Congressional report finds fragmented U.S. response to overseas scams

Americans reported nearly $18 billion in cyberfraud losses to the FBI

A report from the Joint Economic Committee of the U.S. Congress, released Tuesday by ranking Democrats Sen. Maggie Hassan and Rep. Don Beyer, found that the U.S. government is not doing enough to address a surge in overseas cyberscams and that partnerships with the private sector remain fragmented and voluntary. The Associated Press obtained the report before its release.

The amounts cited from the FBI, the Federal Trade Commission, the U.S. Secret Service and the State Department added up to only a fraction of what victims had lost. Americans reported cyberfraud losses of nearly $18 billion to the FBI last year, more than $2 million an hour. Many victims do not report the crime.

The report also said the U.S. government lacks a unified accounting of how much money has been seized from overseas scam compounds or returned to victims. That gap persisted even as a variety of U.S. government agencies announced a quickening pace of seizures, making it difficult for scam victims to recover their losses. The report called for greater collaboration across agencies, support for victims and deeper private-sector engagement.

“Transnational criminal organizations run massive compounds that exploit U.S. technology, including AI, to carry out scams against Americans with devastating consequences,” Hassan said in an email. “The scale of this exponentially growing challenge requires Congress, the Administration, and the private sector to all strengthen their efforts.”

The FBI told the committee that it returned $336 million to scam victims in 2025. The Federal Trade Commission reported that it returned $1.83 billion to fraud victims in fiscal year 2025 but could not determine how much of that money had been lost to overseas scam compounds.

The U.S. Secret Service returned more than $770 million in seized assets to fraud victims in fiscal years 2024 and 2025, though the money came from a range of fraud schemes. The U.S. State Department said foreign law enforcement agencies receiving its support had seized proceeds “in the low hundreds of millions of dollars,” but told Congress to seek details from the Departments of Justice, Homeland Security and Treasury.

The report expressed concern that criminal scam networks continue expanding into more countries. U.S. State Department cutbacks eliminated at least one anti-scam program in Bangladesh that had trained local law enforcement to conduct cyberfraud investigations. A United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime report released last month and funded by the European Union identified Bangladesh as an emerging hub for global scam operations.

The State Department said it has 60 employees in the United States and Asia who devote significant time to fighting overseas scam compounds. The department told the committee it “has the tools it needs to combat the threat internationally.”

The report urged Congress to pass pending legislation that would mandate a unified federal strategy against scams and establish a central location where victims could report losses and seek help. The White House has also advocated greater federal coordination.

Several Justice Department officials told Congress that private-sector companies should focus more on scam prevention, but U.S. regulators and lawmakers have not created clear incentives for them to do so. Unlike the 27-nation European Union, the United Kingdom, Australia and Singapore, the United States has stopped short of holding technology, telecommunications or financial services companies potentially liable if they fail to do enough to protect consumers from scams.

Kate Griffin, a director at the Aspen Institute’s financial security program, said there had been important progress but the U.S. still lacks “durable, sustainable scam prevention.” “We don’t see that showing up yet in reduced victimization,” she said. “And that’s what really needs to happen.”

The report cited findings from a yearlong investigation into global scams by The Associated Press and FRONTLINE. The reporting forms part of an ongoing collaboration between The Associated Press and FRONTLINE that includes the documentary Scammed.