ms. stanger in your article is there a common thread?ou set isolation cell on the phone rings they answer the phone and engage in conversation but is there something common that you are looking r are several things that are common? >> one common thread is that, well many of them they were acting because i wanted to provide for somebody, for children or grandchildren. they thought this would be great. i'm getting these winnings. father ortiz who we profiled, he was hoping to get the money and use it to fund a school. seniors know this. they really know how to push those emotional buttons and that is what's sad. .. >> i have a friend that had an older brother that was being scammed and he was someone that you couldn't get to stop. and have you seen that with some of the other family members saying don't do this? >> yeah, i think that that's part of it. >> that is right. >> unfortunately some of the worst cases develop a relationship with a scammer and relatives are saying that you cannot do this and no, and they trust the scammer more than

ms. stanger: thank you for inviting me to speak. i'm a senior editor at "consumer reports" and i represent today's advocacy arm union. you may wonder why "consumer reports," which is known for reviewing cars and computers, would highlight elder scams. people have a ithe to know their hard-earned savings are protected. when i was asked to testify i was nervous but then i thought about edna, an 86-year-old great grandmother from harvey, north dakota, who had the courage to testify in federal court earlier this year against a man from jamaica who is part of a vast conspiracy to defraud dozens of people, mainly seniors, in a sweep stakes scam. edna herself lost nearly $300,000, her life savings. most seniors would not be willing to talk but edna was angry and wanted her money back so in spite of being nervous and scared, she spoke out. sadly her money may never be returned. but she helped convict a really bad guy. edna was one of eight victims who spoke for me for a recent article on elder scams that appeared in "consumer reports." i'm

ms. stanger: it is true. the worstely, some of cases, the repeat cases, they develop a relationship with a scammer. and relatives are saying you cannot do this, dad. no, and they trust the scammer more than they trust the adult child. know what tos to ay except that once this is senior can at least be told, you know what, if they can be shown some of the things that are not -- that do not make sense, then maybe they will start to realize, you know, this web address, does not seem right, it does not have a .gov at the end. some of these things the seniors s, that think about, url' somebody younger just knows. the pop-up that says microsoft withyou have a problem your computer. a lot of people, i am not going there, but somebody who is not as familiar will not know. it is just education. victims specialist in los angeles said that were some of the victims she dealt with him if you are done something, a script to put next to the phone so when somebody called they knew what to say. preparation. it is almost an ad

ms. stanger in your article is there a common thread? you set isolation cell on the phone rings they answer the phone and engage in conversation but is there something common that you are looking for are several things that are common? >> one common thread is that, well many of them they were acting because i wanted to provide for somebody, for children or grandchildren. they thought this would be great. i'm getting these winnings. father ortiz who we profiled, he was hoping to get the money and use it to fund a school. seniors know this. they really know how to push those emotional buttons and that is what's sad. .. >> i have a friend that had an older brother that was being scammed and he was someone that you couldn't get to stop. and have you seen that with some of the other family members saying don't do this? >> yeah, i think that that's part of it. >> that is right. >> unfortunately some of the worst cases develop a relationship with a scammer and relatives are saying that you cannot do this and no, and they trust the scammer more

ms. stanger, did i say that right? >> yes. >> the way i understand this this wasn't exactly your background. you just started down path. one door opened to another. now it's almost a passion, if i'm seeing that right. is there something that led you down this path? >> it is my passion. i am a personal finance editor. senior editor "consumer reports". this is the second piece. two years ago we wrote about scams or i should say fraud committed by family members and people that the seniors know. this is more about scams by strangers. yeah, i feel very strongly. retirement security is very important to us. i write on all sorts of retirement issues. so i'm very experienced. you have to get drawn in. it is just heartbreaking. there is so much we can do. >> if you can take maybe two things you would like to see for maybe there has to be more personal action, there has to be something signed before you can do it. what would you get of this panel or this hearing. what would you gives, two suggestions, to say, hey, work on this.

ms. stanger we talked about shame and we talked about it again on this panel.'m wondering if there are tools other than the individual having a report that couldn't be more effective. in your article you mentioned several pieces in which a bank allowed older people to repeatedly withdraw large amounts of money and presumably when that was out of, presumably when it was out of order for that particular person and actually did nothing to investigate whether fraud was involved and perhaps didn't even notify anybody until the point at which the person had come to get a loan from the bank. what should be or is being done to encourage banks to take a more active role in intervening in the situations? >> i don't have that much information on this except there are some that are making it part of their companywide effort such as wells fargo understand where they are educating everybody to be a reporter. you know, not every state has the same lot in terms of who is supposed to be -- has to report when they think elder fraud is happening. it varies from state to state. bu

ms. stanger in your article about the little scratchoff money cards. people have. i didn't even know you could do that. so, i don't know if there's any way of watching that kind of activity, and that almost seems like legalized money laundering to me. >> i understand the green dot card doesn't have the capability anymore, so i think they're trying to eliminate that. but the scammers come up with new things. somebody told me that now the iphone cards, cards that you can -- or -- i don't know -- something -- >> apple pay. >> something is being used -- i don't know if that -- the scammers move on. they move on to new payments and figure it out unfortunately. >> they're much more facile than the united states congress. both of you have mentioned and it's come up, the isolation factor, and how that is used and almost monetized to reach -- to take advantage of people. hard to know how to overcome that except that making families aware that is a r population. >> it's ironic because the isolation is something that really motivates their computer use in -- at least in our c

ms. stanger, you have spent obviously a significant amount of time putting together the lies, secrets and scams for consumer reports. what was the most shocking thing you learned while you were researching the article? >> i think the most shocking this is that it really is so around. every person i turn to in the elder justice community and adult protective services, when could i call them and say i was doing this, they would say, thank you, we need to have this publicized. please. it's everywhere. in my own family, with my husband and i together, we could think of four instances of various elder abuse situations. it is everywhere. and it is really underreported. it was very hard to get eight people to talk with me. it took a lot of effort, and i'm very grateful for their bravery because people are afraid to talk. and so the conversation i think needs to change to, not being afraid. >> it's so humiliating for them to have to share that and they'd rather just suffer in silence so it doesn't take a lot of courage to do that. i know dealing in the last year with a gentleman, senior, who fell

ms. toby stanger, senior editor for consumer reports. we appreciate you being here. we will begin with you, professor wallace. >> thank you, members of the subcommittee for the opportunity to speak at this meeting. the students in my math course who get the day off also thank you. my name is charles wallace. i'm an associate professor of computer science. we are a research focused university in michigan with an emphasis on technology, engineering and scientific degree programs. for the past four years, our breaking digital barriers group has organized and participating in a program in conjunction with the local public library called online at the brlibrary that trains elderly citizens in digital literacy skills and exposes our students to the reality faced by digital non-natives. we have identified recurring themes of these. the theme most germane is anxiety versus exploration. lacking appropriate grounding, our senior patrons alternate between naive trust and paralyzing suspicion, neither of which leads to comfortable productive use. our program addresses this progr