WASHINGTON, D.C. — Americans lost an estimated $148.2 billion to online scams & crimes in 2025, up 25.8% from 2024, a per household loss of $1,009, according to an updated report from the Consumer Federation of America (CFA). This “true” cost of scams is over seven times higher than what was reported to the FBI in 2025. Further, over half of all reported losses involve cryptocurrency, which surged 21.93% since 2024, with $11.4B in reported losses and an estimated true cost of $80.7 billion. AI-enabled fraud, measured for the first time this year, added another $6.3 billion.

The $148 billion estimate builds on the FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) data, which recorded just $20.8 billion in reported losses for 2025 — underscoring the scale of harm that goes unreported to authorities. Seniors (60+), in particular, remained the largest targeted demographic and saw an increase of over 60% in reported losses, averaging a staggering $38,500 per reported incident. The under-20 age group remains the smallest, but saw a 198% increase in reported losses from 2024. \

"This update shows that the troubling trend of rapidly increasing scam losses continues while tech companies are too often allowed to avoid accountability," said Ben Winters, Director of AI and Privacy at the Consumer Federation of America. "The good news is that policymakers are beginning to respond, from new lawsuits and the SCAM Act in Congress, to growing momentum in state legislatures across the country. But this crisis demands additional bold action through legislation, enforcement, and public education at every level, including holding tech companies accountable for the role they play in enabling online scams."

“Seniors are the top target for online scams, and AI is making those scams more convincing and harder to spot. The billions of dollars Arizona families are losing to fraud should be paying for groceries, rent, and other necessities,” said Senator Mark Kelly (D-AZ). “That’s why I introduced the bipartisan Senior Chatbot Protection Act to require companies to clearly disclose when consumers are interacting with AI and strengthen protections for older Americans. People deserve to know whether they’re talking to a machine or a person, and CFA’s report makes clear that Congress needs to act now.”

The newly measured category of AI-enabled fraud – which added $6.3 billion to the national online scam total – includes technology that enables the creation of convincing synthetic content, such as social media profiles and personalized conversations, often in mass quantities. This AI-enabled content is becoming increasingly difficult to detect and easier to make. 

Social media platforms remain at the center of the scam economy. Meta's platforms account for the top three spots: Facebook (57%), Instagram (22%), and WhatsApp (8%), according to the Better Business Bureau. The Global Anti-Scam Alliance found that 81% of all scam attempts in the U.S. occurred on platforms with a direct-message function. A recent AP-NORC poll found that 58% of adults now receive a suspected scam attempt daily, and that more people reported encountering scams on Facebook than on any other platform — reinforcing the report's platform-level findings from an independent source.

CFA's findings arrive as accountability efforts against platform-enabled fraud gain traction on multiple fronts. CFA has sued Meta for failing to protect users from scam advertisements, alongside a separate landmark civil prosecution by Santa Clara County, California, and a 2025 lawsuit from the U.S. Virgin Islands Attorney General. In Congress, a bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced the SCAM Act, which would require platforms to verify advertisers and act against fraudulent content. In New York, lawmakers have introduced the Fraudulent Social Media Advertising Prevention Act, which would require platforms to verify advertisers and screen ads for fraud before publishing them. 

Similar to CFA’s initial report, the updated analysis based on the FBI’s IC3 2025 data finds that consumers in four states — California, Texas, Florida and New York — still suffer the greatest projected losses, which account for over one third of nationwide scam damages. New to this year’s report are numbers capturing the true cost of online scams by household. Estimated annual losses in top states include:

• California: $26.1 billion in annual losses (up from $18.1 billion in 2024), with an average of $1,891 in annual losses per household.

• Texas: $13 billion in annual losses (up from $9.7 billion in 2024), with an average of $1,132 in annual losses per household.

• Florida: $11.3 billion in annual losses (up from $7.7 billion in 2024) with an average of $1,239 in annual losses per household.

• New York: $8.7 billion in annual losses (up from $6.5 billion in 2024) with an average of $1,112 in annual losses per household.

Social media platforms, specifically Meta-owned Facebook and Instagram, are the platforms most commonly associated with online scams. Investigative reporting has illustrated how these companies profit heavily from the presence of scam content on their platforms: 

• Reuters reported that internal Meta documents projected roughly 10 percent of its 2024 revenue — about $16 billion — would come from ads promoting scams and banned goods. The investigation also reported that Meta directed its own staff not to take action that would threaten more than 0.15 percent of the company's revenue. 

• According to The New York Times, Meta allowed scammers to run over 150,000 political advertising scams involving deepfakes and misleading paid content, which earned  the company over $49 million over a seven year period.

• The Wall Street Journal reported that Meta, which the article called, “a cornerstone of the internet fraud economy,” allows suspicious advertisers to accrue up to 32 automated 'strikes' for financial fraud before it bans their accounts.