It’s not like seniors want to but yes, they tend to be scammers’ target because of seniors’ trusting nature. Seniors were brought up by their generation to be trusting and polite. They were expected to act accordingly by their parents. Those were the days when doors were held open for strangers and honest answers were thrown to questions. Something this generation would not dream of teaching their kids for all the evilness of today’s society. But, like they say, it is really hard to uproot something that has been imbibed for years, taking from seniors’ stand point.

Scammers chase the last generation of Americans who were taught to trust one another since they are easy and can be bullied. The most popular route of these fraudulent acts are mails, whether snail mails or electronic mails and have different varieties to choose from such as Medicare, Social Security, investments and insurances scams. Crooked schemes like these play on seniors’ vulnerability and often take advantage of their physical and mental health, factors that are age-related and cannot be avoided.

Mails are not our outmost concern here, since scammers do knock on seniors’ doors and were often invited in. This often puts seniors to physical vulnerability even before they realize the consequences of their actions. Moreover, scammers are not always strangers, they can also be someone you trust for a long time and they come in different guises.

So why seniors? It is because more often than not, seniors prepared well for their retirement. They saved for rainy days and they have nest egg in case of emergency. They have assets to last them for 20 more years and still have plenty to go around. Polite seniors often have difficulties in hanging up or saying no to persistent callers, much less to unrelenting swindlers. These traits are well-known to scammers and they are on the usual hunt for susceptible individuals.

According to FBI, seniors are very attractive targets because they are less likely to report a fraud for varied reasons. Also, older citizens often make poor witnesses to scams and are usually poor in remembering dates, time and description of the scammer. It was also found out that, elderly victims usually denies the fact that they were indeed scammed.

Actually, we don’t have to be weary of every John Does we meet everyday, just remember the golden rule, never to give valuable information about yourself, not to anyone, not ever, under any circumstances. Remember that your private data are kept by appropriate offices and they don’t have to ask you for it if in case they need it. They can access it anytime they want to without asking for your permission so be careful with individuals posing as an agent for some offices requiring your personal information. Better yet, hang-up as soon as you smell rat. These unscrupulous people will not take offense anyway so don’t bother being polite.

However, if you doubt your own memory to remember important things and you need to share it with someone else, you just have to choose your candidates wisely to avoid unforeseen circumstances. A little file organizing goes a long way and will prove to be very useful for future reference. Take it to a safe place and tell someone you trust where to find it. You can also apply for a safe deposit box with banks for your files’ safekeeping. These boxes are not easily accessible by anyone else but you and in case someone else attempts to, he or she will be required to present a personal identification and an authorization letter from you. Safe enough to get you out of trouble.