Gullibility, loneliness, exploitation or just bad luck? Exploring older adults’ perceptions of fraud risks, protections and victimhood

Introduction

Navigating cyberspace has become an intrinsic part of engaging in society and the performance of everyday life, whether enrolling in a class, ordering a soft drink at your table in a cafe, or paying a bill. COVID-19 and the wider transition into online forms of doing business, cost-cutting and modernisation processes mean that users of any age are progressively forced to conduct their activities online (Benbow et al. 2021 ; Hakak et al. 2020 ; Osler and Zahavi 2022 ). Although the internet’s availability, ubiquity and speed make our lives easier in many ways, digital inclusion is unequal, with older adults often facing limitations in terms of access, skills and confidence (Age UK 2024 ; Money et al. 2024 ). The multiplicity of access, uses, and the increasing reliance on online environments also presents problems in terms of exposure to online criminality (Monteith et al. 2021 ; Onwuadiamu 2025 ), preventing crime in online spaces (Holt and Steinmetz 2025 ; Brewer et al. 2019 ) and the shifting and reducing means to protect oneself from bad actors.

Cybercrime is as diverse as offline crime but lacks a universally recognised definition (Curtis and Oxburgh 2022 ; Wall 2017 ). In addition to a lack of consensus on what constitutes a cybercrime, there is also a significant variability in the terms used to describe crimes that occur in online spaces (McGuire 2019 ; Phillips et al. 2022 ). However, most cybercrimes fall into one of two broad categories. Cyber- dependent crimes, such as malware, denial of service attacks, hacking and ransomware are relatively new offences which target networks and systems and therefore rely on the existence of computers. In contrast, cyber- enabled crimes are generally traditional offences predating computers and the Internet, such as fraud, harassment, grooming, sexual exploitation and extortion, with computing devices and the Internet deployed by cybercriminals as tools to facilitate the efficient commission of their crimes (Curtis and Oxburgh 2022 ; McGuire and Dowling 2013 ). This distinction is reflected in the way in which crimes in online spaces are prosecuted and recorded by law enforcement and reporting agencies in the UK. Cyber-dependent crimes are generally categorised as “computer misuse” offences, whereas cyber-enabled crimes are dealt with under a range of legislation and recording categories including fraud, sexual offences, harassment, malicious communications and online safety (Crown Prosecution Service 2026 ).

While research has explored older adults’ vulnerability to fraud, primarily in North America and focused on in-person, telephone, or specific crimes like investment fraud (DeLiema et al. 2016 , 2020 ; Phillips 2017 ; Button et al. 2025b ), the digital dimension remains understudied, leaving a gap in understanding and in efforts to protect a growing at-risk population. This paper focuses on older adults (60+) and their self-identified reasons for victimisation, perceptions of victims of these crimes, sources of information and choices of protective measures.

Literature review

Despite traditional expectations of having reduced online presence, internet usage by older adults has been steadily increasing, even if out of necessity (Faverio 2022 ; Mace et al. 2022 ). Ofcom ( 2025 ) reports that around 73% of over 65s in the UK use the internet at home, while Age UK ( 2025 ) puts the figure at 81%, or 10.5 million individuals, as of 2022/2023. For over 75s, the number of internet users almost doubled between 2013 and 2020, from 29% to 54% (Office for National Statistics, 2021 ).

There are, of course, many benefits of internet use for older adults, including increased social connections with friends and family, wider choice of entertainment, improved access to current affairs, health and other types of information, increased choice in relation to purchases and easier access to official forms, maintenance of cognitive function and increased wellbeing overall (Aggarwal et al. 2020 ; Australian Communications and Media Authority 2021 ; Karagiannopoulos et al. 2021 ; Lam et al. 2020 ; Lee 2023 ; Schroeder et al. 2023 ; Zhou et al. 2024 ).

However, the increase in online activity by older adults also brings increased exposure to online criminality (Cross 2021 ; Havers and Tripathi 2024 ; University College London, Dawes Centre for Future Crime 2021 ). These risks may be compounded by factors including social isolation, having – or being perceived by cybercriminals to have – increased funds, lacking the skills or confidence to utilise protective technologies such as password managers and anti-virus software, and cognitive and health decline (Age UK 2021 ; Akdemir 2020 ; Bolimos and Choo 2017 ; Burton et al. 2022 ; Havers et al. 2024b ; Karagiannopoulos et al. 2021 ; Lazarus et al. 2025 ; Zur and Zur 2011 ).

Against this backdrop, recent advances in generative AI, such as the creation of more realistic deepfake images, voice-synthesising and cloning and the ability to create more realistic phishing emails and websites are likely to result in an acceleration in cyber-enabled crimes (Burton et al. 2025 ; National Cyber Security Centre 2024 ), including the potential for increased victimisation of older adults (Shapiro 2025 ; Vulpe et al. 2024 ).

Although some research has found that older adults are more likely to become victims of cyber-enabled frauds (Bolimos and Choo 2017 ; Whitty 2019 ), statistics from the Crime Survey of England and Wales (CSEW) indicate that older adults, especially those aged over 75, tend to be at less risk of victimisation overall than younger age groups (Havers et al. 2024a ; using CSEW data). However, this reflects historically lower levels of internet usage by older adults (Grigoryeva et al. 2014 ; Karagiannopoulos et al. 2021 ) which is now changing, as outlined above. Despite the overall lower level of victimisation and there being “no shortage of measures which are promoted to reduce fraud against older adults” (Button et al. 2024 : 386), older adults are more likely to be victims of fraud than other digital crime types (Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services 2023 ; Kemp et al. 2024 ; Satchell et al. 2022 ; Temple and Makkai 2007 ). While some studies have indicated that older adults are more likely to report repeat victimisation, others have indicated that age is not a significant factor for repeat victimisation (Havers et al. 2024a ; Whitty 2019 ). However, older adults may be more likely to targeted because they are perceived as having accrued wealth (Lazarus et al. 2025 ) and suffer a higher financial detriment following fraud victimisation (Bolimos and Choo 2017 ).

