test test. test. >> that's great news to hear. ms. greisman, i'm also really pleased to hear the ftc has stepped up its efforts and you mentioned the agreement or the settlement with western union that had been made. and i am interested in whether or not that $586 million is going to end up compensating any of the victims. were you able to trace the money that had been lost, and will some of the victims be compensat compensated? >> that is precisely the goal of the settlement. the department of justice, pursuant to the two setments will be the claims administrator and it will take it upon, do their best job to try to reach out to victims and provide redress. >> that is so important because in the vast majority of these cases, once the money has been wier wired, it is gone forever. and it's difficult to trace. and that's why i really appreciated not only the settlement with western union that's going to lead to some restitution but the quick work of the inspector general's office for tax administration that really stopped a fraud in progre progress. that's the kind of cooperation we need across government. one of the things that truly frustrates me about these con artists is that they're very clever and they're always changing their tactics to stay ahead of the consume education efforts that we do and law enforcement. and i think we're all makes a difference, but the fact is that the calls to our hotline doubled last year to more than 2200. and i'm going to bring up a chart which demonstrates why scammers -- it's a little hard to read. it's a little busy there. but why they're continuously changing their strategies. let me explain it since it's a bit busy, as i said. between november 2014 and early 2016 the losses per month in the irs impersonation scam averaged approximately $1 million. it's $1 million loss per month. however, starting in the spring of 2016 the losses were month increased to 2 to $4 million. and i can see mr. camus nodding his head. and it stayed at that level through the end of last year. and what happened during that time is the scammers made a change and they're no longer using the walmart debit card as much. they've gone to the itunes card which struck me as very strange because i thought you used those to buy records. but perhaps i'm out of it. but mr. camus, i'd like you to comment on whether the change in tactics plus the relentlessness that we've heard about from mr. hatch where they call again and again and the next day with more demands, has that made scammers more successful in terms of the money they're bringing in, even if the number of victims has declined? >> yes. we noted in april, senator, april 2016 that there's a shift to the itunes card as a method of payment. they also redoubled their efforts on their autodialer program so they're able to make hundreds of thousands of telephone calls in a very short order. to your point exactly, when the scam first started it was individuals calling one on one. and then when they shifted to the auto dialer technology, they were able to blanket individuals with hundreds of thousands of calls, leaving a call back number. about the same time they shifted to the itunes card, what we learned in our investigation is that the itunes cards makes it very easy for them to flip the money. they're no longer paying middlemen to convert payments into money orders. they're now selling the itunes cards on a third party market and then pocketing the money immediately. and also it's very difficult for law enforcement to trace that transaction. >> thank you. senator casey. >> thanks very much. diane, i'm going to start with you. and not simply because you're a pennsylvanian but most especially because of your longer work. i mentioned as well in my op opening comments the acronym and i want to put the words behind the acronym. diane you've worked for a, we'll call it a couple of years. >> just a few. >> just a few. i guess i can say decades. >> it's 28 years. >> 28. for the center for advocacy for the rights and interests of the elderly. so called carie. we're grateful for that work. one question i had was how do you coordinate in your work with both state authorities, federal authorities, sometimes the most difficult challenge in any investigation is to the coordination of it. how do you do that and is there anything we should know about those issues? >> yeah, it sure is challenging sometimes. but in pennsylvania we have a network of elder abuse task forces that operate in various counties across the state. in philadelphia our task force is specifically focused on financial exploitation. we have bankers and others at the table. i think that's one of the best ways to coordinate, is to actually know these people, be able to sit around the table and talk about the problem. sometimes we do case reviews. you get to talk about how this case got played out through the system. and it helps us. last year, you know, i know that the committee had a hearing about the drug mules that were being used and one of the calls about that came in to our office about a gentleman who was from pennsylvania and jailed in japan. and we were frustrated by that because we started calling everybody we could think of and we found no help for that family. but eventual lu ly he did get o. when we were at the task force meeting we talked about that case and someone from homeland security was there and we shared, they wanted -- they gave us their card and said can you share the information about the family. and so we talked to the family and we were able to connect them with homeland security. it's that kind of collaborative work i think that is