Fear of fraud amongst older adults: a hidden epidemic?

Introduction

…traditionally we would’ve had fear of crime [among older adults]. Now the fear is less about somebody coming in and breaking into your house. It’s much more around a fear of scams. And there’s been almost displacement of fear of crime to fear of scams and fear of losing money (Senior UK police officer).

The quote above from a senior UK police officer in charge of a fraud prevention partnership illustrates the transformation of crime concerns amongst older adults. This is a consequence of the changes in crime. In England and Wales, along with many other countries, fraud has become one of the most common types of crime people experience (Office for National Statistics [ONS], 2023 ). For traditional crimes, there is a substantial body of research that shows some groups experience significant fear of crime, particularly amongst older adults (Ferraro 1995 ; Ollenburger 1981 ; Ortega & Myles 1987 ; Sundeen & Mathieu, 1976 ; Warr 1984 ). Surprisingly, there have been no major studies into the fear of fraud, other than for romance fraud victims (Cross & Lee 2022 ). Fraud victimisation amongst older adults has been gradually increasing in recent years in many countries. In England and Wales, for example, in 2019, 4.8% of 65–74 year old and 3.6% of over 75 s had been a victim of fraud, which grew to 7.6% and 5.8%,, respectively in 2022 (Button et al. 2023 ; ONS 2023 ; Teaster et al. 2023 ). Frauds often have greater impacts on older adults as it is often more difficult for them to recover from large financial losses and the fraud may affect their confidence causing a change in their behaviours (Bailey et al 2021 ; Button et al. 2014 , 2021 ; Cross 2016a and Cross 2016b ; DeLiema et al 2020a and DeLiema et al. 2020b ; DeLiema et al. 2021 ; DeLiema & Witt 2022 ).

During the 1970s and 1980s, the rise in property crime was associated with widespread fear of crime (Ollenburger 1981 ; Ortega & Myles 1987 ; Sundeen & Mathieu, 1976 ; Warr 1984 ). This paper seeks to address the question of whether the increase in fraud has also been associated with fear of fraud amongst older adults. Drawing upon exploratory research involving a sequential survey of almost 2000 respondents and interviews with older adults, the paper provides a unique insight into the impact of fraud fears on the lives of elderly persons.

The paper will begin by briefly exploring fraud in the context of older adults. It then reviews the literature on fear of crime amongst older adults and then introduces the very limited research on fear of fraud. The methods used for this research are then outlined before the paper, then moves on to explore the findings. the findings first set out the experience of prior victimisation of fraud before assessing the qualitative and quantitative data that illustrates the concerns and fears relating to fraud reported by the participants. This paper seeks only to illustrate the problem of fear and concern with fraud as this has not previously been noted as a major problem in the fear of crime literature. The authors are planning to conduct further research exploring the factors causing this fear in more depth and they encourage other researchers to do likewise.

Literature review

The essence of fraud is a deception that causes a loss or gain and its diversity is such that it encompasses a wide range of behaviours and contexts, from staff fiddling expenses and companies providing lower quality products than that contracted to individuals tricked into supplying their personal banking information through phishing emails. Fraud can also be criminal, civil, or regulatory in terms of the legal means of redress and it can be very different according to the victim context, whether an individual, company, or public body. Button et al ( 2022 , p 34) draw these factors together to define it as:

… the intention to dishonestly deceive a person or legal entity in order to make a financial or economic gain for the offender or another, or to cause a financial or economic loss to the person or legal entity, such that there is a prima facie case for criminal, civil or regulatory justice.

Scam is common word used to describe frauds against individuals, although, to some, it encompasses a wider range of unethical behaviours which might not necessarily be unlawful (Button and Cross 2017 ). The scam term, however, has become a synonym for fraud in common parlance. Indeed, in the UK, a recent Government backed campaign to tackle individual fraud victimisation, it is called ‘Stop Scams’, not fraud (Stop Scams 2024 ).

For individual victims of fraud, which is the focus of this paper, there is also a huge diversity of frauds that target them. Beals et al ( 2015 ) have attempted to categorise this diversity into the following broad groups:

Consumer investment frauds (fake investments, etc.)

Consumer products and services fraud (fake shopping websites, etc.)