Additionally, becoming a victim of online crime can have a significant impact on older adults (Havers et al. 2024b ; Tripathi et al. 2019 ) with negative impacts similar or exceeding offline crimes (Borwell et al. 2024 ). Older adults may not have time to recoup financial losses, or may fear either being victimised again in the future or being judged as having reduced mental capacity leading to denial of personal agency, and may internalise guilt and shame (Bailey et al. 2021 ; Carter 2021 ; Cross 2015 ; Temple and Makkai 2007 ). Victimisation can cause older adults to restrict, modify or cease their online activities, adopting disproportionately avoidant protective behaviours which limit access to the benefits of being online (Bailey et al. 2021 ; Karagiannopoulos et al. 2021 ; Kemp et al. 2024 ) and lead to marginalisation and social disadvantage.

Methodology

This research draws on data from semi-structured interviews of older adults to explore reasons for victimisation, perceptions of victimhood, choices of protective measures, and sources of information. 11 older adults (7 male, 4 female), all aged 60 or over, were recruited to take part in semi-structured interviews from Hampshire ( n = 9) and Essex ( n = 2) in England after receiving a favourable ethical opinion from the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences Ethics Committee of the University of Portsmouth (reference number FHSS 2023-013). As this research is concerned with how older adults construct and negotiate their understanding of fraud, vulnerability, and support through language, it is informed by an interpretivist epistemology, which seeks to understand the subjective meanings individuals attach to their experiences (Miller 2004 ).

Given the complexity and context-dependence of their accounts, qualitative methods were used to capture the richness of participants lived experiences and the social and discursive processes through which they are articulated.

Participants were recruited through one of three purposive sampling routes:

Email invitations disseminated by Essex Police’s Neighbourhood Watch team;

University of Portsmouth Ageing Network (UPAN) emails to individuals previously expressing an interest in research participation; and.

Selected at random from a pool of volunteers who either attended (or heard about by word of mouth) a presentation about the proposed research delivered to a local pensioners’ group in Portsmouth by a member of the research team.

Purposive, non-probability sampling was employed to ensure participants had potential exposure to, or awareness of, fraud-related issues relevant to older adults. Participants were excluded if they had any diagnosed condition impairing mental capacity to provide informed consent, were under 60 years old, or had no exposure or awareness of fraud-related issues. The interviews revealed that five of the participants had been a victim of fraud. Although a small sample, which cannot yield insights into patterns of perceptions and how these relate to fraud victimhood status, this proportion does reflect the broad prevalence of fraud victimhood reported in the UK as around half of all reported crime (NCA 2025 ).

The number of interviews conducted was guided by the study’s qualitative and interpretivist orientation, which prioritises depth of engagement with participants’ accounts. Iterative data collection and analysis allowed insights from earlier interviews to inform subsequent ones. As interviewing progressed, participants’ descriptions of awareness, responsibility, and protections revealed recurring patterns, with later interviews contributing nuance and elaboration rather than new themes. Using the richness and explanatory value of the data to inform the sample size is consistent with qualitative approaches that emphasise informational depth and analytic sufficiency rather than statistical representativeness (Malterud et al. 2015 ). The intention was not to produce geographically generalisable findings but to develop a contextually grounded understanding of how fraud and vulnerability are constructed in everyday discourse.

Participants were supplied with an information sheet explaining the purpose of the research, how it would be conducted, and how their anonymity would be respected prior to signing a consent form. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews, chosen for their flexibility in enabling in-depth exploration of participants’ experiences while allowing the interviewer to probe emergent themes (Brent et al. 2024 ). The interview schedule focused on participants’ awareness of different fraud and cybercrime types, perceptions of personal and collective vulnerability, protective behaviours, and experiences or narratives related to fraud and cybercrime and associated prevention. The ways in which researchers, law enforcement professionals and legislation categorise cybercrime do not necessarily reflect public perceptions and experiences of or responses to such crimes in everyday life (Conway and Hadlington 2021 ; Cross et al. 2021 ). While interviewees were asked about their understanding of certain terms such as phishing, the research team did not define cybercrime or cyber-enabled fraud for them, allowing interviewees to define and describe their experiences using their preferred terms.

Interviews were conducted either face-to-face or via video call, based on participant preference, reflecting an adaptive and participant-centred research design. All interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim, and anonymised.

We drew on an approach combining discourse analysis, content analysis, and principles from conversation analysis to explore how participants constructed meanings, identities, and social roles in relation to age, trust, and vulnerability to fraud. The use of multiple interactional analytic perspectives and integration of discursive and thematic approaches provided insights not only into what participants said, but how they said it; allowing for both depth and breadth in the interpretation of data (Carter 2021 ).

Information about marital status, living arrangements and other individual personal circumstances was not sought but was revealed by participants during the interview process, and in the spirit that it was given, only attended to analytically where participants themselves oriented to their circumstances as relevant in constructing their perceptions of and accounts of fraud victimhood, risk, confidence, support or vulnerability. Such characteristics were not used as sampling criterion or treated as analytic variables as this information was unevenly articulated across interviews and given the analytic approach of this research.

The analysis was performed in three interconnected stages; first, each of the interview transcripts were listened to and read several times to develop an overall familiarity with the data, during which recurring themes were identified (loneliness, knowledge, blame, protections). These emerged inductively through close listening to the audio and reading the transcriptions, consistent with the principles of reflexive thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke 2006 ).

We then examined the discourse within each theme using discourse analysis to explore how participants constructed accounts of fraud, responsibility, and vulnerability, focussing on how they invoked, resisted, or made relevant aspects of their everyday circumstances, such as divorce linked to loneliness, or their own experiences of victimhood linking to their narratives of (self)blame. We also explored how individual narratives connect with broader societal understandings of older adults and fraud and cybercrime vulnerability, protections and victimhood.

We then drew on content analysis to identify and examine participants’ interpretative repertoires, categorisations of risk and rhetorical strategies through which speakers normalised, resisted, or attributed risk. We refined the themes to move from what was discussed, to how it was framed and oriented to. This involved a conversation-analytic informed reading of selected passages to examine interactional detail such as hesitation, repair, emphasis, and lexical choice. These features were analysed to understand how participants actively construct meanings of responsibility, competence, and vulnerability, and managed stake or uncertainty in situ; enabling broader interpretations to be grounded in observable features of talk.

