FTC fraud and imposter-scam reports by state

What is an FTC report?

A report is what a consumer tells the Federal Trade Commission’s (FTC) Consumer Sentinel Network: that they suffered a fraud, identity theft or another problem. The FTC publishes how many it receives, by state. A report does not show that fraud happened. Here we count reports, not cases, and we name no business or person.

What did we find?

• Imposter scams, 2024: 845,806 reports nationwide. 22% said they lost money, 2,952 million dollars in all, with a median loss of $800.
• Imposter scams per 100,000 people (estimate): highest, District of Columbia 329, Washington 274 and Colorado 264. Lowest, North Dakota 130, Louisiana 145 and Mississippi 149. The FTC prints only a whole percent for each state, so these figures are rounded estimates.
• The category the FTC lists first: imposter scams in 22 of 51 jurisdictions (Alaska, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Utah, Vermont, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin and Wyoming). In the others the list starts with credit bureaus and information furnishers or with identity theft.
• All fraud and other reports per 100,000 people: highest, Florida 2,163, Georgia 2,108 and Delaware 1,876. Lowest, South Dakota 676, North Dakota 696 and Iowa 715. The FTC ranks only the 50 states.
• Identity theft per 100,000 people: Florida 528, Georgia 517 and Nevada 466.
• Fraud losses people said they suffered: the largest totals, California $1.68 billion, Texas $898 million and Florida $866 million. The highest median loss for a state was $600 (Arizona, Hawaii and Wyoming). Nationwide, 38% of fraud reports said money was lost, about 12.5 billion dollars, with a median of $497.

Where are there the most imposter scams per person?

How did we build it?

We read the FTC’s Data Book PDF by script. Counts stay as the FTC prints them. Before publishing we check that the ranks follow from the rates, that each state page repeats the tables’ counts, that the two tables imply the same population, that the losses match Appendix C, and that the states add up to less than the country. In 2024, the states hold 85.1% of the country’s fraud and other reports; the rest carry no state or come from a state’s own contributors.

• A report is a consumer’s account. It is not a finding that fraud happened. We name no business.
• Imposter scams are an estimate. The FTC prints only a whole percent per state, so the count and rate are rounded and flagged.
• Some reports are missing. Those from state-specific data contributors and those with no state are not in the state tables.
• Losses are self-reported. They are the amounts consumers said they lost, unverified.
• Reporting is not the same as suffering. A higher rate can mean more reporting.
• Not legal advice, and not a list of cases.

The full table is in this file: one row per jurisdiction.

Where can I read more?

• Each state’s lawyer ad rules: our state rules library.
• The FTC’s own Data Book: FTC Consumer Sentinel Network.