very important. because we have to know one another. and reaching out to community groups that are in the community that actually work with older adults, working with law enforcement. i mean we do this in our health care fraud program as well. it's very important we get to the oig's office, the fbi is involved, all of these other groups so we can get to the bottom of this. it's not always the same agency. so we try to work in collaboration as much as we can. >> i want to ask as well about you mentioned health care fraud. the so-called senior medicare patrol. i know you've worked very hard with that, with that patrol. we're having a big debate here about the affordable care act and this is one area where there's a very strong set of numbers that aligns with the progress that's been made over the last couple of years in combating medicare fraud. what's -- to the extent that you can give an opinion on what happens with regard to the aca, if it were to be repealed, repealed and not replaced -- i know that that's a big subject of debate. but just give us your sense of the impact of the medicare fraud patrol. >> well there's a number of issues that i think have impacted the health care fraud, you know, uncovering health care fraud but also just medicare and other provisions as well that we think are very important looking at nursing homes and a number of other issues. but one of the things that the affordable care act did and it sort f related to your last question, it allowed agencies like cms, medicaid, department of veteran affairs, social security administration and other to data share, to help them identify criminals who are defrauding. sometimes we'll get a call -- we had a lady in philadelphia who was a podiatrist and the went into chinatown. she was part of that community. and she started basically getting people's medicare numbers and billing. turned out she was billing hundreds of thousands of dollars and it actually was in the millions. at one point she was vacationing in paris when those bills were submitted. it's really important, you know, because we had a couple of complaints from the beneficiaries and that's probably not going to rise to the level of a major investigation. but once you start looking at the data you can see what's happening. and so that is extremly critical. it's important to see because these criminals are going across programs. they're similar to the other scammers. they're setting up business where it's opportunistic business. the affordable care act created a medicare fraud strike force. i think that cost 350 dollars and so far it's rofrecovered mo than $10 billion dollars. there's economic advantage to doing the work. when they find the scammers, a lot of them are very large scale. the one i talked about was probably small compared to the large scale. i know in florida, for instance, there were these groups, these store fronts set up to basically pay medicare beneficiaries for their medicare numbers. so it made the beneficiaries complicit in the fraud. they certainly didn't understand what was happening. they were getting $10 or $20 or something like that. but they didn't understand what was going on. so we really need to continue to do this work to make sure that we're combating this stuff. and it just sometimes to us, when we're getting the complaints, it seems all too easy and sometimes the solution seems easy too. so we really need to make sure that we're looking at how to make these systems work. and i think the more what was provided for in the affordable care act has created some results and we need to continue doing that. >> i appreciate that. i'm out of time but we'll come back. thanks. >> thank you. senator rubio. >> thank you, madam chair. i want to continue to build on what you just mentioned about the store fronts. it's a topic a lot of people aren't aware of. what we have in florida, south florida in particular is an outrageous case of medicare fraud. i say this to you with a cuban american with deep regret and shame about this reality. we have 50 to 100 individuals mostly recent arrivals from cuba who arrive in the united states, somehow set up a medicare company, usually a stort front, often a p.o. box. they then acquire a medicare numbers from somebody who works at a hospital and they begin to build those medicare numbers for no services provide. to the tunes of hundreds of thousands of dollars. i've been told by law enforcement in south florida that if they don't get greedy and are willing to steel 200 to $300,000 a month, they're probably not going to get caught. they're stealing to the tune of millions 0 dollars. the list of the top most wanted medicare fraudsteres in america are almost entirely from south florida and when we're about to arrest them, they know we're coming, they leave to coo ba for millions of dollars. it's an outrage. people may think that seniors aren't victims. they are victims. it's helping to exacerbate the troubles of made care and if many cases seniors are being told, there's nothing wrong with it, it's legal, sit down for an interview, give us your medicare number and they get wrapped up in it. when i tell people this they don't believe -- this is organized crime. it's organized crime and they're brazen about it and they laugh about it. my mother is a senior and this is why i want to ask you this question. she has been the target in the past. i just recalled this as we were having a conversation. she suffered a stroke in 201 is, largely home ridden except she goes to therapy. she gets calls about taxes she owes. i know enough about my mom to know she's not made a lot of money ever. she relies