{"id":237763,"date":"2026-04-06T22:05:20","date_gmt":"2026-04-06T22:05:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/237763\/"},"modified":"2026-04-06T22:05:20","modified_gmt":"2026-04-06T22:05:20","slug":"texas-among-top-u-s-states-in-victims-of-cyber-scams-fbi-study-finds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/237763\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas among top U.S. states in victims of cyber scams, FBI study finds"},"content":{"rendered":"

HOUSTON \u2013 Americans lost nearly $21 billion to cyber-enabled crimes<\/a> in 2025, with cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence-related scams among the costliest, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation\u2019s latest Internet Crime Report.<\/p>\n

The FBI\u2019s Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) received 1,008,597 complaints, up from 859,532 in 2024. <\/p>\n

The states reporting the most victims and financial losses were:<\/p>\n

California \u2013 $3.6 billion <\/p>\n

Texas \u2013 $1.8 billion <\/p>\n

Florida \u2013 $1.6 billion <\/p>\n

The most common complaints included phishing and spoofing, extortion, and investment fraud, with older Americans hit especially hard. <\/p>\n

Individuals over 60 reported $7.7 billion in losses, a 37% increase from the previous year.<\/p>\n

Cyber-enabled fraud remains a major driver of losses, with 453,000 complaints totaling $17.7 billion, nearly half of which stemmed from investment scams. <\/p>\n

Cryptocurrency fraud accounted for 181,565 complaints and more than $11 billion in losses, the highest reported for any category.<\/p>\n

ALSO READ: 12 ways you can save money at the pump as 2026 gas prices climb<\/a><\/p>\n

Scammers are increasingly exploiting new technologies, including artificial intelligence. <\/p>\n

For the first time, the IC3 report includes an AI-focused section, detailing 22,364 complaints that resulted in nearly $893 million in losses. <\/p>\n

Fraudsters employ high-pressure tactics alongside AI-generated tools, including fake social media profiles, voice clones, forged identification, and realistic videos of public figures or family members to manipulate victims.<\/p>\n

To combat cryptocurrency scams, the FBI launched Operation Level Up in 2024, a proactive initiative that identifies and notifies potential victims. The program has alerted over 8,000 people and helped reduce losses by more than $500 million. <\/p>\n

In 2026, the FBI introduced Operation Winter SHIELD, providing actionable steps organizations can take to strengthen cybersecurity defenses.<\/p>\n

The FBI warns Americans to remain vigilant, carefully vet investment opportunities, and implement strong digital security practices to protect personal information.<\/p>\n

Copyright 2026 by KPRC Click2Houston – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HOUSTON \u2013 Americans lost nearly $21 billion to cyber-enabled crimes in 2025, with cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence-related scams…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":237764,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[4267,294,91391,3646,17688,8374,56,66,223,5793,27,29,28],"class_list":["post-237763","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-ai","tag-crime","tag-cyber-crime","tag-fbi","tag-fbi-houston","tag-fraud","tag-houston","tag-local","tag-news","tag-scam","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237763","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=237763"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/237763\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/237764"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=237763"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=237763"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=237763"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}