AI scams hit millions of Americans, losses estimated at $68 billion
AI played a role in 12% of successful scams, as Americans lost an estimated $68 billion and about 15 million people were cheated out of money.
Americans lost $68 billion to scams last year in a Gallup and Stop Scams Alliance survey of 5,173 U.S. adults conducted in January and February 2026. About 6% of Americans, or roughly 15 million people, said they were scammed out of money in 2025, and victims reported that 12% of those successful scams involved AI or deepfakes.
AI is still a minority part of the scam economy, but it is making fraud harder to spot and easier to scale. Ken Westbrook, the founder and chief executive of Stop Scams Alliance, said the scale of organized fraud is larger than what federal complaint systems capture, and that scammers are operating like organized crime. He said the U.S. does not regularly collect comprehensive scam-loss data from residents, and the survey’s estimate was nearly four times the losses reflected in Federal Trade Commission complaint data.
Interpol warned in March 2026 that AI could enhance and fuel fraud, and Secretary General Valdecy Urquiza said AI, low-cost digital tools and greater criminal collaboration are driving the “industrialization of fraud.” OpenAI said in February 2026 that it had documented attempts to use its tools in scams, including fake “scam recovery” ads aimed at people who had already been victimized.
AP-NORC polling in 2025 found that 60% of Americans overall, and 74% of adults under 30, use AI to find information at least some of the time. Impersonation scams can feel more convincing when they arrive through voice, video or text that seems routine at first glance.
Realistic deepfakes have been used to impersonate Marco Rubio, Susie Wiles and Joe Biden.
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