FRANKFORT – (KT) Last week was National Consumer Protection Week, and Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron outlined some of the top scams in Kentucky and is offering tips on how to protect against them.

Cameron says scams are quite a problem in the state. “Last year, there were around 2,100 complaints made to this office, and there were $31 million in losses. That doubles the number of losses we saw in 2021, so this continues to be an issue.”

According to Cameron, Kentuckians lost the most money to scams related to investments, real estate or rentals, identity theft, romance and networking and sweepstakes and lottery scams.

The top five scams in 2022, in term of dollar losses by Kentuckians, were:

• $14.3 million dollars to investment scams.

• $5.6 million to real estate and rental scams.

• $1.7 million to identity theft.

• $1.3 million in romance and networking scams.

• $1.1 million in sweepstakes and lottery scams.

The top three counties in Kentucky reporting the highest amount of dollar losses to scams in 2022 were Daviess County, with nearly $13 million; Jefferson County, with $2.3 million; and Fayette County, at $1.4 million.

“What we try to do through our ‘Be a Fraud Fighter’ campaign and other initiatives that we have in the office,” he said, “is to equip people with information to make wise decisions and ask probing questions, before they hand over their credit card, hand over their debit card or write a check to somebody. You need to understand the legitimacy of the person you might be corresponding with online or over the phone.”

Among the things people need to determine, Cameron noted, is whether this is an organization or entity that would reach out in that fashion. “Would the FBI give you unannounced calls before sending you some sort of notification in the mail? Think through who is communicating with you and now are they communicating with you.”

For those contacting you on the phone, he suggests asking question like, where are you located, how did you get my number, what is this you are calling about? For those contacting you online, if they claim to be with a government agency, check to see if they have a .gov web address. Any misspellings in an email is another indicator that something is not right.

Cameron says if you believe you have been scammed, contact his office.

“We can, depending on when we find out about it, hopefully get somebody their money back. If we’re not able to, we can certainly stop them from taking more money, and we can also send that information out to other people, so they become aware of these scams.”

Kentuckians should report scams to the Attorney General’s office by calling 888-432-9257 or by going to ag.ky.gov/scams. 

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