education, bringing the experts in 

to talk about it, how we educate, how we train, and how we constantly get that information out. That is one thing that I would 

love your help with in Nevada, to continue down that road. 

The next one, however, is challenging for me when it comes to 

law enforcement, and this is a question I have for our law enforcement folks. Given the aging population—in Nevada it is growing, 

but also we are constantly evolving with technology and technological scams—what additional resources or innovations does law 

enforcement need to keep up with the financial threats posed to 

seniors now? And when you talk about it, talk also about how we 

examine also the money transfer systems, which make it much 

easier for some of these criminal elements to engage and scam our 

seniors. 

Mr. CAMUS. Just a couple ideas. Thank you, Senator, and we do 

look forward to working with you in Nevada. 

One of the ideas you could come up with would be—there is a 

72-hour right of rescission on large transactions, so maybe it could 

be considered that on any wire transaction, instead of it being 

rapid and instantaneous, there is some sort of a 72-hour right of 

rescission, because many of the victims that we spoke to, they realized it, but just a little bit too late. By the time they realized or 

talked to a family member about being scammed, the money was 

already gone, and there is no way to get it back. But if we could 

get that frozen for just a period of time to allow a recognition, a 

family discussion, or law enforcement to intercede, we might be 

able to save people a lot of money and save their lives actually. 

But as far as some of the other ideas, the challenge for law enforcement is the money moves so quickly and the ability to convince somebody to put their Federal income tax payment on an 

iTunes card, that is really difficult. As I said in my testimony, we 

estimate that just through media on our own as a small agency, we 

believe that we—we had 113 million views, over 100 media interviews, and it is constant with us. We had Apple agree to fund a 

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23 

pilot program where over the air in CVS stores and other drug 

stores, the message over the air as they were shopping was, ‘‘Do 

not use Apple iTunes cards to pay public debt. Do not use Apple 

iTunes cards to pay Government. It does not work that way.’’ And 

we think that that worked, but it is very, very expensive. That 

project cost Apple I believe $140,000 to fund that. But it was a 

pilot. 

So if we could get more of that type of cooperation, a fund set 

up where some of these retailers and companies are required to put 

aside some money to help educate and continuously educate—because it is so difficult to penetrate. You know, I am not a journalism major, but I am astounded by how difficult it is and how— 

and I take calls myself at my desk. And just this morning, I took 

a call from a victim, and they had no idea that there was any such 

thing as an impersonation scam. And it perplexes me. I am, like, 

‘‘What more could we all do, what are other things that we can do 

to try to reach that?’’ 

Senator CORTEZ MASTO. Yeah, and that is why it is constant. The 

education has to be constant, because people are not really listening. And let me just say one thing as well, and I found this in Nevada. Part of it, too, is when they become victims—and we have 

heard it here, but they are embarrassed to come forward. They are 

embarrassed to say that this happened to them. And we have to 

give them a venue to be able to say it did happen, it is all right, 

it is happening across this country, to make sure that they are willing to come out and educate themselves and educate others about 

this type of scam. 

Ms. GREISMAN. Thank you, Senator, and we have enjoyed the cooperative relationship with your former office as well. 

You mentioned how do we get out into the community. Well, we 

have had some 33 common-ground conferences throughout the 

country. One was in Vegas with the help of your former office. 

There we are working with grassroots members, people from the 

Chamber of Commerce, legal service providers, obviously the Attorneys General offices, local law enforcement. And the discussions 

vary nationwide, but a lot of focus is on issues affecting seniors in 

the community. And we learn from those conferences. We push out 

our consumer education materials. We will continue to do more on 

that front. 

Money transfer services, well, I would like to sit here and be cautiously optimistic that the near half-billion-dollar settlement with 

Western Union will squeeze some of the fraud out of that system, 

and I think it will. It is an order with very rigorous requirements 

that, if they adhere to them, should make a difference. Of course, 

if we are squeezing money out of that system, then it is just going 

to find another path of less resistance to move to. 

There is no silver bullet in this. Education has to complement 

law enforcement, and that is what we are committed to doing. We 

certainly look forward to working with each and every one of you 

to build upon what we have been doing. 

Senator CORTEZ MASTO. Thank you. And let me just add one 

final thing. Diane, the Senior Medicare Patrol unit was in my office. It is instrumental. I will always continue to support it. I cannot tell you how many seniors not only were excited to be a part 

LAP51NQ082 with DISTILLER

24 

of it, but we were able to uncover fraud. And I cannot say enough 

about the journals, the diaries, the health care diaries and journals 

that we would hand out to individuals. It matters. They really pay 

attention when you talk about it and when you have their peers 

talking to them about how we address Medicare fraud and Medicaid fraud, which we handled in my office. It made a difference. 

So I will continue to support programs and advocacy, so thank you 

for what you do. 

Ms. MENIO. Thank you. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you, Senator. 