Employment fraud (fees for fake training for jobs, etc.)

Prize and grant fraud (bogus lotteries with no prizes, etc.)

Phantom debt collection fraud (offering fees to reduce debts which are not possible, etc.)

Charity fraud (bogus charities soliciting gifts, etc.)

Relationship and trust fraud (romance frauds, etc.)

Button and Cross ( 2017 ) argued that in addition to these categories, an additional category of identity frauds should be added.

Identity frauds (securing the personal information of an individual to pursue credit card transactions, loans, etc.).

These frauds are perpetrated against individuals through a variety of communication methods including: In-person, over the telephone, email, websites, social media and SMS messaging (Button and Cross 2017 ; Hanoch and Wood 2021 ). Fraud schemes often involve a combination of these mechanisms. Specific fraud schemes tend to target specific groups based on opportunity and vulnerability. Older adults are especially vulnerable to investment, consumer, romance and impersonation frauds (Carter 2024 ; DeLiema 2020b ).

Investment-related frauds are a type of fraud particularly targeted at older adults because many having retirement pots to invest (DeLiema et al 2020a ). They are also vulnerable to consumer-related frauds via the telephone or bogus websites where they are tricked into purchasing non-existent or inferior goods and services (Fan and Yu 2021 ; Jorna 2016 ). Due to loss of partners or friends, some older adults seek companionship and love online, making some vulnerable to romance frauds (Bailey et al 2021 ; DeLiema 2018 ). There are also a wide range of impersonation frauds and phishing scams, usually based on the impersonation of the police or a bank security department that trick older adults into giving away sensitive personal information to enable identity fraud or cause the victim to pay the wrong person (Benbow et al 2022 ; Choi et al 2017 ).

Fraud is now one of the most common crimes and in England and Wales, where the regular victim survey, the Crime Survey of England and Wales (CSEW), has shown fraud accounts for around 40 percent of all crime (ONS 2023 ). The impact of fraud on the population in general and older adults in particular has been well documented, but, as was noted in the introduction, research into the fear of fraud is much less developed (Button et al 2014 ; Cross 2016a ; DeLiema et al 2021 ). However, fear of crime, particularly physical crime and anti-social behaviour, has been explored in depth and some of the literature will now be examined.

The fear of crime, particularly vis-à-vis older adults has been the subject of extensive research since the 1970s (LaGrange & Ferraro 1987 ; Ollenburger 1981 ; Ortega & Myles 1987 ; Skogan 1987 ; Sundeen & Mathieu, 1976 ; Warr 1984 ). This research has been contentious and the subject of much debate. The central challenge has been conceptualising and measuring fear (LaGrange & Ferraro 1987 ). The criticism expressed by several academics is that perceptions or attitudes which have been conceptualised as fear are actually something else, such as the perceived risk of becoming a victim, and these risks are often linked to test scenarios the individual is unlikely to confront. For example, the perceived safety of walking in their neighbourhood at night might be very low for some older adults, but the reality is they are highly unlikely to do it (Brands & Van Doorn 2022 ). Ferraro and Grange ( 1987 , p72) sought to better categorise these different crime emotions into personal and general domains:

Personal (or individual): Judgements (risk to self, safety of self); values (concern about crime to self, personal intolerance); and emotions (fear for self-victimisation)

General (community, area): Judgements (risk to others, crime or safety assessments); values (concern about crime to others); and emotions (fears for others victimisation).

These different perceptions of fear and safety have meant there has been little academic agreement on what fear of crime is (Franc & Sucic 2014 ). Some researchers have also criticised the methodologies of some studies, arguing that crime-focussed questionnaires often funnel results towards high fear of crime scores (LaGrange & Ferraro 1987 ).

Along with challenges of definition and methodology, there has also been a contentious debate over whether certain groups, such as older adults or women, are more fearful of crime (LaGrange & Ferraro 1987 ; 1989 ). Several studies have suggested older adults and women are more fearful (Ollenburger 1981 ; Ortega & Myles 1987 ; Warr 1984 ), yet LaGrange & Ferraro ( 1989 ) found younger people are more fearful.