We took steps to limit interpretive bias; the layered analytic process allowed patterns that were identified at the content level to be tested against the linguistic and interactional organisation of participants’ accounts, enhancing the coherence and rigour of the analysis. Theme development was inductive, with repeated returns to the transcripts and audio recordings to ensure that interpretations were grounded in participants’ language and interactional detail. We paid close attention to disconfirming cases and alternative readings of extracts. As a research team we regularly discussed and interrogated analytic decisions and refined interpretations.

Analysis

Loneliness is a theme that arises in many of the interviews, with this framed as a factor in victimisation. Although age isn’t topicalised in all participants’ narratives around victimhood, loneliness is perceived as a key component of vulnerability, and this could be interpreted as a proxy for advanced age as key indirect factors of loneliness such as limited social interaction and living alone due to divorce or widowhood are more likely to be experienced by older generations (Von Soest et al. 2020 ).

I mean, as far as the romance ones are concerned, I know loneliness and all the rest of it that goes with having been divorced. –AA

if you’re lonely, and you get someone saying, hello, how nice to see you, you know. And they believe it. – AG

[some people become victims of fraud online because of] desire, loneliness – AE

This is supported by the below quote which qualifies ‘lonely… old ladies’ with ‘normal’.

They’re not thick, they’re not [stupid] or anything, they’re just normal lonely poor old ladies. – AE

Further supporting the link between older adults, loneliness and vulnerability to victimhood, the following extracts demonstrate that younger victims of fraud (and those that are educated) are seen as unusual.

The use of “even” implicitly constructs younger or educated victims as unexpected, thereby reinforcing the assumption that fraud is something that ordinarily happens to older people. Rather than functioning solely as a linguistic intensifier, “even” orients to a shared cultural expectation about who is most at risk. In doing so, participants reproduce a discourse in which older adulthood is aligned with susceptibility, while cases involving younger victims are treated as noteworthy exceptions, using “presupposition of likelihood-based scalarity” (Zhang 2022 :250) to highlight the power of the fraud and cybercrime to be such that the unlikely scenario of younger and educated individuals of being victims, as opposed to the normative assumption that this crime type affects older and uneducated adults (Murga 1999 ). This interactional framing is significant for understanding how vulnerability is socially constructed, not simply experienced, and how age-based expectations shape interpretations of victimhood.

Even young and educated people become victim to fraud

even some of the programmes I’ve seen, particularly on the BBC in the mornings, they do, and there’s even younger people, things, like the what was it where a person has been phoned and on supposedly on their son’s phone and they’ve said, can you send so much money to me, because I’m having problems? And they send the money and it’s gone to somewhere else. – AC

‘Even’ works therefore not solely as a linguistic intensifier, but as a discursive tool that reinforces prevailing social representations by relying on and activating presupposed background knowledge, which the listener must draw upon to fully grasp the speaker’s point. This becomes particularly relevant when examining how victimhood is framed in relation to age.; here, the assumption that older adults are more vulnerable to these crimes due to presumed isolation, diminished digital literacy, or trust in authority. In this way, the use of ‘even’ reinforces the dominant discourse linking old age with susceptibility, while simultaneously highlighting exceptions that prove the rule.

This narrative continues with the below extract that contrasts the age of the victim (“young woman”), and professional, educated status (“who’s a teacher”) with their status as a victim of fraud, using narratives of being fooled by trickery (“got sucked in”) as the contrast to her youth and intelligence.

There’s a young woman who lives along the road from me, who’s a teacher. Who got sucked in and had a whole load of money taken. So, I think they, yeah, I think they play on your emotions. They try to make you scared that something terrible is going to happen. And then you just get sucked into it. – AE

This implicit linguistic contrast signals that the situation of a victim who is “a young woman… who’s a teacher” is against the norm, unexpected, and is worthy of note, identifies the underlying assumptions of fraud and fraud victimhood. The linguistic emphasis on her youth and professional status signals a contrast with stereotypical expectations of fraud victims. The connective “so” (Schiffrin 1987 ) functions as a discourse pivot, separating this contrast from the subsequent account of how the fraud occurred through emotional manipulation rather than age, cognitive, or professional deficiencies. In this way, the narrative both acknowledges the universal possibility of victimhood and also treats this young, educated teacher as noteworthy, revealing underlying assumptions about who is considered vulnerable. By managing these presuppositional contrasts, the participant highlights that perceptions of fraud vulnerability are multifaceted, involving emotional rather than purely physical or cognitive deficiencies.

Knowledge is also highlighted in participants’ narratives in terms of the difficulties in self-protection experienced by older adults, including the challenge of remembering passwords that accompanies the cognitive decline associated with ageing:

[Laugh]. It leaves me speechless, [laugh] this forever having to remember passwords. Now, I know that they’re necessary, um, but in the end, um, being the age I am, I have to write them down, which kind of defeats the purpose [laugh]. – AH

Narratives that are suggestive of ageing involve this inevitable and ‘obvious’ decline in memory reveals the difficulty oriented to by participants that older adults can experience in engaging in and enacting recommended protections. Lacking the cognitive ability to perform the task (remembering a variety of passwords) in the way in which it will be effective (without writing them down) is oriented to as inevitable and unremarkable; part of “being the age that I am”. The use of ‘but’ signals the contrast between the knowledge of the necessity of protections and the inability to do so in a way that fully retains the protections. Similarly, the laughter in the extract is a non-lexical manifestation of the impossibility of the task for an individual his age.

The hesitation (‘um’) that precedes the contrastive “but” marks a moment that often signals a difficulty-to-come (Clark and Fox Tree 2002 ) in which the participant negotiates a tension between knowing what constitutes good security practice and being unable to enact it. These disfluencies are therefore not solely features of speech, but are interactional evidence of how participants manage the potential stigma of appearing careless, forgetful, or incapable. In this way, difficulty implementing protective behaviours is framed as an inevitable feature of ageing rather than a personal failing, allowing participants to maintain a morally competent identity while acknowledging vulnerability.