exclusively on social security and small savings. so we get the number. even thee i am in this position of public service, first of all, i didn't know who to call about it at the time. number two, it's caller id so there's nothing i can do about it. but even if i had been able to lure them into an extensive conversation, i'm not shuure if should have gone to local government, the fbi, a little confusion about what to take it to. the second is her caregiver. she has people that come during the day and watch her sometimes, making sure she's taking her meds. we have to educate them as well. and the third is the language barrier. my mother speaks english but her first language was spanish. that's where she watches the soap operas every night. she watches them on the spanish language networks. a lot of people are being targeted because of the language barrier. in all of this is embedded the fom lo following questions. what can we do to better educate the caregivers. like, do we recommend that they actually talk to these people, enganl them and play detective or hang up and don't deal with them. and the third is what can we do to make sure that communities, enclaves of seniors who are getting the majority of their news and information in a second language like spanish that we're doing enough to inform them about these scams and things that are occurring? >> i think the public education is critical. i do think that another issue you might be interested in the future is looking at why people become subject to scams. and you know, we talked about people with dementia. but there's an issue around financial capacity at which someone may be able to function very well in their life but their ability to manage finances goes down. and one of the reasons older adults are targeted so often is they're the ones that are at home and answer the phone. they might be lonely. these guys, not only do they come up with the latest best scams, but they also know how to engage people and become their friends. it's -- i say that because it's very challenging, even when they're doing the education to get people to pull back from this. when you talk about the caregivers, the caregivers certainly should be educated about this as well. because they're on the front lines and they will see this happening. i will, though, caution, that sometimes we do see caregivers being the exploiters as well. it's really important for families to be vigilant about this. we certainly also deal with people with limited english as well. one time we did a presentation in chinatown and i think it was simultaneously translated into about eight different languages so that people could get that information. so we try to do as much as we can to reach people. and to also train gate keepers in those communities so that they're -- you know, if it is a spanish speaking community, we can train people in that community to take that message to individuals, those people who are going into the home for for instance, who are work in the housing sites. we have housing coordinators who are working with people individually. we've had scam -- we had a scam by somebody telling them they were the cable company. it happened in housing, senior housing throughout the city. and we were able to, through that -- one of them was at a housing site where most of the people speak spanish. that's where we were able to tackle the problem. >> i know i'm out of touchdown. just a suggestion. we may want to talk to the two primary spanish networks about public service networks. they have that as part of their fcc licensing especially for the programming geared toward the elderly. >> we have been able to get these on our local stations. >> as you were talking i was thinking that we should get this post card translated into spanish as well. so that -- >> you want me to do it? i'll do it. i can translate. i even know how to do the accents. >> i have no doubt of that. we can -- >> we'll call you suzanna. >> and i love the idea of including it with meals on wheels because they would reach a lot of home bound seniors. so that's something we can look at also. senator gillibrand. >> thank you, madam chairwoman and thank you mr. ranking member. this is such a vital hearing. you know, i've traveled around new york state asking community centers and senior centers, you know, have you been affected and overwhelmingly almost every hand in the room is raised because someone has gotten the irs scam, someone has gotten the grandparent scam, somebody has gotten the sweepstakes scam. it's heartbreaking. some of these seniors have lost tens of thousands of dollars and there's no protection for them. i have three sets of questions. first, what should we do as the senate committee to -- all of you said yes, there must be public education. how must there be public education. what legislation do we write about how to educate all seniors apt this scam. ho do we reach all seniors in this country. number two, every one of these scams has public participation on some level. the cva counter that sells the itunes card, the target that sells the itunes card, the credit union, the bank. thank goodness one new york woman, she went to her bank to take out $5,000 to pay the irs scam and someone sitting outside waiting for her to bring the money. and the teller so smartly says, ma'am, you look so nervous. are you okay. and she's like no, aye got the irs on the phone and i have to give them the money right now. the woman was smart enough to say give me the phone, hung it up, said the irs will never call you. should we not be having conversations directly with any place you can purchase an