LaGrange and Ferraro’s research was based upon 320 telephone interviews from a randomly selected sample in one metropolitan area in the USA, so there are limitations in terms of geography, specific area and sample size. Nevertheless, it is just one of the handful of studies which have included fraud or related crimes in their scope. Of the 11 offences considered, it included ‘con’ (conned, swindled or cheated of money) and on a scale of 1 to 3, where 3 is the highest, ‘con’ was rated 1.4 for men and 1.6 for women, which compared to home burglary at 1.3 for men and 1.8 for women.

In a study based upon 104 interviews in 3 distinct locations (an urban city area, urban municipality and retirement community), Sundeen and Mathieu ( 1976 ) found that, of 4 crime types (burglary, robbing on street, car theft and consumer fraud), consumer fraud was the most feared of these crimes within the retirement community, although a very low score. Amongst the other two groups, consumer fraud was the lowest rated of crimes, though it still scored higher on their fear index than in the retirement group. This led the authors to argue that social determinants were important factors in stimulating fear because the retirement community were heavily protected from the physical crimes, but were less protected from the consumer frauds (i.e. attack vectors via the telephone and mail). In his analysis of crime fears, Warr ( 1984 ) clearly distinguished between fear of crime and perceived risk of crime occurring. He found fraud to be considered one of the least feared and with the least perceived risk of occurring of the 16 offences considered. However, it should be noted that since these studies, the landscape of fraud has significantly changed with the growth of the internet, email, social media and cheap telecommunications.

Cybercrime fear has secured much more interest recently (Brands & Van Doorn 2022 ; Cook et al 2022 ; Virtanen 2017 ). However, whilst there is an overlap between some cybercrimes and frauds, there are many frauds that are not cyber-perpetrated. Cybercrime covers a much wider range of offences beyond fraud such as cyber-bullying, stalking and others (Ibrahim 2016 ). The fraud-related studies in cybercrime also tend to focus on a very narrow range of financial cybercrimes such as hacking, phishing, identity-related frauds and online shopping. Brands and Van Doorn ( 2022 ), in their extensive assessment of fear of cybercrime studies, found ten studies showing a positive relationship between gender and fear (females), but with other traits less positive. They found some evidence of fear and prior victimisation (seven studies with a positive relationship, two inconclusive), perceived risk (six positive, one inconclusive), but it was more mixed with respect to age with five positive, three negative and five inconclusive studies.

One of the few studies to explicitly explore fear of fraud is the Cross and Lee ( 2022 ) study on female romance fraud victims, which found extensive fear of fraud within this group. Romance fraud, however, is a unique fraud in that it tends to last months to years, involves extensive grooming, large losses and the additional dimensions of emotional loss (Carter 2024 ; Cross 2022 ; Kassem and Carter 2024 ). Romance fraud in England and Wales also only accounts for 0.6% of recorded frauds (Button & Shepherd 2023 ). It is, therefore, difficult to use this study to generalise to all fraud victims.

Perhaps the only firm conclusion from the research on fear of crime to date is that women are more fearful than men as are prior victims (Warr 1984 ; Skogan 1987 ). Warr ( 1984 ) suggests that the heightened fear of physical crimes amongst women is underpinned by fear of rape, that is, scenarios like burglary and robbery could potentially lead to a sexual attack. Whilst such fears are unlikely to be associated with most fraud victimisation, romance fraud, as illustrated by Cross and Lee ( 2022 ), is perhaps one of the few types of fraud where a potential rape scenario or sexual abuse could be imagined by victims. For example, a former ‘partner’ could turn up at a victim’s residence or the ‘partner’ could record intimate and sexual images during the ‘relationship’ which may be later released. Very important research questions are, therefore, to consider whether fraud is a crime that stimulates fear amongst older adults and, if so, which types of fraud trigger fear and whether fears impact on individuals’ lives.

Method

This research is based on a project commissioned by a UK charity, which works largely with elderly female adults aged 75 and over to improve their social connections and reduce loneliness. It is, therefore, important to note from the start that the sample frame is non-probabilistic and is not representative of the older population in the UK: The sample is predominantly female and is regionally biased, the participants tend to be living alone and are supported by the charity, and the fact they are using the charity’s services means that they are experiencing some degree of loneliness. The research project was commissioned to evaluate the impact of a scheme that was designed by the charity to improve the resilience of this group to frauds and scams. To assess the impact, the same questionnaire was sent to the charity’s client list before and after the implementation of the scheme. Interviews were also conducted with the charity’s clients.

