Federal agencies warn Alaska seniors: government will never demand gift cards

Alaska's seniors lost more than $16 million to scams in 2025, part of a 43 percent jump in a single year — and during April testimony on cryptocurrency-kiosk fraud, one state lawmaker said his own mother had lost a year's worth of house payments to a scheme built on spoofed law-enforcement calls and a Bitcoin kiosk.

That is the backdrop for a federal warning aimed squarely at older Alaskans. On Monday, marking World Elder Abuse Awareness Day, Social Security Commissioner Frank J. Bisignano released a video message with a single blunt rule: no government agency will ever demand payment by gift card, cryptocurrency, wire transfer, or payment app — only a scammer will. The message launched the federal "Never Ever" campaign, coordinated through the Elder Justice Coordinating Council, an alliance of 17 federal agencies.

The other tells are just as bright-line. A real agency will never say your money isn't safe and must be moved to "protect" it, and will never threaten to suspend your benefits unless you pay immediately. The threat is also growing more sophisticated: the Social Security Administration says scammers are now using artificial intelligence to impersonate officials in tech-support, sweepstakes, romance, and government-impersonation schemes.

The national numbers are stark. The FTC logged more than 375,000 government-imposter reports in 2025, with losses of $917 million, and losses among consumers 60 and older quadrupled between 2020 and 2024, reaching $2.4 billion.

In Alaska, the Medicare Information Office is distributing federal toolkits and connecting seniors to the Eldercare Locator. Suspected Social Security impersonation can be reported to the SSA Office of the Inspector General at oig.ssa.gov, with guidance at ssa.gov/scam; any government-impersonation scam can go to the FTC at reportfraud.ftc.gov.