Senator Flake. 

Senator FLAKE. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Sorry if 

I am plowing old ground here, but could you tell me what innovative programs are already out there that the States have come up 

with for addressing these senior scams? Anybody who wants to 

start there. 

Mr. CAMUS. As far as the States are concerned? 

Senator FLAKE. Yes. 

Mr. CAMUS. We work with multiple States, and we work with 

law enforcement agencies, local and other Federal partners. And I 

am not uniquely aware that any of the States that we are working 

in have come up with innovative approaches, but I am probably not 

the one that is best suited to answer that. 

Senator FLAKE. All right. 

Ms. GREISMAN. Many States have wonderful, robust programs 

addressing fraud targeting seniors. Many have discrete offices that 

directly focus on that, and to the extent possible, we work closely 

with them. I had mentioned earlier our Pass It On materials. We 

freely distribute those to the States. We urge everyone to put their 

own name on it. We have no copyright interest in it. We just want 

to pass on those materials so that they can be used. 

Senator FLAKE. Okay. 

Ms. MENIO. And can I just add that one of the tools we have at 

the State level is the Older Adult Protective Services Office, which 

often gets the first report on these cases. And I just want to say 

that one of our recommendations is to make sure that those programs are strong enough to do what they need to do. 

One of the things that they often lack is forensic accountants, for 

instance, to be able to actually take on a case and figure out what 

is happening. So we need more resources in that program. And at 

the same time, we are aware that the social services block grant 

funding is under question at this point, and that is the money that 

often supports those programs at the State level. So, you know, 

while we need to enhance the funding for those programs, we need 

to at least maintain the funding for those programs, because they 

are often the first line. When Senator Rubio asked who to report 

to, I did not answer his question, but what I meant to say was just 

report it, it does not really matter, because when you report it to 

one place, it will get to the right place eventually. And that is what 

Protective Services does. It is the first line, and it is very helpful 

to be able to get that person into the system. 

Senator FLAKE. Well, thank you, Ms. Menio. You mentioned in 

your testimony that a beneficiary called to thank you for the timely 

ScamWire alert she received in her home, and they delivered a 

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package shortly thereafter. Are there any reoccurring services that 

seniors use where companies can include these fraud alerts so that 

they can be delivered more—— 

Ms. MENIO. Yes. We also distribute those to public libraries, senior centers, senior housing. We distribute them to a large number 

of places where we know—grocery stores, places where people gather, where older people do business. And the home-delivered meals 

project that we do is really focused on people that we will not reach 

by going to a library or a senior center or those kinds of places. It 

is the people who are homebound and do not get out and would not 

get that message otherwise. But we are trying to do that through 

many different public venues. 

Senator FLAKE. All right. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you, Senator Flake. 

Before you were here, Ms. Menio mentioned the Senior$afe Act, 

which you were a cosponsor of in the last Congress and which we 

have reintroduced. Senator Casey is a cosponsor. And just yesterday, AARP has endorsed that bill along with we have endorsements from Legal Services for the Elderly, the National American 

Securities Administrators Association, the Conference on State 

Bank Supervisors, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, and a wide variety of regulatory groups, and that is one 

concrete action we could take in this Congress that would really 

make a difference in empowering those front-line tellers that our 

witnesses were describing and who can make a real difference in 

stopping fraud right up front. So I am going to ask unanimous consent that all of those endorsement letters be entered into the 

record. 

[The letters referred to are in the Appendix.] 

Chairman COLLINS. Senator Warren. 

Senator WARREN. Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and 

thank you very much for holding this hearing, you and the Ranking Member. And I want to just follow up. I think your point about 

how better to empower people on the front lines is really important. I just want to look at another aspect of that. 

As we know, the con artists who perpetuate IRS impersonation 

scams, identity theft, and other forms of financial exploitation often 

target seniors. And when a senior needs to report that they were 

the victim of fraud, it is frequently the men and women who work 

in our Government enforcement and consumer protection agencies 

in Washington and in all 50 States who are on the front lines taking their calls and investigating their cases. 

So it seems pretty obvious to me that one easy way to protect 

America’s seniors from fraud is to strengthen that workforce. But 

instead of staffing up the workforce that cracks down on scammers 

and fraudsters that hurt our seniors, on his first full day in the 

Oval Office, President Trump issued an Executive order freezing 

Federal hiring and starving our enforcement agencies of their most 

important resource—American workers. 

So, Mr. Camus, you are Deputy Inspector General for investigations at the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration. 

Your job is to protect seniors against scammers who pretend that 

the IRS is calling and trying to collect back taxes. Almost 2 million 

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26 

people have reported this scam to your office, and these scams have 

cost Americans more than $54 million. That is a lot of money. 

Does a hiring freeze help you achieve your goal of protecting seniors from fraud? 