This paper does not report the findings related to the impact of the charity’s scheme (that will be reported in another paper, see Button et al., 2024 ); it focuses solely on the findings related to fear and the experience of frauds and scams and consequently only uses the quantitative data from the second questionnaire. Although there is no widespread agreement on what constitutes fear of crime, the researchers adapted questions from previous studies into the fear of crime. This included adapting CSEW questions into the impact of fear of crime on quality of life (Table 1 ), walking alone in the neighbourhood after dark (Table 2 ) and worry over being a victim of crime (Table 3 ) (Kantar Public/ONS 2018 ). These questions are rooted in strong evidence—albeit contentious—based on perceived safety, concerns about crime and impact on quality of life. The advantage of this approach is that it enables comparison to the ONS data too. The researchers also used the term frauds/scams throughout the questions to reflect their synonymous use in common parlance.

The postal questionnaire was distributed first between January 2022 and March 2022 (6595 sent, 1177 usable responses—17.8% response rate) and then between November 2022 and February 2023 (4053 sent, 820 usable responses—20.2% response rate). Whilst this paper draws on the respondents’ open-text comments from both surveys, the quantitative analysis is based solely on the second survey because many of the respondents were common to both surveys and the second survey introduced an additional question which asked the respondents whether they had been a victim of any crime in the prior 5 years. The exploratory purpose of this question was to determine whether such victimisation had any impact on their fear of frauds/scams.

The postal questionnaire comprised 27 questions and the semi-structured interview schedule used 12 broad questions. Most of the questions were adapted from existing high quality questionnaires, including the CSEW and the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) (ELSA, n.d.). The interviews and questionnaires explored personal demographics, lifestyle and satisfaction, fraud awareness, security behaviours, trust with communications, experience of fraud and the impact of frauds.

As this was a vulnerable group, ethical considerations were very important. The funders of the project were already aware telephone calls were seen as a major fraud menace by many within the target population and, therefore, a likely cause of distress. Consequently, postal questionnaires were used both to avoid telephones and because many of this age group do not use modern technology such as email. Similarly, to avoid distressing older adults by cold calling, the charity contacted its clients to recruit volunteers for the interviews. The charity subsequently supplied the authors with a list of volunteers who were written to by the research team. This resulted in 18 interviews with older adults, which, due to the post-COVID period, were either conducted online or over the telephone and lasted from 30 min to 2 h. Even with these methods, some of the older adults were sceptical of the contact from the University and required additional reassurance from the charity. Indeed, for some older adults, merely mentioning frauds and scams caused distress, which leads to one of the key lessons from this project of the need to be very careful researching this age group in relation to fraud. As the project co-ordinator noted:

…we did have quite a lot of incoming calls that were concerned people, whether it was older people directly or volunteers on their behalf, worried about the questionnaire, and saying, what is this? I don’t trust it, why have you sent this to us, or volunteers saying, why have you sent this, you’ve really worried them. Laura, Project co-ordinator.

The quote opening this paper was drawn from another project conducted by the researchers, which was concerned with what works in preventing fraud. It illustrates why ethical considerations were central to the development of the research design, which was approved by the University’s ethics committee (Ref 2021–86). A very important methodological consideration for future research is that, as the findings will later illustrate, scams cause fear and anxiety within the elderly population. Future researchers will need to be very careful when conducting research on older adults so as not to unduly frighten them further in relation to frauds and scams.

Interviews were also conducted with six charity workers, five of its volunteers and its project co-ordinator. The interviews were conducted either through Zoom or over the telephone, recorded, transcribed, coded, added to an Excel sheet and thematically analysed. Pseudonyms are used throughout this paper for the interview participants. The quantitative data from the postal survey were manually entered into online surveys and then analysed using Excel. The survey respondents were coded using a number, sex and whether they had been victims (V) or non-victims (NV) in the prior 6 months. As the research is exploratory and based on a highly non-probabilistic sample, the survey results presented in this paper are descriptive.

