True Link (YC S13) To Help The Elderly Avoid Scammers With Pre-Paid Visa Cards

Re:True Link (YC S13) To Help The Elderly Avoid Scammers Wit... by rabidonrails on Thursday August 01, 2013 @11:02AM (#6140748)

...it’s hard to put an exact number on the scope of scams out there. But he estimates that there are 10 million people in the U.S. above a certain age who are living alone and susceptible to fraud.

I'm not sure what the point of the latter sentence is - I had to read it twice to make sure that I wasn't missing something...am I?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:True Link (YC S13) To Help The Elderly Avoid Scammers Wit... by sarahkpeck on Thursday August 01, 2013 @12:53PM (#6141646)

In answer to this question; the phrasing could be more specific. I believe he's referencing the number of seniors who are targets for scams like these and would benefit from a card like this. In this case, the question is: how many seniors are there in America, who are living alone, with some cognitive decline, and highly susceptible to fraud and scams?

See this Bloomberg piece -- 2010 estimates that financial abuse victimizes 1 in 5 elderly; about 7.3 million senior citizens have reported being taken advantage of. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-06-15/financial-abuse-vic...

The scary part is that it's likely much, much higher (the number of people being taken advantage of) -- because so much of it goes undetected, or worse, unreported.

[ Parent | on HN ]