Mr. CAMUS. As you point out, Senator, these are—it is a huge 

issue, and every one of these victims is a significant challenge on 

our resources. So, naturally, I have been told I am not allowed to 

pander for resources at these events, but—— 

Senator WARREN. Okay. We will let you know if you have crossed 

the line into pandering here. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. CAMUS. I can tell you I am very proud and we are very efficient agency, but certainly this has stretched our agency very thin. 

We are seeking the exemption in the President’s order under a 

public safety clause, at least for the special agent portion of our 

workforce. 

Senator WARREN. Well, I appreciate that, Mr. Camus. You know, 

according to testimony from your office back in 2016, ‘‘Reduced 

staffing has affected the IRS’ ability to deliver its priority program 

areas, including customer service and enforcement.’’ Given that 

your enforcement team is already understaffed, I worry that this 

kind of hiring freeze is music to criminals’ ears. 

Now, Mr. Camus, you also work with the Department of Justice 

to help protect seniors from criminals who are trying to defraud 

them. Will the hiring freeze help you with the DOJ? 

Mr. CAMUS. Again, you know, it is—we are only limited, all of 

us are only limited by how much resources we have, and we are 

all very passionate about protecting all Americans, but most especially our most vulnerable. That is why I took the oath to be a law 

enforcement officer. So it is a challenge. Resources are a challenge 

on a good day. So any disruption in that is certainly a cause for 

concern. 

I am not sure whether the Internal Revenue Service or the Department of Justice have any exemptions available to them under 

the order. 

Senator WARREN. All right. But if they do not? 

Mr. CAMUS. I could not comment. I do not know the impact. 

Senator WARREN. You know, I just want to point out we have 

seen this movie before. A 2011 hiring freeze at the Social Security 

Administration eliminated 15 percent of the agency’s workforce and 

closed 64 field offices. Ms. Menio, you are the executive director at 

the Center for Advocacy for the Rights & Interests of the Elderly 

in Philadelphia. 

Can you explain how the 2011 Social Security personnel freeze 

affected the seniors that your center works with every day? 

Ms. MENIO. Well, certainly it takes a lot longer to make an appointment. 

Senator WARREN. So increased wait times. 

Ms. MENIO. I can tell you that we are—you know, interestingly, 

the Social Security—I am in downtown Philadelphia, and the Social Security office is in our building. They have the top floor. And 

the way that it works is no one goes upstairs until the guard lets 

them go upstairs, so they get the message, ‘‘You can send more 

people up.’’ And that line gets quite long, and people are standing 

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there with their walkers and their canes and waiting to go upstairs. And so that is something I see every day. 

I can also tell you that my staff spends a lot of time when they 

are helping consumers doing three-way calls because we are not— 

you know, we like to empower people and work with them, but 

sometimes it is difficult for them to make that call on their own. 

So we will sit with them, and they tell me it is 30 minutes to an 

hour sometimes they are waiting for that call to get through. 

We had a client who called us recently from the western part of 

the State. Her husband died and she was collecting—she wanted 

to switch her Social Security so she could collect on his account, I 

believe something like that. And what happened was—and, you 

know, I think this is illustrative of the short staffing. She got lost 

in the system. She did not get a check at all for 3 months, and that 

meant her Medicare Part B was not being paid. And so she did not 

even have her health care during that time. Eventually, we were 

able to help her get that back, but, nevertheless, it was a very 

stressful time for her. It should not have happened that way. It 

probably took more man-hours from the Social Security office to fix 

this than it would have taken to help her in the first place. So 

those are some of the kinds of things we are seeing. 

I also know that the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities put 

out a report, and they said that less than 1 percent of their expenses are spent on overhead. I cannot run my agency on less than 

1 percent—I wish I could, to be honest with you, but I cannot. And 

so that just is not realistic. How can you continue to provide the 

level of services to this aging population, to many of us who are 

ready to, you know, go into the Social Security system, into Medicare? We need to be able to get that information as quickly as we 

can and work with people without going through a lot of red tape 

and spending hours on the phone and in offices. 

Senator WARREN. And I appreciate that. I just want to add a couple of statistics if I can, and then I will quit. Thank you, Madam 

Chair. 

You know, appeals times also go up. She is talking about helping 

people apply. But the appeals times go up. Almost 20,000 people 

died waiting for a disability eligibility discussion in fiscal year 

2016. You know, with all of these negative consequences, you would 

at least hope that these freezes save money. But what the data actually show is that they do not save money, that we have a workforce that is just more stressed, more inefficient. You spend more 

time trying to fix the problems that are broken because you did not 

solve it early on. 

I just want to say I appreciate the work you are doing, and I 

hope that we can give you better support to do it. Thank you. 

Thank you, Madam Chair. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. 

Senator Tillis. 

Senator TILLIS. Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you all for 

coming before the Committee and, at least in one case, returning 

to the Committee. 