Results

Considering that the focus of the charity is largely upon over 75 s who are lonely, it is important to offer more details about the demographics of the participants. As expected, 91% of respondents were aged 75 or over, 8% were aged 55 to 74 and 1% declined to give their age. The survey was also very biased towards female respondents (84%) and was very white (97%). The very good response from Wales (19%) over-represents the region, which accounts for just 4.6% of the UK population. Scotland was also over-represented with 10% of respondents compared to its constituency at 8.2% of the UK population (ONS 2021b ), whilst London, with 13.4% of the UK population, was under-represented with 8% of respondents (Greater London Authority, 2023 ).

Around a fifth (21%) of the sample had at least a degree or postgraduate qualification, over a third (35%) had school level qualifications and the largest group (37%) had no educational qualifications. It is difficult to comment on the representativeness of the educational profile as there are no national qualification data for the over 74 population.

Respondents were also asked to indicate their household situation and 81% of respondents indicated they lived alone. The next most common were those living with a partner (10%). Around 5% lived in assisted accommodation and 2% lived with family or friends. Again, national statistics do not provide an easy comparison for these categories. However, data for England and Wales indicate there are 3,001,789 single-person households over 66 years old in England (12.1% of households) and 196,056 single-person households over 66 years old in Wales (0.8% of households) (ONS 2022 ). As such, there are large numbers of single-person households above 66 years old and this is largely what this survey represents. Overall this sample can be considered as biased towards:

Females

Wales

White British

Nevertheless, this study does represent one of the largest surveys to date of persons predominantly aged 75 and over who live alone and which is supported by interviews. There are clearly limitations due to the sample frame, but given the growing number of over 75 s who live alone in the UK generally and the large number of single, lonely older adults who do not receive support from the charity, there is very likely to be a large group beyond that represented by the sample frame who experience the problems in the UK.

Overall, 8% of respondents had experienced at least one fraud which caused them loss in the prior 6 months. The CSEW data for over 75 s estimate a victimisation rate of 5.8% in the prior 12 months . The higher rate in the current study could mean the fraud victimisation rate is at least double what the CSEW finds or that there are a large number of repeat victims. There are, however, other possible reasons for the apparent higher victimisation rate. As the sample is not representative of the older adult population, the higher rate may reflect a section of society more prone to fraud. Furthermore, some respondents may have recalled events more than 6 months prior to the survey, and some may have misinterpreted incidents such as sharp trading by vendors as fraud.

A very important finding from this research was the sheer number of attempted frauds older adults experience: 64% experienced at least one attempted fraud in the prior 6 months. Around one-third (32%) experienced frequent attempted attacks: 16% monthly, 14% weekly and a small minority (3%) indicated they experienced daily attacks. The survey also sought data on the communication methods used for the attempted frauds. The telephone was by far the most dominant method using the landline telephone, mobile phone or text message. The telephone was involved in over three quarters (81%) of attempted frauds. The landline telephone is especially prominent and clearly the most favoured method for targeting older adults as it accounted for nearly half (44%) of the attempts.

Fear and concern over fraud was a major issue for many of the older adults who were interviewed or responded to the survey. Indeed, as was noted earlier, it was difficult to secure interviews with older adults because some were so anxious about the subject that talking about it would be too upsetting for them. Some of the qualitative data from the interviews and survey comments will now be considered to illustrate the problem. Some participants linked their worries to their loneliness or other vulnerabilities:

I am in my 90s and live on my own and get very lonely at times. I do worry about getting scammed and robbed but I am aware of those problems. Male 354 NV.

Constantly aware that scammers are around and living alone and been elderly feel particularly vulnerable. Especially vulnerable because of my ignorance regarding modern forms of communication by emails text etc. Female 289 NV.

After losing my husband in May 2021 I do feel very vulnerable at times. I do rely on my grandchildren at times to make sure I don’t do anything rash. Female 425 NV.

As a person with sight loss I feel vulnerable to scams of all kinds, though I wouldn’t describe myself as over cautious. I get a trusted friend to do any internet transactions for me. Female 855 NV.

As an OAP I do feel vulnerable to scammers due to the sophisticated methods they may use. Updates on identified scams are useful to alert the elderly. Female 328 NV.

One of the volunteers who worked with the older adults, in noting the problem, also illustrated the definitional challenge, alluded to earlier in this paper.

