Japan Survey Finds One in Three Aging Parents Received Scam Phone Calls

A survey conducted by the security firm Secom on 560 people in Japan aged from 30 to 69 revealed that 87% felt worried in some way about their aging parents living apart from them. The top three concerns were “sickness or injury” (66.3%), “decreasing cognitive abilities” (42.5%), and “driving a car” (30.2%).

The percentage of respondents who were worried about their parents being tricked by specialized fraud, including those who were “somewhat” concerned, was 56.0%. Although only 3.2% had “actually been the victim of specialized fraud,” 35.9% said their parents had “received that kind of phone call,” (thought to be specialized fraud) indicating that there is already imminent risk of them being scammed.

However, 32.0% of respondents said that their parents had “not taken any measures” to protect themselves from scams.

Of the 283 people whose parents were taking preventative measures, 54.4% “don’t answer calls from unknown numbers,” 38.2% “hang up on people they don’t know,” and 36.0% “let the landline go straight to voicemail.”

The first step to fraud prevention is considering the possibility of encountering a scam, rather than trusting too much that everything will turn out fine.

(Translated from Japanese. Banner photo © Pixta.)