I have got a more general question. This Committee is intended 

to provide insights into seniors’ abuse, caregiver programs, those 

sorts of things, over the course of the last 2 years that I was on 

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it. And then we have had some discussions about legislative proposals here at the Federal level, and we have talked about potential best practices down in the States. But it does not seem to me 

we have made much progress, so could you give me in any of your 

opinions, in the capacity before this Committee, of examples of 

where I should be kinder in my assessment? What kind of progress 

are we making at the State or Federal level that you think is really 

moving the ball substantially in the right direction? Mr. Camus, 

want to start with you? 

Mr. CAMUS. One of the biggest challenges I have, Senator, is— 

and I have been working with staff here—as we investigate crimes, 

we learn. We learn how they are doing it; we learn how they are 

shifting. And as Senator Collins pointed out, the criminals are 

watching every single thing that we do from all over the world, and 

then they are adapting to what we do. It is literally a cat-andmouse game, and they will continue to victimize our most vulnerable citizens because they can get money. So any ideas that we 

have, we are happy to meet with staff and talk about this is how 

the crime happened, so legislatively, what are some of the areas 

that could be explored. 

One of the things we are excited about is in our investigation 

through the FTC’s help, we started working with the Federal Communications Commission, and what we learned was they have task 

forces under the U.S. Telecom Consortium that are actually working on technology to block robocalls that are coming in spoofed. 

And in one pilot, in the IRS—— 

Senator TILLIS. Not political ones, right? No, I am kidding. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. CAMUS. In the robocall area, in a pilot, they were able to 

block about 2 million spoofed calls that were coming in that could 

have hit the seniors. How many people would have been victimized 

by those calls? 

And then the other area that we are excited about the technology 

is there is a trace-back task force as well, and what that will allow 

us to do as law enforcement is be able to figure out, when the bad 

guys are calling in from offshore, quickly determine where that call 

came from and then work with partners offshore to try to get them 

investigated or taken out of service. 

Senator TILLIS. How do we get to a point where we are scaling 

some of those things to where we are going from kind of a good 

proof of concept to a pervasive capability that—clearly something 

like that could have a significant effect on a lot of the nets that are 

being cast and then capturing seniors and then taking advantage 

of them. So I think that is more of—we will go down and just get 

an assessment for why I should feel better about things that we 

can scale, but give me your read down the panel. 

Ms. GREISMAN. Thank you, Senator. I appreciate the opportunity 

to be here again. 

Aggressive continued law enforcement is ongoing, and it is making a dent. It may not be a sustained dent, but you have got—that 

is not a reason not to do it. I will point again to the recent Western 

Union settlement, $586 million, with significant injunctive relief requiring the company to change how it does business in terms of 

fraud prevention. 

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The recent crackdown by DOJ with TIGTA on entities in the U.S. 

and in India, targeting U.S. consumers with the IRS imposter 

scam, those make a difference. We need to figure out how to sustain them and implement them on a more permanent basis. 

Mr. Camus just referred to some of the work going on with 

robocalls. We have been at this for years, and what has happened 

as a result of it is that new technologies have been developed, they 

are in the marketplace. One of the first ones was a result of an 

FTC challenge back, I think, in 2012. These are call-blocking technologies that work. And then there is more great cooperation and 

coordination among industry and Government to bring these technologies to the forefront and also to develop—though it is not going 

to happen overnight—caller ID authentication. That will provide a 

significant tool, technological change that will prevent some of 

these calls from hitting consumers. So I think there is good reason 

to be optimistic. 

Ms. MENIO. Well, I wish I had some of their answers for you, but 

we are not on that scale. But I think on a very large scale, in a 

sense, our Senior Medicare Patrol is a good example of this work, 

and it is in every State in this country. And I can tell you right 

now we are working—we had some consumers, some beneficiaries 

call us about something that we think is a scam, not totally—we 

are not sure yet, and I am not going to say what it is because it 

is being investigated right now. But what we were able to do is get 

on the phone with people from your State and from, I believe—I 

am not sure if it is Maine or not, but it is one of the New England 

States—a number of States with our colleagues who are doing the 

same work we are doing, and we were finding out that the same 

scam is—or the same situation is happening in each of those 

places, which made it a lot easier for us to go to the Inspector General with this. And so it is being investigated now. We think it 

might be a very large scale issue. That is the way—but, again, it 

gets back to that working in collaboration with other people is so 

important, because we get two calls, we will say maybe it is a problem, maybe it is not. It sounded fishy, so we definitely wanted to 

look into it further. But with those two calls, nothing was going to 

happen when we called the OIG. But once we get our colleagues 

from other States identifying these problems as well, then that 

makes a case. And I think something can happen to protect people 

in the future through that situation. 