I wouldn’t call it fear, I just think more anxious about...I think if you live alone as well it must be quite...more worrying. You have probably got this thought that somebody could end up knocking your door or something like that. I can only imagine most of them are quite unsettled about it. Sandra, Volunteer.

One interviewee who had also been robbed of pension twice was clear about her concern:

Well, I am worried and also I have had people pinch my pension twice. Paula.

For some, it was attempted frauds via phone calls that caused distress, which has been developed in another paper from this data (Button et al. 2025 ):

I am more worried about somebody getting my phone number and calling me and saying X, Y and Z. I am more worried about people calling me. Somebody called me once and pretended that they were from Microsoft, and asked for access to my computer, and I gave it to them, and then they somehow managed to put a bug on my computer, and I could see, and it was following, you know, they could show me that it’s there; but they’d put it on. Do you know what I mean? Melanie.

When refusing to divulge my details on the phone to someone wanting to ‘confirm’ my bank details, they become antaganistic and aggressive. This leaves me shaking and doubting myself—I just put the phone down. It is very upsetting being a victim of such bullying. I dont want to think of myself as a victim just because I am elderly. Female 159 NV.

Im always nervous about cold or strange phone calls—I normally give as good as I get—the same with strange emails. I just delete. I think I can handle post. If in doubt I speak to one of my daughters. Male 448 NV.

It’s still leaves me very wary, especially a phone calls not listed in my phone and people at the door. It’s quite frightening to see how clever the scammers are. I do not have any telephone banking etc Thank you also to re-engage I look forward to my monthly afternoon tea get together. Female 44 NV.

I hate the telephone scam calls. Even though I hang up quickly I feel frightened and disturbed for quite a while. I have also got phobic about ordering anything using my phone or computer. If I want to buy something I have to do it through my very patient daughter or I am anxious. Female 109 NV.

I often feel very insecure when I receive phone or mobile messages, I try to ignore them but they make me feel not safe in my own home. Female 837 NV.

I find ‘silent calls’ a bit unnerving but will not let them control my life: I block numbers. Female 615 NV.

For others, it was the media reporting of frauds and scams that scared them:

I find that the media information tend to make me even more scared about scamming. It just seems all around me at the moment. Female 712 NV.

The co-ordinator of the project thought the sharing of stories of frauds between older adults added to the fear:

…the stories that people hear from other people and you know, it is a topical conversation occurs on social groups older people might share stories of where it’s happened to them and then other people become quite frightened. Laura, Project co-ordinator.

The actual questionnaire itself caused concern to some:

Questions made me feel more insecure I had to ask my daughter to fill this in deciding not to complete all the questions. Female N642?.

Several mentioned the strain of trying to be resilient to fraud and the impact upon them:

I’m always suspicious an alert which is very wearing—strain on my nerves, very exhausting but there is nothing for it but to struggle along. I won’t give up. Female 456 NV.

I am afraid and often forget to be vigilant. It is disgraceful that this government do not include fraud in their criminal activities report when it affects so many people so badly. I worry very much about fraud. Female 310 NV.

I’m currently competent to deal with most attempts at scamming but I worry about the future as I age. I also worry about my husband’s ability to deal with this type of activity—he’s less tech-savvy. Female 532 NV.

The fears and concerns for some older adults meant many were frightened to use modern technologies:

I’m afraid to bank online, but will always ring someone if I’m not sure about dubious phone messages or calls as I had some cash tried to be taken from my bank account—luckily the bank stopped it so I changed my card. I am really careful about disclosing any information over the phone or at the door. Female C71 NV.

I have never bought anything online, as I am afraid my account details will be stolen. Female 292 NV.

I don’t buy online. I don’t buy online. I don’t feel safe buying online, and I buy very little online, very, very…I don’t shop online as a rule. I don’t shop online. I like the old-fashioned way of going and seeing things and touching things, and maybe I buy. I used to buy some medication and supplements online because that’s the only way you can get…I buy online if that’s the only way I can get the thing that I want, but if there’s an alternative way I don’t buy online. Melanie.

I think possibly that I haven’t gone online because there’s so many complications. You know, pop ups, and cookies, and scams, and all sorts of things like that. And I can’t honestly see myself sitting down in front of a machine all that time. Joy.

