Montana consumers reported losing $17,004,601 to scams last year

The Federal Trade Commission received 5,683 fraud reports from consumers in Montana in 2022, according to newly released data.

Montana consumers reported losing a total of $17,004,601 to fraud, with a median loss of $575.

The FTC’s Consumer Sentinel Network is a database that receives reports directly from consumers, as well as from federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies, the Better Business Bureau, industry members, and non-profit organizations. Reports from around the country about consumer protection issues—including identity theft, fraud, and other categories—are a key resource for FTC investigations that stop illegal activities and, when possible, provide refunds to consumers.

Across all types of reports, the FTC received a total of 9,197 reports from consumers in Montana in 2022.

The top category of reports received from consumers in Montana was Imposter Scams; followed by Identity Theft; Online Shopping and Negative Reviews; Prizes, Sweepstakes and Lotteries; and Banks and Lenders.

Nationally, consumers reported losing nearly $8.8 billion to fraud in 2022, up from $5.8 billion in 2021. Consumers reported losing more money to investment scams—more than $3.8 billion—than any other category in 2022. That amount more than doubles the amount reported lost in 2021. The second highest reported loss amount came from imposter scams, with losses of $2.6 billion reported, up from $2.3 billion in 2021.

The FTC received fraud reports from 2.4 million consumers last year, with the most commonly reported being imposter scams, followed by online shopping scams. Prizes, sweepstakes, and lotteries; investment related reports; and business and job opportunities rounded out the top five fraud categories.

Sentinel received more than 5.1 million reports overall in 2022. Of these, more than 1.1 million were identity theft reports received through the FTC’s IdentityTheft.gov website.

The FTC uses the reports it receives through Sentinel as the starting point for many of its law enforcement investigations, and the agency also shares these reports with approximately 2,800 federal, state, local, and international law enforcement professionals. While the FTC does not intervene in individual complaints, Sentinel reports are a vital part of the agency’s law enforcement mission.

A full breakdown of reports received in 2022 is now available on the FTC’s data analysis site at https:// ftc.gov/ exploredata.