Senator TILLIS. Well, thank you, and I know that the Chair has 

put together great proposals for programs that have worked their 

way through Congress and authorizing maybe additional initiatives 

that will be helpful. But it really also points to why we have got 

to get to a regular order appropriations process so that we then 

have the financial resources behind these programs to scale them 

and get them implemented, and so that we can come back and 

start measuring what I think are the results that can come about. 

A lot of great ideas, a lot of great pilots, a lot of great proofs of concept, a lot of great law enforcement actions that we have just got 

to scale. And then, also, if I had more time—I am way over now. 

At the end of the day, most of what we are talking about here are 

the cure. We have got to work on the prevention side, which means 

that we have to continue to focus on education, destigmatizing pubLAP51NQ082 with DISTILLER

30 

lic acknowledgment that you have been abused, and doing those 

kinds of things so that you very early in the cycle of abuse prevent 

it from ever happening. 

Thank you. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you very much, Senator. I certainly 

agree with your comments about the appropriations process. I 

would indicate that, compared to the very first hearing that we 

held on scams, we have come a long, long ways. Law enforcement 

has stepped up to the plate, has started aggregating these scams 

rather than dismissing them because they are only $2,000 here or 

$3,000 here. And when GAO came out with $2.9 billion annually, 

I really think that helped, and our hearings helped raise the 

awareness of the public and the need for aggressive enforcement, 

the cases that were described earlier today. So I am actually encouraged that we are making progress, but these criminals are relentless and will continue. 

Senator TILLIS. Me, too, Madam Chair. I am just mad at the people that do this, and I want them to suffer badly as a result of it, 

as quickly as possible. 

Chairman COLLINS. Well, there is nothing like putting people in 

jail to be a good deterrent, that is for sure. 

Senator Blumenthal. 

Senator BLUMENTHAL. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and 

thank you for having this hearing and your very, very persistent 

drive to increase the effectiveness of our laws and the enforcement 

of them. And like my colleague from Nevada, I was State Attorney 

General for some years—in fact, 20 years—and we established a 

unit quite a while ago to focus on elder abuse and criminal activity 

that victimizes them. And I agree as well that education is among 

the best preventive steps. An ounce of prevention is worth a pound 

of cure. Recovering money after the fact is very difficult, but it is 

possible. And educating the bad guys is important, at least as important as educating the good guys, because educating them 

through deterrence, the Chair is absolutely right that prison time 

teaches a very valuable lesson. 

So with that in mind, I introduced a bill called the ‘‘Robert 

Matava Criminal Victim Abuse Prevention and Restitution Act.’’ It 

became, with bipartisan support, the Elder Abuse Prevention and 

Prosecution Act, which was approved by the Judiciary Committee. 

In fact, it is bipartisan. Senator Grassley and I together lead it, 

and it would improve the current law in a number of ways. It is 

now out of Committee. It is on the House floor. We can approve it 

if we get bipartisan support there; and if our distinguished leadership there puts it on the floor, I am sure it will be approved near 

unanimously. 

It would expand data collection and information sharing to better 

prevent and respond to elder abuse and exploitation. It would increase training, improve information sharing among agencies, and 

it would increase penalties for perpetrators of these crimes. So the 

anger that my colleagues feel could be channeled very positively 

and effectively against those bad guys by passing this measure, including mandatory forfeiture to deter future offenses. 

Everybody here knows that what drives these crimes is money. 

If you require mandatory forfeiture, it hits them where they live. 

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And mandatory forfeiture, in fact, will enable more restitution so 

that we prevent by deterring but we also make people whole, or at 

least work to make them whole. 

So to any of you who would like to answer, do you believe that 

mandatory forfeiture, restitution, and increased penalties for perpetrators will be effective in deterring future criminal activity? 

That is the softest ball that anybody has thrown to you in quite 

a while. 

[Laughter.] 

Mr. CAMUS. As a career law enforcement man, yes. We work 

really hard and we dedicate resources to investigate these, and 

there is nothing like at the end of the day when my agents can go 

to court and the perpetrator especially picking on our vulnerable 

citizens gets a significant sentence. So the more that we could punish them and the more that we can rapidly recover any monies that 

are available—in many cases, there may or may not be assets 

available—the better for us. So we wholeheartedly agree with increased deterrence through increased penalties. 

Ms. GREISMAN. Senator, it is a delightful softball. We are a civil 

law enforcement agency, so I cannot speak to it. I have to defer to 

my criminal colleagues. I will say, though, that anything that 

ramps up deterrence and helps us on the civil side would be greatly 

appreciated. 

Senator BLUMENTHAL. Thank you. 

Ms. MENIO. And I would just like to add that I think one of the 

reasons that elderly are targeted is that oftentimes the perpetrators feel that they are not going to—and I am talking more about 

that homespun type of financial exploitation that happens. They 

just think they are going to get away with it, because they do. And 

so one of the things we are advocating for in Pennsylvania is enhanced sentencing for people who commit crimes against the elderly. 