itunes card. shouldn't there be a notice on every cash register if someone guys an itunes card please confirm it's for news music or a video game, it's not go give to the irs. why aren't we posting at every vendor that sells itunes, every bank and teller should be trained on this. i don't think we're doing enough to prevent the horrible crimes from happening. these are significant criminal networks. i've heard some are run by the russian mob for god's sake. we if we knew massive criminal networks were targeting our seniors and families, i would think we're doing much more than we should be doing. we're not taking this as serious as we should. these seniors are being duped. the money is gone. if we had a huge cartel bringing drugs in the country, we'd have federal action. we'd be sending money to address it. we're not doing that. the degree of the scam is bigger than we've disclosed. we only have what's been reported. but we know that 40% isn't reported because it's so embarra embarrassing. this happened to my aunt, she got the irs scam, she sent the money, she never told me mother who does all of her finances. she was so embarrassed. so from each of you i would like to know what you recommend to us to prevent this, from warning various parties that have involved in these scams unwittingly, the people who sells the itunes cards, the banks. i had a senior who took out an advance. the bank is charging her interest because she can't pay the money back because it's gone. no relief in her bank. this is a problem. so from each of you, direct recommendations for us. >> thank you so much, senator. you're on target with what we're trying to do. we agree that once the money is gone it's gone, as the senator pointed out. public education is the number one way to combat this. criminals will continue to go for the vulnerable, in this casein your citizens, as long as they get money. >> specifically what kind of public education and what form. >> we spend the special agents out and look forward to invites from town hall meetings. we think we can penetrate into that segment by actually participating with members of congress at various town hall events and we would be proud to have a special agent come and speak to this issue. that's one idea that i have. as far as the vendors, we're work og an project with walmart to do exact as you described, post placards and train their cashiers that when somebody comes through with a handful of itunes cards, that there's some sort of dialogue that goes on prior to the purchase being consummated. there's a scam going on. are yes aware of the scam. have you been told that the itunes scams are for taxes. if you have, it's a scam. when the individuals go on the money gram key yochks at the cvs, one of the warnings that pops up, if you've been told to pay your taxes with a money gram within you're being scammed. please stop the transaction. we have to leverage the retailers and get them to cooperate. in some cases we have. a recent shift is that walmart was being used as the retailer and now our data is telling us within just this past month it's now being shifted to target. just yesterday i had one of my executives reach out to target and we're going to insist that target work with us the same way walmart did. for us as a small law enforcement agency, we think that every person we protect is a victory. that's how we view this. it's no just a law enforcement aspect. it's every single person that doesn't become a victim is a victory. but how do we collectively tcom together to make a bigger impact. certainly working with the ftc is something we've really enjoyed doing but there's still more to be done. i want to give you the assurance that we're doing a lot behind the scenes. >> thank you, i appreciate the opportunity to address the points you raise. it's very serious and i don't want to have you think in any way that this is not a top priority for the federal trade commission. i would urge each of you if you don't use our pass it on materials, these are tested. this is, we think, a very effective way to reach seniors where they are and to provide them with the tools that they need so they're the ones positioned to assist friends and family members not to be victimized. there's a specific piece on irs imposter scam. the intermediaries. one, we sue them. that's what the settlement with western union is about. we had a settlement years before with money gram through amendments to the sales role. we made wire transfers in connection with telemarketing and prohibited other types of reloadable cards being used. law enforcement is front and center in terms of the intermediaries. we also, as deputy inspector camus referred, we have lots of conversations with apple, with walmart, with trade association for relevant industry members. the western union settlement imposes specific requirements to make it more likely that the company will intercept and prevent the transfer of money. as we've all discussed, once it's gone, it's gone. that's why the scammers are using those types of payment sbu instruments. that's where we'll work to get better tools in place to identify where the bad actors are and how the transfers are going forward. thank you. >> i can't agree more with what you said. but i do want to put a plug in for the senior safe act, which is one thing that you can do. and this is -- one of the biggest problems we've had with financial institutions is making these reports. in my written testimony you'll see a story about a lady who was bilked out of $800,000. that was basically everything she had. she was in her 80s and she thought she was winning the