Below we can see that, beyond practical barriers such as remembering passwords, a broader issue with not keeping abreast of information about cybercrime protections, and an inability to recognise and understand fraud risks are described as age-related traits:

older people who don’t keep abreast of things, like I obviously don’t, because I only know what phishing is, I don’t know what the other things are. Unless somebody, you know, a younger member of their family is warning them, it is quite difficult for them to, erm, recognise where the actions might be inappropriate. (AD)

Interestingly, although the first extract provides a first-person account of not “keep[ing] abreast of things”, this quickly turns into a third person account when the narrative moves onto discussing how difficult it is to recognise fraudulent contact. This distancing also occurs in the following accounts that draw on a more pointed lack of understanding: of “what’s going on” in general rather than a lack of specific knowledge; the latter being remediable whereas the former is not and speaks to issues of declining mental capacity associated with advancing years.

[telephone banking fraud] seems to be the most…the most prominent, especially on elderly people as well, because they don’t, sort of, understand – AC

it seems to be the elderly that are, sort of, over 80 and 90 that they [cybercriminals] seem to go for… they are most likely to not understand what’s going on. – AC

This is reinforced through narratives of disparity in relation to older adults’ inability to protect themselves against fraud as opposed to the ability of younger individuals to do so, leading to younger adults being called upon to support protective efforts, discussed in the following section.

Reinforcing the narrative of age-related knowledge gaps and cognitive decline being considered risk factors for older adults’ ability to protect themselves from fraud and cybercrime, younger family members are described as “much more savvy” than their older counterparts, and as such are perceived as a key part of older individuals’ defence from victimhood. Relying on the knowledge and skills of younger family members is a recurring theme from the participants, with the perceived ‘savviness’ required to avoid fraud victimhood being framed as something that reduces with age. Participants’ perceptions of their own increased vulnerability with age, contrasted with the perceived superior skills and expertise of younger adults, were exposed through their narratives of normalising (“most people my age”) younger family members as a key (and often sole) source of fraud protection.

most people of my age have got a son, or a daughter, who’s much more savvy than they are, to go to for advice. – AD

I’ve got, er, a friend who lives in Birmingham, and she’s pretty good [laugh]. And she’s got a useful son. – AB

I was watching something [on tv] and it was this elderly woman, she was in her 90 s and she’d been continually phoned and every time she was phoned, she phoned her daughter. And her daughter had to go around and they ended up…they went to Trading Standards – AC

This also comes to the fore in the below extract, where this participant seeks assistance from local computer repairers for issues relating to viruses, ascribing their abilities to fix the problem to their young age:

there’s a shop around the corner from us and the two guys who run it, if I get any problems, I take it down. Explain to them and they sort it out because the latest computer I’ve got, I got from them. Because they, erm, they, sort of, erm, repair them and do things and I’ve been using them for about the last eight or ten years and they’re very good. Because they’re young, that’s what it is, I guess. – AC

The hesitancy in the false starts and self-repairs (“because they, erm”, and “they, sort of, erm”) and lack of specificity (“and do things”) in describing the process shows that there is an uncertainty in knowing or understanding what the computer repair staff do to resolve the problems. This also displays a distancing from the need to understand those processes. By presenting the work as something opaque but reliably handled by younger experts, the responsibility for technical competence is shifting away from themselves. This supports a broader narrative in which protection from fraud is relationally outsourced.

There is also a parallel narrative that frames asking others for this kind of assistance as an admission of an inability to protect oneself; something particularly significant when the individual is of advanced years, as it may imply a lack of intelligence or a diminished capacity to maintain independence. In the following extract, the participant describes how they do occasionally seek advice from their children; however, this admission is immediately qualified by the rarity of such occurrences. The coordinating conjunction “but” introduces a contrast between the initial acknowledgement and a firm assertion of self-reliance, subtly shifting the focus to their ongoing competence and autonomy. This resistance to help-seeking is analytically important because it illustrates how protective behaviour is shaped by identity concerns around independence and ageing, rather than knowledge or access, which may discourage individuals from drawing on available safeguards.

The participant’s use of the term “streetwise” then emphasises their awareness and astuteness and suggests that there is no increasing distance between themselves, as an older adult, and younger members of society: implying a continued awareness and alignment with contemporary norms and digital literacies. The phrase “I’m not stupid” further reinforces this stance.

…every so often, I say to [my adult children], oh, er, what do you think of this [message, could it be a scam], but it’s very rare, because I, I think I’m more streetwise than [that] but, I’m, I’m not stupid. – AD

This highlights an aspect of accessing fraud protection advice, beyond the issue of practical assistance to assess if a communication is fraudulent; the psychological as well as physical barriers to asking for help that can be underpinned by self-limiting negative perceptions of needing help representing or exposing a lack of intelligence, cognitive decline, losing independence, or appearing vulnerable.

The difficulty in realising (and admitting) there are a host of challenges that only appear once out of the workplace, as increased isolation from previously readily available informal sources of advice often disappear once retirement begins, are reflected in the following extract, where the hesitation marker “erm” shows uncertainty (Fetzer 2011 ), together with the repetition “it’s, it’s” and multiple reformulations “you know” suggesting face-management and alignment work in action. These features occur at the point at which the participant acknowledges needing help, and can be understood as interactional resources for managing a potentially face-threatening admission of increasing lack of support and potential need of assistance, revealing the ways in which participants negotiate competence, pride, and vulnerability as part of later life.

there’s also a certain amount of pride here, about, you know, admitting that you need help, or you don’t know what to do. Erm, I found it easier when I was at work, because I could just ask a younger colleague, because there was always somebody around. But, you know, once you’re out of the workplace, it’s, it’s more difficult. – AB

This adds another layer of differentiation between generations, with retirement from the workplace contributing to loneliness and reduced resources in terms of sources of cyber-enabled fraud protection information and assistance. It also reinforces the overarching perception that younger individuals are the preferred source of information, whether this be younger colleagues (AB), employees in a computer shop (AC), or family (AD, AC, AA, AB).

When asked “where do you get your information about fraud from?”, the most common response was the television, suggesting that older adults tend to be passive consumers of fraud protection information; taking it on as part of their usual activities in the home rather than actively seeking out information from organisations that offer it. This also suggests that ‘information-as-education’ is perceived differently from the type of ‘information-as-assistance’ sought and so valued from younger family members or acquaintances.