So I think it is very, very important because the other issue that 

we have often with crimes against the elderly is that if someone 

does have dementia, oftentimes we are finding that the police are 

not arresting because that person is not a good witness in court, 

they are not a good reporter. So we have got to get past that as 

well. And I can tell you of some horrendous crimes that have been 

committed against people who are without capacity. And we have 

got to come up with a system to make sure that there is a reason 

for people not to do this, that they are going to be a little afraid 

of taking advantage of the elderly. So thank you for that. 

Senator BLUMENTHAL. Thank you all for your support, and thank 

you for your great work. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. 

I want to thank all of our witnesses today for your very important contributions, whether it is law enforcement or education or 

civil actions against those who would rip off some of the most vulnerable citizens in our country, our Nation’s seniors. 

As we have heard today and as our Committee’s new Fraud Book 

makes clear, criminals are relentless in their pursuit to swindle 

seniors out of their hard-earned savings. We see infinite varieties 

of these scams. Once one is closed down, another pops up. I, too, 

have had those phone calls on my home answering machine in 

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Bangor, Maine, and I called the IG’s office up immediately because 

I was so excited. I thought I could help entrap one of these criminals, and it turned out that the numbers expire after 3 days. So 

that by the time I got home for the weekend, the numbers were no 

good. I was so crushed because I thought I could help bring these 

people to justice, which is exactly what is the commitment of each 

and every one of us here. 

While much remains to be done, I am proud that this Committee 

has been just as relentless as the criminals in fighting back against 

this fraud, and the important work that all of you are doing really 

contributes to our efforts. 

I look forward to continuing to work with our Ranking Member 

and with our returning and new members of the Committee as we 

continue this fight in the new Congress. Committee members will 

have until Friday, February 24th, to submit questions for the 

record. 

As a reminder, at the risk of sounding like one of those late-night 

infomercials, the Committee’s toll-free fraud hotline number is 1– 

855–303–9470. 1–855–303–9470. The reason I mention that is 

those 2,300 calls that we got last year enabled us to identify new 

scams so that we could warn people and come up with tips for 

avoiding people becoming victims. So we have distributed so many 

copies of our Fraud Book and our postcard, and we are going to 

continue those educational and prevention efforts as well. 

I would call on our Ranking Member if you have any concluding 

remarks that you would like to make, Senator Casey. 

Senator CASEY. Thank you, Madam Chair. 1–855–303–9470. 

[Laughter.] 

Thank you for the message. Thanks very much. 

Chairman COLLINS. Thank you. This concludes our hearing. It is 

now adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 4:19 p.m., the Committee was adjourned.] 

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APPENDIX 

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Prepared Witness Statements and Questions 

for the Record 

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PREPARED STATEMENT OF SENATOR SUSAN M. COLLINS, CHAIRMAN

Good afternoon. I am pleased to welcome both new and returning Members to the 

Committee, and I am delighted that my good friend, Senator Casey, will serve as 

the Committee’s new Ranking Member. My apologies that this hearing had to be 

delayed from when it was first scheduled on February 1st due to a long series of 

votes on the Senate floor. 

The Committee will continue its focus on three primary issues this Congress: retirement security; biomedical research investments for diseases like Alzheimer’s and 

diabetes that disproportionately affect seniors; and financial schemes and other 

scams targeting older Americans—the subject of today’s hearing. 

Last summer, an 81-year-old constituent came to my office in Portland, Maine, 

with an alarming story of deception and cruelty. A con artist claiming to be an 

agent of the Internal Revenue Service had just cheated him out of $8,000. He narrowly avoided losing $15,000 more. 

After reporting the crime to local police, my constituent, Philip Hatch, and his son 

came to my office. My staff gave him a copy of the Fraud Book that this Committee 

produced last year and a post card that we created with tips on avoiding scams. 

Mr. Hatch told us that the tactics described in the materials we provided were exactly those used by the scammer. If only he had received that information sooner, 

he might have recognized the scam and avoided losing his hard-earned savings. 

Mr. Hatch was very willing to testify today, but health issues prevent him from 

traveling. Instead, he graciously and courageously provided a video in order to tell 

his story. We will see that in a moment. 

This episode demonstrates two important points. First, the criminals who prey on 

seniors are relentless. They will harass seniors until they have drained every penny 

in their life savings. 

Second, this Committee’s longstanding dedication to fighting fraud against seniors 

is raising awareness and prompting enforcement actions that are making a real difference. We must redouble our efforts to educate seniors, their families, and caregivers. 

The stakes are extremely high. According to the Government Accountability Office, America’s seniors lose a staggering $2.9 billion each year to an ever-growing 

array of financial exploitation schemes and scams. 

Today’s hearing coincides with the release of our Committee’s 2017 Fraud Book. 

Like the book we published last year, it lists the top 10 scams being perpetrated 

against seniors, along with information on how to recognize, avoid, and report them. 

