August 4, 2020//-According to data analyzed by the Atlas VPN research team, Americans reported 152,129 coronavirus-related fraud cases since the start of the year.
These reports reveal that citizens lost more than $97.39 million to COVID-19 and stimulus check scams.
Online shopping scams are the most common, with over 23,296 cases as of August 3rd, 2020. Internet shopping scams swindled an excess of $13.73 million from unsuspecting victims.
Cybercriminals are building scam websites to trick people into purchasing supplements, masks, and sometimes even vaccines that are not approved by the FDA.
Travel and vacation scams account for even bigger losses, totaling $33.45 million since the start of the year. As stated on the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) website, US citizens reported 17,659 travel and vacation complaints.
It turns out that hotels and flight companies are not in a hurry to issue refunds to customers, which is the main contributing factor to these reports.
On average, consumers reported 707 fraud cases per day, counting from January 1st, 2020 to August 2nd, 2020. The FTC received most complaints on April 15th, 2020, totaling over 1,922 coronavirus-related scam reports.
Most reports came from Californians
By far, most reports came from the bear flag state – California. Citizens in California reported 15,501 COVID-19 scams since the start of the ear.
Next comes Florida, with 10,228 complaints. Texas has around 7 million more citizens than Florida, but there are more COVID-19 cases in the bear flag state, which might be the reason why fraudsters are targeting Florida more often.
As stated on the FTC website, Texas is third in terms of coronavirus-related scam reports by state, with 9,304 cases as of August 3rd, 2020. Similarly, 9,139 complaints came from the state of New York.
Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Washington filed over 5,000 reports each.
n contrast, the least complaints came from North and South Dakota, with 125 and 138 reports, respectively. Vermont, Alaska, and Wyoming also had less than 200 complaints each.
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