Mostly the television [nowhere else]. – AE

I only know about Action Fraud from watching telly. – AE

The following quotes show how daytime programmes are perceived as being aimed at older adults as an age group with more free time and are likely to be at home during the day. It also demonstrates that participants believe this is an effective way of taking on information about fraud, expressing confidence in their knowledge and perceiving themselves to be well informed, even if it is framed as a negative activity (“unfortunately I do like watching these things”):

I know a lot, I think I know quite a bit about cybercrime because of the television programmes I watch… And there’s a lot of it during the day… aimed at older, I guess it’s aimed at people who are retired, because it’s daytime television – AE

Because I like…unfortunately, I do like watching these things [BBC daytime fraud programming], it seems to…it seems to be the way you keep up to date… and I’ve tried to watch them when I can and it’s…I’m trying to think where it is…erm, that’s right, in the…in the Daily Mail on Wednesday, which is when they have the money post in there. – AC

This suggests that information about fraud is accessed and actively sought out (“I’ve tried to watch them when I can”) by participants during leisure time and as part of ordinary activities and entertainment. This suggests potential future work could be done in terms of addressing perceptions of information and advice; aligning the type of support older adults seek from family members with the type of support offered by fraud prevention organisations in tone, practicality, interest and accessibility.

The context in which fraud occurs is crucial in determining whether the criminal communication is perceived as genuine or identified as fraudulent. Participants described how the content and timing of fraudulent messages often overpowered the protections offered by intelligence and prior knowledge. This highlights how contextually tailored and well-timed targeting can bypass the usual fraud defences that individuals have developed.

they probably sent out a million, and one of them lands on an architect’s desk, so they won’t know I’m an architect and if I was still practising, I might have been tempted to open it just to see what it was. But it’s clearly nonsense [to anyone it’s not relevant to]. –AA

if you…you use my father as an example, and although he’s…although he is, you know, a clever, intelligent, educated person, he does deal with, um, TalkTalk, so if he gets an email which purports to come from TalkTalk and it says he didn’t make his last most recent payment, he will take that absolutely at face value. – AA

These extracts demonstrate an understanding of victimhood in terms of ‘if I were in that situation I would have done the same thing’, seen in the use of if/then conditional logic of “If I was still practising, I might have been tempted”, and “if you were of a certain frame of mind… I think you could be very quickly drawn into that” - AA.

The next quote describes an ‘unhappy fluke’, which again minimises agency (it wasn’t deliberate and aimed at them), with the contextually-driven expectation of genuine contact and the timing of the email containing contextually-relevant detail matching perfectly:

I was expecting some money from an organisation to whom I’d done some public speaking. I didn’t know the treasurer’s name. By an absolute unhappy fluke on their part, two days later I got an email from a name I didn’t recognise, saying, er, here is the BACS payment, so I opened the email, I clicked on the attachment –AA

This account shows the participant distancing themselves from being the type of victim that is blamed, by foregrounding the relevance of the email and the timing of it. This narrative highlights how contextual vulnerability, along with the situational relevance and specificity of fraudulent communications, is key to the success of modern fraud; regardless of the victim’s personal characteristics, education, age or intelligence. The content and timing of fraudulent messages often overpower the protections afforded by prior knowledge or fraud awareness, suggesting that the fraud protection information reaching older adults may be insufficient to safeguard them. Additionally, and aligning with Cross’s ( 2015 ) findings that victim-blaming discourses were lessened in cases of phishing, participants acknowledged the power of the situation and attributed successful fraud to the manipulative strategies used, rather than victim behaviours or failings.

The following extract features the participant describing how they became a victim of fraud after receiving a phone call from someone claiming to be from an IT company. The caller stated that a virus had been found on their computer and offered to help remove it:

it’s very easy to get sucked into it, because you don’t want a virus in your computer, do you? – AB

The above extract highlights the difficult position in which victims of fraud often find themselves: whether they accept help, or risk allowing an impending negative outcome to unfold. This situation typically arises when an issue needs resolving and the fraudster presents themselves as knowledgeable and authoritative, particularly when external resources or reference points are limited. The absence of alternative sources of support may make the authoritative figure’s input appear more credible and persuasive. Older adults may be particularly vulnerable in such situations, especially if they experience isolation, loneliness, or lower levels of technological literacy compared to their younger counterparts. The participant’s use of language (“sucked into it”) conveys the compelling and urgent nature of the situation, as well as the psychological pressure to act quickly to prevent harm.

It sounds plausible and you’re very used to dealing with the rest of society using social media or whatever, you’re likely to fall for it. – AA

This narrative draws attention to how contextual vulnerability can be shaped by a sense of perceived knowledge and safety, where the victim’s own perception of plausibility becomes the very thing that makes them vulnerable. It also underscores the mismatch between fraud protection messaging that emphasises unexpected or “out of the blue” contact (Carter 2024 ), and the reality of the tactics being used, that seem contextually and situationally relevant, personalised and timely.

“somebody is sending out, um, random requests for bank information which ninety-nine per cent of the population will probably ignore, but it hits somebody just at the point they do”. –AA.

Another theme that emerged is that of accidental victimhood, where there is no active decision-making in relation to a fraudulent communication, but engagement is inadvertent, rather than a deliberate act or conscious choice.

what concerns me most is I accidentally open an email that’s carrying a virus and the mere opening of the email is enough to shut me down or take over my email account –AA

Although in practical terms these cases are not ones that would be averted through fraud awareness, as they involve a mis-click, the reality is that it is rarely the case that simply opening an email would trigger a virus; the common route is through opening an attachment or clicking on a link in the email. This suggests that fraud awareness would in fact be advantageous insofar as raising awareness of the realities of technology-assisted fraud, which would enable individuals to tailor their activities rather than curtail them completely under a misapprehension of the risks.