I wouldn’t do online again. At my age, it can get very confusing, it can get very frustrating. It’s also quite difficult when you’re doing something technically that you’re not really used to, and you aren’t making an effort to understand it. So, I think that as I’m doing it now, I feel much more safer. Becky.

The survey data provide an insight into the impact of fraud fears on the respondents’ quality of life. The respondents were asked to rate how much their quality of life was affected by fear of fraud/scams on a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 is no effect and 10 is total effect (Table 1 ). About a fifth (18%) rated the impact as high (8 to 10), 37% rated it as moderate (4 to 7) and the remainder (38%) experienced little or no impact. The key finding here is that the fear of scams has a moderate or high impact on the quality of life of over half (55%) the charity’s clients.

Further analysis reveals that the impact on quality of life is correlated with living alone and with being a victim of any crime in the past 5 years. The implication is that those living alone and/or who have been victims of any crime are less able to cope with the anxieties induced by the fear of scams:

High impact on 19% of those living alone, compared to 12% of those not living alone.

High impact on 28% of 5-year victims, compared to 14% of non-victims.

The survey also sought data on the older adults’ feelings of safety whilst undertaking a variety of activities. As was noted earlier, although these types of questions have been criticised for offering scenarios that many respondents are unlikely to experience, they are used in relevant, high-quality surveys such as the CSEW. Therefore, it was important to secure data which could be compared to different scenarios and past research. The respondents were asked how safe they feel doing them on a scale of 1 to 4, where 1 is very unsafe, 2 is unsafe, 3 is safe and 4 is very safe. The questions were adapted from ONS questions, including how safe respondents feel walking in the dark in their local area.

The safest older adults felt was meeting online, using email and answering the telephone, with over 70% rating these activities as safe (Table 2 ). Using the internet, buying things online and banking online were rated slightly lower. The least safe activities were answering the door to strangers (48% felt unsafe) and walking alone in their local area after dark (66% felt unsafe). The level of insecurity felt with respect to walking alone after dark is significantly higher than the findings reported by the Office for National Statistics. The ONS data indicate that insecure feelings increase with age: 33% of all age groups perceive the activity as unsafe, rising to 40% for those aged over 70 (ONS 2022 ). It also found that females feel more insecure than males and, more specifically, that 52% of females aged over 75 felt unsafe. The implication is that the mainly female survey respondents for the current research are more concerned about their physical safety than the wider elder population.

It is important to note that a substantial minority felt unsafe doing basic activities in the home, such as answering the telephone (25%), using the internet (38%), buying online (38%) and banking online (38%). Given the low usage of the technologies within the elderly population, the level of fear associated with the telephone, though lower, is more concerning because it is an essential form of communication for elderly people to maintain contact with friends, family and support agencies.

The respondents were asked to rate how worried they were about a variety of fraud/scam types using the scale: 1 very worried, 2 fairly worried, 3 not very worried and 4 not at all worried. The fraud/scam they were least worried about was being a victim to a friend or family member (18%) (Table 3 ). The elderly group is far more worried about the other types of frauds/scams: About half (54%) of the respondents were worried about postal scams and around two-thirds were worried about the in-person, postal, telephone, text and online scams. These results are very close to the findings of the very large Crime Survey for England and Wales, which found that 62% of adults aged 75–84y are worried about fraud and 64% are worried about the security of their personal information (ONS 2021a ).

Those living alone and those who were victims of any kind of crime in the prior 5 years were more worried than those living with others and non-victims (Table 3 ). The victims of any crime in the last 5 years worried the most of all groups with two-thirds to three quarters worried about all the fraud/scam types except the family/friend scam.

