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Monica Vaca, the Associate Director of the Division of Consumer Response and Operations at the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) just released the results from last year regarding the top frauds of 2017. Topping the list of reported frauds are the imposter scams, with nearly 350,000 reported.

Questions:
1. How many people fell for someone pretending to be a loved one in trouble, a government official, tech support, or someone else who’s not who they say they are?
2. How much money was lost to imposter scams?
3. Which type of fraud composed 23% of the fraud reports to the FTC last year?
4. What were the top fraud report states per 100,000 population? Why do you think those states are targeted?
5. What was the most interesting statistic for you and why?

Source:
Vaca, M. (2018). The Top Frauds of 2017. The FTC, March 1 (Retrievable online at https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/blog/2018/03/top-frauds-2017).