In both years, the IRS Impersonation Scam was the leading offender. 

These lists are the result of calls made to our Committee’s toll-free fraud hotline. 

In 2015, Hotline staff fielded more than 1,100 calls. Last year, the Hotline’s call volume doubled to more than 2,200. It is clear that our efforts are raising public 

awareness. More important, our efforts are producing real results. 

I look forward to the testimony of the Treasury Inspector General’s Office today 

on recent evolutions in the IRS imposter scam, such as the demand for payment in 

iTunes gift cards, to which Mr. Hatch and many others have fallen victim. Raising 

awareness about the IRS scam is particularly timely, as we are now in the midst 

of tax filing season. 

Last May, thanks to the work of our hotline investigators, TIGTA arrested five 

individuals in connection with the IRS imposter scam. Federal authorities believe 

these suspects stole almost $3 million from more than 1,200 victims. In October, 56 

individuals and five call centers in India were indicted in another case. 

In addition to producing criminal charges, these efforts are making it harder for 

criminals to find victims. 

I also look forward to hearing from the Federal Trade Commission on other scams 

targeting seniors, such as grant scams, counterfeit check scams, and romance scams, 

which is timely with yesterday being Valentine’s Day. 

As our 2017 Fraud Book makes clear, while we are making progress, far too many 

victims are still losing money and, often, their retirement savings, to these criminals. Law enforcement, consumer protection, Area Agencies on Aging, and financial 

institutions play vital roles, but alert citizens are our first and best line of defense. 

I am proud of the Committee’s work on this crucial issue to help seniors become 

more aware and informed, and to put criminals on notice that they will be stopped 

and brought to justice. 

I now turn to Senator Casey for his opening statement. 

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PREPARED STATEMENT OF SENATOR ROBERT P. CASEY JR., RANKING MEMBER

Good afternoon. I am pleased to join Chairman Collins in convening this first 

hearing of the Special Committee on Aging for the 115th Congress. I am glad to 

take on the role of Ranking Member of this Committee at such a crucial time, knowing that the future of key programs for older Americans like Medicare and Medicaid 

are on the agenda of the new Administration. It is essential that we protect these 

vital programs for older Americans, and the Aging Committee has an important role 

to play in this work. 

For today’s hearing, we have the opportunity to hear from expert witnesses on the 

challenging issue of combatting fraud and scams targeting older Americans. Experts 

testifying today include Diane Menio from the Pennsylvania senior advocacy organization CARIE, a group that works every day to help older Americans live with dignity. Diane is accompanied by Charlotte Kitler, a lawyer from Nanticoke, Pennsylvania who is volunteering in her retirement years to protect her peers from fraud 

through her work with the Senior Medicare Patrol. I look forward to their comments 

as well as the testimony from our agency experts. 

I’m also pleased to join with Senator Collins in releasing a Committee report detailing the top 10 scams targeting our Nation’s seniors. This report is based on the 

experiences of more than 2,200 individuals who contacted the Committee’s Fraud 

Hotline over the past year. What we learned from these older Americans and their 

families not only provided us an opportunity to help individual citizens, but it also 

will inform the work of this Committee going forward. And, I am pleased to have 

joined with Senator Collins in reintroducing the Senior$afe Act last week. This important legislation both encourages financial institutions to disclose suspected exploitation of seniors when they see it and protects them from being sued for making 

these reports if they have appropriately trained their staffs and make good faith reports. 

In the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, more than one-in-six residents is aged 65 

or older. As a result, I know all too well how vulnerable older Americans can be 

to fraudsters and scam artists and other abuse. In fact, in 2015, over 22,000 cases 

of suspected elder abuse and neglect were reported to the Pennsylvania Department 

of Aging’s protective services program. 

That is why, last Spring, I held a field hearing of this Committee in Wilkes-Barre, 

Pennsylvania to hear directly from my constituents—both those affected by scams 

and those trying to prevent them. One constituent from Kingston Township told the 

heartbreaking story of scam artists attempting to steal the identify and use the 

credit cards of her husband of 43 years after his death. Also at the hearing, the 

Luzerne County District Attorney highlighted the most common type of scam happening in the county—the sweepstakes or lottery scam. This is one of the top 10 

scams documented in the Committee’s report and one that we will hear about from 

some of today’s witnesses. Victims are promised lottery winnings if they just pay 

often sizable so-called ‘‘taxes and fees’’ up-front. The D.A. recalled one older victim 

being scammed out of $85,000 in the hopes of retrieving $1 million in fake lottery 

winnings. 