I probably opened an email by accident. Yeah, I suspect, you know, I probably accidentally opened an email that I would ordinarily have deleted because it was one below the one I wanted. –AA

Drawing on the language in the above extract, there are a series of hedgings and false starts (“I suspect” “you know”), and repetition of ‘I probably’ which suggests that the narrative may be an attempt to account for personal fraud victimhood that they are not entirely sure how it happened, whilst also maintaining the belief that victims of fraud are cognitively or ethically compromised. A physical mis-click being an involuntary reflex that distances themselves from the blame-associated cognitive (faulty) decision-making victimhood (despite the low likelihood of a compromise taking place in this way without a more conscious clicking of the “wrong” attachment).

The following extracts describe fraud victimhood as avoidable (by being aware all the time), as well as this crime being reimagined as a type of battle, with the fraudster ‘thwarting’ the well-intentioned plans of an unaware victim. This is repeated by another participant below, where becoming a victim of fraud is likened to being hunted; ‘caught’ or having fallen in a ‘trap’. Interestingly, taken together with the above extract, we can also see a pattern of participants being unaware of their victim status, or being unwilling to admit to it:

I don’t know if I’ve ever been caught in the last twenty years. I’m sure I have once or twice, and fallen into a trap. – AE

The following quotes demonstrate that avoiding any type of fraud victimhood more generally is also seen as a matter of luck, verging on the superstitious (“touch wood”). It also highlights a belief of inevitability that they or their friends will become defrauded or the victim of a cyber breach (“yet”), suggesting a belief that safety from fraud victimisation is a result of luck rather than the use of fraud protection measures:

I’ve been so lucky, so far [laugh], I haven’t had any problems with viruses. – AD

I mean, touch wood, none of my friends, as far as I know… have been thwarted by anybody or, erm, and it’s just trying to, as I say, be aware all the time, that’s the thing. – AC

The following quote highlights the contrast between the perception of the accidental and the deliberate victim, with the element of social engineering framed as the type of fraud that one should be able to guard against (that is, not be ‘stupid enough’ to believe it).

Sometimes, it’s accidental, you might just pick it up on something that somebody has sent you. Or other times… it arrives through the programme, and if you’re stupid enough to open it, it sets itself up on your – stupid enough, I shouldn’t say that [laugh], because they’re so beguiling sometimes. – AD

The participant’s reaction to their own use of ‘stupid’ then triggers an afterthought made clear through self-repair of the description ‘stupid enough’ which recognises and foregrounds the belief that these manipulative frauds are not always possible to spot, suggesting they could happen to anyone. This brings into sharp focus the conceptual struggle between judging victims as stupid and recognising that the perpetrators’ work is to appear believable. The use of the term ‘beguiling’ however indicates that the complex social engineering is perceived as more of a trick that entices those who are able to be tempted; a positioning that both recognises the attempts of the perpetrator while also suggesting a certain type of individual could be manipulated by it.

This is at a complete contrast to the following quotes, where ‘deliberate’ victimhood is discussed. One of the most common themes that emerged is the fault of the victim, namely the weakness, lack of intelligence or inability of the victim to identify the communication as a fraud, or are compelled by greed:

they’re gonna find people who have a weakness due to circumstance or they’re just incredibly stupid. –AA

If I was a bit vulnerable and a bit dim, I could see myself being drawn in by that.

a certain percentage of the population who are greedy and they would fall for the…it has to be, if it…you know, you know, it’s…it doesn’t sound too good to be true because they’re not bright enough to see that. –AA

I think if you were of a certain frame of mind, a certain naivety and you are perhaps online dating and this person is a real person or a fake person or whatever, but they’re bombarding you with affection and compliments and all the rest of it, I think you could be very quickly drawn into that –AA

I would, you know, I’d like to think at this stage in my life, I’m still astute enough not to get conned, unless it’s very, very, very clever. – AA

People who perhaps are not as sharp online as they ought to be. I mean, I think if you’ve been, I hope, that if you’ve been brought up, as most people have these days, using the internet, and mobile phones… you were savvy enough to know that it’s a whole world of trickery out there, and I must always be on my guard. – AD

The use of language here shows the participants distancing themselves from the type of person who would become a victim of fraud. Fraud and cybercrime victimhood is aligned with a variety of negative personality traits and inabilities such as being naive, greedy, not sharp, not bright, dim, stupid and weak. The use of ‘person’ and ‘people’ compounds this, by framing victims as ‘other’, as does the juxtapositioning of the use of ‘they’re just’ ‘they’re not’ - inflexible and unable - when contrasting themselves to victims of fraud, and ‘I hope’ ‘I’d like to think’ ‘I must’ ‘It has to be’ - agile and able - when putting themselves in that position. These final quotes below show the shame and self-blame that occurs when victims believe they should have known better; they felt equipped and aware, with knowledge and cognitive capabilities to be able to identify a fraud, and yet they are in the situation where it has happened to them:

I allowed them access to my computer, and, erm, you know, I know now that, that was a pretty stupid thing to do. – AB

I feel completely useless and stupid that I’ve done it… So the scammers are very clever, they win your trust, they become your friend and that’s how they get in. – AF

The language is clear here, in taking ownership of the blame; in the first quote we see ‘I allowed them’ taking agency for the fraud rather than the fraudster’s actions being foregrounded. In the second quote, while the fraudster’s actions are the focal point, the victim still precedes that acknowledgement with damning self-blame and ‘I’ve done it’.

Understanding and empathy for fraud/cybercrime victims appears to be extended to those with contextual vulnerabilities, and where fraud victimhood is seen as an accident or bad luck. Where there is a perception of victim agency or choice, there is an increased expectation on them to be able to avoid being defrauded, and an appetite for their victimhood to be seen as deliberate negligence of their own personal safety, of greed or naivete. This pattern of victim blaming occurs despite beliefs expressed by participants around the pervasiveness and indiscriminate nature of attacks, and the intricate social engineering and contextual and situational manipulations involved.

Discussion

The findings above have provided useful insights offering a deeper understanding of older adults’ perceptions of risk, vulnerability and victimisation.