Discussion

This paper has illustrated a major problem amongst older adults, particularly women who live alone and/or prior crime victims who are fearful and concerned about fraud to such extent that it is affecting their lives by causing anxiety, distress and changes in behaviour. Given that prior research on crime in general has found similar effects, is the findings are not surprising, but this is the first study in an age of mass fraud victimisation to illustrate that the problem also applies to fraud (Warr 1984 ; Skogan 1987 ). The research also builds upon the ground-breaking research of Cross and Lee ( 2022 ) to add further evidence that fraud also generates much fear and concern. This is important because there has been a common view that fraud is a less serious crime, perhaps even victimless, because it does not involve violence and because some victims of scams are reimbursed by their banks (see Button et al 2014 ). The current research addresses this common misconception by providing further evidence of the substantial impact of fraud on many individuals who have been victimised as well as many who have not been victimised. It finds that around two-thirds of the sampled group of elderly persons are worried about a range of scams, over one-third feel unsafe using the internet, banking online and buying online, and the fear of scams has a moderate or high impact on the quality of life of over half the group. These findings imply that there is a ‘hidden epidemic’ of scam fear which negatively impacts the majority of the charity’s clients.

That the fear of scams impacts on people who have not been victimised is an important observation that is consistent with some of the major studies into the general fear of crime (Bilsky, & Wetzels 1997 ; Prieto Curiel, & Bishop 2018 ). Although the factors stimulating fear and concern need further and deeper research, the current study suggests attempted frauds, loneliness, media coverage of fraud and perhaps even fraud awareness campaigns are playing a part. Given the impact of this fear on individuals and society, this is an area requiring further research.

It is important to note that the sample for this study, although large, is not representative of older adults, nor even those aged 75 and over. There are many older adults living alone who do not access the charity’s services. However, this does not mean they are not lonely; as the project co-ordinator explained to the authors, the charity’s clients are the lucky ones, there are many other older, lonely adults who receive no support. This observation clearly illustrates that more representative research needs to be undertaken to determine the prevalence of fraud fears in the elderly community and how those fears impact their lives.

The lack of consensus about the correlation between fear of cybercrime and age (Brands & Van Doorn 2022 ) indicates that further research is required that embraces all age groups and specific social groups. There are glaring gaps in the literature with respect to the experiences of ethnic minorities, disabled people, those with learning disabilities and people with long-term health problems. Members of these groups are likely to be socially isolated and homebound similar to many of the older adults.

This paper has not explored the causes of fear and concern, but the administration of this project did highlight some important lessons for future researchers in this area and practitioners. Many of those targeted for this research found the mere mention of the words fraud and scam traumatic. Some thought the whole research project was an elaborate scam, despite extensive communication from the charity and researchers. Conducting research or working with this group requires researchers and practitioners to be very careful as their activities may well be stimulating even greater fear and concern within the community.

Conclusion

This research was based upon interviews and a large survey of older adults, mainly females aged 75 and over. It has illustrated that a substantial number of older adults are burdened with fraud fears and these fears impact their lives. These problems are more pronounced for those living alone and those who had been a victim of any crime in the past 5 years. Fraud victimisation, however, is not a central factor as many older adults who have not been victims are still fearful of fraud. Fear of fraud has been the subject of only limited research and this paper clearly shows, albeit with a non-probabilistic and biased sample, that the fear problem that can be described as a ‘hidden epidemic’. An epidemic is something that affects a large number of people and given there are 3.2 million households in England and Wales with an older adult living alone, even if less than 5% of those were experiencing significant fear due to frauds and scams, this would amount to hundreds of thousands of people, which would clearly qualify the problem as an unrecognised ‘hidden epidemic’. However, the reality is that we do not know how prevalent this problem is.

A priority should, therefore, be to conduct further research into the elderly population and other demographic groups, especially disadvantaged groups, to determine the extent of the problem and it aetiological factors. For practitioners, the findings suggest more action is needed to support elderly people, particularly older women who live alone or have experienced a crime in the past 5 years. Policies that can support these groups include facilitating greater social activities, providing one-to-one support and practical advice on frauds and scams to minimise their vulnerabilities, enhance their resilience and reduce their fears. The authors also think that campaigns to raise fraud awareness—although clearly important–needed to be tested on relevant groups to determine whether they stimulate undue fear. Even if a campaign is successful in reducing victimisation, which is debatable, it is of little use to society if some of its most vulnerable citizens are left cowering at home because they are unduly scared of fraud. Campaigns and awareness raising measures need to be tested and evaluated to ensure they not only work, but that they do not cause undue fear. Ultimately the authors hope this paper stimulates more research on this very important but under-researched topic.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the charity Re-engage for their support in this research and the many older adults who took part. This study was not pre-registered.

Funding

This work was supported by Re-engage.