Attorney General Speaks to Seniors

Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan spoke with area seniors today about how to identify and avoid some of the common scams she says her office sees all too often. In a partnership with the Glen Ellyn Police Department, Madigan spoke at the Glen Ellyn Civic Center to crowd of seniors.

Chief of Police Phillip Norton introduced Madigan and thanked her for attending  the day's event, saying that unfortunately these scams were "often a crime commited against older adults in Illinois."

The crowd broke into applause at Madigan stepped up to the microphone.

"We still have people, real live people, answering our phones," said Madigan as she told the crowd to contact her office for more information. The promise of real people answering their calls got a positive reaction from the crowd.

Madigan spoke for about twenty minutes about a number of scams that she said her office has identified and are often targeted at senior citizens. Madigan explained that when she first started her job in office Illinois saw about 24,000 complaints filed per year regarding scams of this type. Last year, Madigan said, her office saw that number increase to around 32,000. Madigan blamed a bad economy for driving more people to seek "illegitimate ways to make money."

"I want to go over the three most important scams that I see," Madigan told the crowd. 

According the Madigan, these included a Medicare Scam that saw con artists seeking to exploit people's understanding of the recent changes in their healthcare; a Grandparents Scam, which sought to exploit older adults emotional response to a con artist calling and frantically requesting the wire transfer of a large sum of money to help out a grandchild in trouble; and a mortgage scam which used a "reverse mortgage" deal to con seniors out of money.

With the Medicare scam, Madigan reminded seniors to be vigilant and not give any personal information, like social security or bank account numbers, out to strangers over the phone.

"You can no longer trust the info that comes up on your caller ID," Madigan warned seniors, telling them that con artists use that function to convince people that they are talking to someone in the government. "They will take your money right out of your account."

Madigan told the attendees that they could call her office with information about scammers and to be very careful who they give personal information out to. She also recommended that seniors get a copy of their credit score at least once a year to avoid identify theft, adding that scam artists are clever and can be very charismatic. 

"There's nothing you can do to guarantee you wont be a victim of identity theft," Madigan said. "But there are things you can do."