The first issue highlighted was how loneliness was considered a very important risk factor and conduit of victimisation, since it made older adults more vulnerable due to lack of support networks, echoing work by Age UK ( 2015 ), Bailey et al. ( 2021 ) and Liao et al. ( 2024 ). Social isolation was also seen as a motivating factor for older adults to interact with individuals online that appeared to be helpful, friendly or romantically interested - highlighting this as a particular point of risk of exploitation. This element of loneliness, linked directly with older age, was seen by participants to be an ‘acceptable’ reason for victimhood. Victimisation at old age was normalised, contrasted often with the perceived abnormality victimhood in youth. The loneliness element was also compounded with references to retirement as increasing isolation by reducing access to the support networks and younger colleagues, the easy access to whom would previously have been used for fraud/cybercrime protection knowledge and information.

Perhaps even more interesting was the distilled realisation that social engineering-based crimes have become so much more targeted, with criminals using more well-timed, tailored approaches (harnessing and exploiting contextual and situational vulnerabilities). This has resulted in more prevalent victimisation of users, even when someone has the characteristics older adults consider to be usual safeguards against victimisation, such as youth, education and intelligence. The belief of inevitability is also reflected in the lack of victim blaming in these situations where the social engineering was so persuasive due to skilful tailoring and timing on behalf of the fraudsters, and by references to luck in terms of not having been victimised yet.

At the same time there are references to being aware as reinforcing that element of luck, but also victimisation being a result of an unlucky accident such as inadvertently opening an email. This could either be an indication that we have seen in previous work with older adults regarding the confusion as to how victimisation happens (Home Office 2025 ; Carter 2021 ), or it could indicate a sense of shame regarding victimisation where the participant is trying to present their actions as accidental.

The narrative that older adults must consult younger counterparts to be deemed diligent and effective (and blameless) in their victimhood is also challenged with this overarching narrative that everyone can become a victim of a well-timed targeted attack. These competing perspectives reflect the issues with victimhood as an overall concept; that these crime types, predicated on the active participation of the victim (Borwell et al. 2024 ; Home Office 2025 ; Notté et al. 2021 ) require effective protections to be mounted in order to be perceived blameless rather than negligent or complicit.

Juxtaposed to this were narratives around carelessness and stupidity. Victim blaming strongly came into play when someone has behaved in a perceived naive or unintelligent manner, having done something that in general should have been avoided. Other vices such as greed or need for attention are also stigmatised. In fact, the language used here seems to create a sense of “othering” towards victims. This entails a dual risk; first, victims of fraud and cybercrime are snubbed and feel ashamed of their victimisation, adding to their emotional distress, barriers to reporting and support-seeking, and reinforcing exclusion mechanisms that can perpetuate revictimisation. On the other hand, “othering” provides those who engage in it with a false sense of immunity; a dangerous mindset when it comes to the risk of victimisation. It leads them to believe they are more intelligent, educated, or tech-savvy than those who experience victimhood, and relevant advice becomes easier to dismiss, as it is perceived to apply only to those “others” who are considered vulnerable to such risks.

This paper underlines the conflicting views of older adults around assessing and judging ‘ideal victimhood’ and whether some victims are less deserving of empathy and support than others in terms of not causing or contributing to the crime and making appropriate efforts to protect themselves (Christie 1986 ). On the one hand, victims who have not engaged in relevant efforts and have behaved naively are characterised as ‘stupid’ by some, whereas those have been victimised despite their efforts and awareness are deemed ‘unlucky’, revealing the complex and sometimes contradictory underpinnings of victim blaming across this group as reflected by our sample.

Although participants do not go as far as explicitly indicating victims that behave in one way (stupid) have lesser claims to victimhood than others who have been “unlucky”, these distinctions still highlight that more work is needed with this group as well in terms of explaining how vulnerability and victimisation can be pervasive as cybercriminals have become very skilled and can now utilise powerful AI tools. Traditional perspectives of victim blaming are still existent, and this is potentially impacting on their willingness to report and seek help, but also to empathise and support to other victims.

Aligning with exigent literature, there are core themes emerging from the present research in terms of the factors associated with victimhood of older adults, in particular loneliness and (lack of) knowledge in terms of technology and crime types. The perception of a ‘digital divide’ is apparent from the participants’ responses and reinforces older adults’ views of a necessary dependence on others for cyber protection and risk management.

For the participants, there is the perception of an inevitable and inherent inability to protect oneself due to the physical, cognitive and social barriers experienced by older adults. Aligning with Akdemir ( 2020 ), Age UK ( 2024 ), the discussion supports an overarching narrative about digital exclusion and how this reinforces reliance on informal rather than institutional vectors of support, such as younger family members and acquaintances. These individuals are considered reliable and knowledgeable of the technical and general cybercrime and fraud issues, (with an unimpaired cognitive capacity) and more accessible compared to the organisations whose role it is to inform the public.

An associated juxtaposition was the perception that avoiding victimisation is linked to being educated or young compared to an expected decline in mental capabilities as age progresses. This distinction was also highlighted in relation to the practice of implementing safeguarding measures, remembering fraud protection information, and the lack of confidence or competence in doing so. Furthermore, this was also linked with older adults reaching out to younger family members and friends or even professionals who are presumed (as found by Akdemir 2020 ) to have the technological ‘savviness’ required to support them. This was a key theme from this research, to the extent that those that did not employ this route of knowledge acquisition were perceived to be negligent or at fault for their victimhood. What is interesting is that the importance the older adults placed on reliance, and their expectation of reliance, on younger adults to assist in cybercrime/fraud protections and provide advice on online interactions belies the reality of fraud and cybercrime victimisation rates, as such crimes are most likely to be experienced by younger, not older, generations (Havers et al. 2024a ; using CSEW data). Despite the more frequent victimisation in younger age groups (16–24), research findings into the link between age and repeat victimisation are mixed (Havers et al. 2024a ; Whitty 2019 ), while older adults may be more likely to report a higher financial loss (Bolimos and Choo 2017 ). The above perhaps highlight the need for more granular research with older adult subgroups to better understand different risk factors within this age group. In revealing older adults’ perceptions of younger family or acquaintances and peer support as effective and accurate sources of fraud/cybercrime protection to rely upon which manifest as anecdotal and word of mouth types of support, we expose the disjoint between realistic and perceived effective support networks.