Other common schemes include scammers impersonating IRS officials demanding 

payment of unpaid tax bills; those claiming to be computer support technicians to 

gain access to personal information stored on the computer under the guise of ‘‘fixing’’ it; or those claiming to be grandchildren in desperate need of a grandparents’ 

money for bail or a hospital bill or some other emergency. While experts struggle 

to estimate the total financial impact of scams targeting seniors, mainly because it 

is so underreported, they know it adds up to nearly $3 billion a year in lost savings—and potentially billions more. It isn’t just money that is lost in these scams, 

it is also older Americans’ sense of security and financial independence. It is outrageous that people who worked hard all of their lives are being targeted for their 

nest-eggs when they are at their most vulnerable. And, it is wrong that seniors still 

feel afraid to report these schemes. They should not be embarrassed or ashamed. 

They should know that we have their backs and are here to help them fight back. 

That is why enforcement is such a critical part of this discussion. While it may 

not be easy to track down these increasingly sophisticated scammers and their domestic and international networks and hold them accountable, we must do so for 

the safety and security of our parents and grandparents. I know that the tireless 

work of this Committee and the federal agencies here today has helped make 

progress toward this goal. 

In fact, the Chair and I applauded the Federal Trade Commission and the Justice 

Department settlement with Western Union in which the company admitted to 

criminal anti-money laundering violations that have disproportionately affected 

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sible and aided in the fraud by willfully ignoring warning signs. The $586 million 

settlement will be used to compensate victims of fraud where Western Union agents 

were complicit in the scams. 

But there is more work to do, and we will continue to use the spotlight of this 

Committee to both help consumers understand the threat and highlight the need 

for action. It is for this reason that I will continue to fight to ensure that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has the resources to help. The CFPB houses the 

only federal office solely focused on sharing financial information with seniors and 

educating seniors about how to prevent becoming the victim of fraud. Until recently, 

this office was led by former Pennsylvania Secretary of Aging, Nora Dowd Eisenhower. 

We also need to keep up the fight against health care fraud and abuse that we 

launched through the Affordable Care Act. In fact, the government has realized a 

record-breaking $10.7 billion in recoveries of health care fraud in the last three 

years. Thanks to the ACA, we have new tools like increased federal sentencing 

guidelines for health care fraud and enhanced screening for providers and suppliers 

who may pose a higher risk of fraud or abuse. And, the law provides an additional 

$350 million over 10 years to boost anti-fraud efforts. We also know that proposals 

to block grant Medicaid could present states with a significant barrier to addressing 

waste, fraud, and abuse in the program. Block grants could jeopardize funding for 

program integrity resources, as states would lose federal program integrity resources that currently go along with Medicaid matching dollars. 

I look forward to hearing from our witnesses about what more we can all be doing 

to fight fraud and abuse. 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF PHILIP HATCH

My name is Philip Hatch. I’m 81 years old, and I’m from Portland, Maine, born 

and raised. 

I received a telephone call. I answered the phone and the man said he was a representative from the Internal Revenue Service. I said what can I do to help you? 

He said, ‘‘well we’ve gone through the records and there has been a mistake on your 

returns and you owe $5,988 and some odd cents.’’ So, I said fine—tell me who I 

make the check out to and I’ll mail it. He said ‘‘well we can’t do that. We have a 

warrant out for your arrest. The marshals will be in your house within the hour.’’ 

I said well what would you like me to do to help resolve this? They said, ‘‘you can 

go to CVS and get those iTunes cards and when you come back you can read the 

numbers off to us.’’ I said this doesn’t seem like a very professional way to do this. 

They said, ‘‘well it’s either that or the marshals are coming. If we do this I can tell 

them not to come.’’ So I did. I went and got these little iTunes cards and read them 

off to them and they said ‘‘alright you can’t tell anybody about this.’’ I said what 

do you mean I can’t tell anybody about this? I’m gonna tell the guy who does my 

tax returns. I’m a little mad at him. He made a mistake. He said, ‘‘No. Don’t do 

that. It will all be taken care of.’’ This started at four in the afternoon and went 

on to eight o’clock at night. They called me the next day and said there was mistake. I said what do you mean a mistake? It wasn’t $5,900 something dollars it was 

$23,000. They had someone call me on the regular phone who said he was a Portland Police Officer and that they have a local warrant out for my arrest. So I put 

my son on the phone and he says ‘‘who’s this?’’ They asked who this was and he 

gave them a phony name and said he was an FBI agent and they said ‘‘whoops’’ 

and they hung up. That was the end of it. But I had already sent in $8,000 to these 

people. 

Being in the military and working for the government—you know when the government calls up you say aye aye sir. What do you need? Can I help you? Okay. 

Maybe if I hadn’t had that background, I wouldn’t have been so cooperative. But 

I was mad—upset that I was taken in. Just give me five minutes in a room alone 

with these people and I’d be happy. 

All I can say is just be wary. Just be careful. When it comes to someone going 

after your money just say ‘I’ll think about it tonight and get back to you tomorrow 

and contact someone about it.’’’ 

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PREPARED STATEMENT LOIS GREISMAN

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