The particularities of this group in terms of accessing and getting guidance and support from the above groups become even more important when we see that according to our current sample and previous research the primary organised and structured source of expert/official information about fraud and cybercrime is daytime television, with relevant programmes being perceived as useful, familiar and low-effort sources of information. This consistent finding not only reinforces the importance of these programmes, but also highlights the need for government and law enforcement to engage with such media even more actively if they want their support and advice investments to penetrate this group that still follows more traditional informational routes, such as TV, radio and physical media (Button et al. 2024 ).

Conclusions and recommendations

This research has identified a strong perception in participating older adults linking loneliness and vulnerability to fraud, highlighted knowledge gaps and misconceptions and also indicated a consistent reliance on younger members of their social circle, which can leave older adults dependent on this support, without providing opportunities for them to learn and become capable of using these techniques independently. These findings become even more important when considering that the ONS ( 2020 ) expects the numbers of people reaching old age without children to triple by 2025 (from 2019 numbers). This is an additional risk factor for fraud victimisation as there will be increasing numbers of older adults with fewer links to younger generations to rely on for advice about the internet or other digital technologies. Reliance on younger adults and family members has been seen consistently as an important aspect of older adult online safety and thus more investment should be allocated towards educating and supporting such groups interacting with older adults (Rocheleau et al. 2021 ). To help with this, peer-led digital training, where older people help each other learn, and cross-generational mentoring, where older and younger people share skills, could help build confidence and reduce dependence. Nicholson et al. ( 2021 ) also note the importance that such initiatives have the backing and support of authorities such as Universities that are considered non-commercially motivated or the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) which could increase their legitimacy with older adults and engagement overall.

Furthermore, while many older adults are aware of cybercrimes and ways they can manifest, these understandings can be limited or shaped by misconceptions despite an abundance of advice (the awareness-action gap, Tan 2008 ). The present research highlights a potential mismatch between how prevention messaging is offered and the needs, preferences, cognitive capabilities and digital realities of older adults, suggesting the need for practical, inclusive and socially responsive strategies to help protect older adults from fraud as also indicated in current literature which finds that fraud and cybercrime advice is considered not appealing, overly-complex, too jargon-filled, not immediately available, not relevant (Havers and Tripathi 2024 ; Karagiannopoulos et al. 2021 ; Frik et al. 2019 ), patronising or irritating (Havers et al. 2024b ). Failing to account for the needs of this ever-increasing category of citizens results in compounding victimisation and financial losses alongside serious psychological impact (Button et al. 2025a ). With this in mind all interested stakeholders must consider older adult perceptions and desires around the topic and decide on how guidance and support can be more tailored, fit for purpose and easier to implement for this population.

Moreover, people who regularly interact with older adults, like carers, community nurses, and postal workers, should be trained to spot the signs of cybercrime and fraud and know how to respond. Carter and Brown ( 2020 ) produced a guide for workers that have a safeguarding responsibility for those in the community, specifically in relation to fraud victimhood in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic; similar guidance could address cybercrime victimhood and vulnerabilities. Those who work in the community are well-placed to notice when someone might be at risk, or being victimised, and should be considered key in the implementation of fraud and cybercrime awareness and protective measures for older adults (Rocheleau et al. 2021 ), helping them navigate reporting mechanisms and reimbursement procedures that might be challenging to engage with effectively without support (Martin 2024 ; House of Commons 2023 ).

On a more institutional level, organisations such as government agencies or banks should involve older adults in terms of co-producing content and establishing/cybercrime context when designing their systems and fraud awareness outreach. If online safety measures assume a certain level of digital confidence and memory, which may not be realistic, this may drive individuals to modify measures to make them accessible but less effective, or abandon them completely (Carter 2021 ; Morrison et al. 2023 ); both risk undermining confidence in cybercrime/fraud protection agencies, their independence and safety. Linking the concept to practical ideas, banks and payment processing platforms should implement intelligent warnings that recognise anomalies in transactions through AI behavioural analytics or embed personalised messages and enforced pauses before major transactions (Saha and Chavan 2025 ). This would support a transition from passive awareness to targeted nudges promoting safer decision-making processes in ways and using language that feels supportive and understandable by older adults. AI tools can also be implemented more specifically to further reduce feelings of social isolation and loneliness and even provide support and guidance on security issues (through virtual companionship), but designing such applications to support and provide resilience to such crimes for older adults should be done with security in mind in order to avoid interactions that provide false information or even simply what the user wants to hear to reinforce further interaction (AI Psychosis) (Yang et al. 2025 ; Hudon and Stip 2025 ; Wei 2025 ).

Additionally, awareness campaigns should tackle victim blaming trends and focus on correcting the misperception that fraud and cybercrime only happens to people who are naive, careless or uninformed (Cross 2015 ; Nataraj-Hansen 2024 ). Sharing best practice on maximising personal protection and reducing the risk of victimhood, and the sharing of real-life stories of how people of all ages, education levels and status have become victims of fraud can help challenge established preconceptions about the characteristics of victims of fraud and cybercrime (Lin 2021 ). Insights from this paper on self-blame and shame could inform support services, reporting pathways and public communication that normalise disclosure. Focusing on the contextual and situational manipulation that these crimes often implement would help reduce shame among victims, encourage more people to take these crimes seriously, support each other and use aftercare services and would remove barriers to reporting consequently enable the true picture of fraud and cybercrime to be captured in order to shape more informed responses (Meikle and Cross 2024 ; Reynolds 2023 ).

Overall, this research adds one more piece in the complex debate of older adult cybercrime/fraud prevention and support, highlighting the interplay between digital literacy, social isolation, victimisation perceptions and reliance on specific but limited support mechanisms and exposing how the current landscape reinforces victimisation trends and false perceptions rather than meeting the nuanced needs of older adults. The discussion herein constitutes another step in a wider effort by the authors and colleagues to promote the interests of and support older adults in their cybersecurity journeys as well as influence law enforcement, private sector and government policy and practice. It is hoped that the mindset and perceptions of older adults around the topic become even clearer through this piece of work and that this refinement can also lead to policy recommendations and respective actions for better support becoming more nuanced and actionable in a constantly shifting threat and vulnerability landscape.

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