lottery. so she kept paying money and didn't tell her family until it was way too late. i think it was finally she anher husband had invested their money with an investment firm for all of their adult life and her husband had died. that was their money in the bank. and no one made a report. and eventually the money got transferred to another bank and she continued to buy the walmart cards and everything to pay this thing. and finally that second bank made a report but that as after $800,000 was lost. so we need to do something to make them feel better. i mean, you know, we keep pulling out the act saying you can do that, you're covered. but they still are not doing it. and sometimes i can tell you what happens in some of the cases that work out well is it's the teller who is making the report. they're not necessarily authorized by the guys at the top but it's the ellteller comi in seeing all of the withdrawals taken. that gets to your point of training the people who see it happening. the people who are at the tellers at the bank, although we have fewer and fewer of those these days and the people at the stores. the other thing is that we need to encourage age friendly services in those institutions. we need to have fraud technology. there's a lot of technology out there these days. i remember sitting in a meeting with the bankers saying if i'm out of town and i use my credit card, like i was somewhere in chicago, i think, and suddenly my card got shut off. well, you know, it was legitimate charges but they shut off my card because they were monitoring it. i said why can't you do that for some of these cases and they're very shy about doing that. they won't do it. but those technologies need to be used for this. and the age friendly services are also important to make sure that they have protections like encouraging them to plan for incapacity, offering age friendly features, having someone who has access to your account, maybe they can't take money out but the daughter can monitor online to make sure nothing is going wrong. so all of those kinds of things i think can be done. i hope that we can do more the combat this. and we need to -- you know, when you talk about education, sometimes it really is just as easy as putting up a sign at the cash register so the person managing the cash register seeing someone buying, someone who's 82 years old buying all of these itunes cards. that's a flag. i can't imagine why you wouldn't report that. we need to do exactly what you're saying. >> thank you. senator cortez masto. >> thank you. very excited to be a member of this committee. thank you very much. thank you to all of you for what you do. i was fortunate to be able to work with the ftc as the attorney general of nevada and had great partnership. and many of you, we have worked with on so many different levels. this area was important for me as attorney general. that's why i created a unit in my office to address elder abuse neglect and exploitation. every single one of the scams that you identified here happens in nevada. i want to talk about the public education. to me this is the first step in prevention and it's so hard to do. it really is. many of us are trying to do the outreach and get out to talk to folks but it has to be on a constant basis. you can't say i'm throwing this out there, we'll do it overnight and that's done. the education occurs all of the time. i have been -- i always say this just about to every senior center in nevada to reach out to the seniors. but it's reaching out to caregivers, family and service providers. for my purposes, and this is what i'm going to ask with your help, i have put on conferences in the state of nevada, bringing people in for the training, the public education. bringing the experts in to talk about how we educate, train and get the information out. that's what i would love your help in nevada to continue down that road. the next one is challenging for me when it comes to law enforcement. and this is a question i have for our law enforcement folks. giving the aging population, in nevada it is growing, but also we're constantly evolving with technology and technological scams. what additional resources or innovations does law enforcement need to keep up with the financial threats posed to seniors now. when you talk about it, talk also about how to examine the money transfer systems which make it much easier for some of these criminal element to engage and scam or seniors. >> just a couple of ideas. thank you, senator. and we look forward to working with you in nevada. one of the ideas you could come up with, there's a 72-hour right of rescission on large transactions. maybe it could be consider that on any wire transaction, instead of it being rapid and instantaneous, there's a 72-right of rescission. many of the victims realized it but a little bit too late. by the time they realized of talked to a family member about being scammed the money was gone and no way to get it back. if we can get that frozen for a period of time to allow recogniti recognition, family discussion or law enforcement to intercede, we might be able to save people a lot of money and save their live actually. as far as some of the other ideas, the challenge for law enforcement is the money moves so quickly and the ability to convince somebody to put their federal income tax payment on an itunes card, that is really difficult. as i said in amy testimony, we estimate through media on our own, a small agency, we believe we had 113 million views and it's constant with us. we had apple agree to fund a pilot program where over the air in cvs stores and other stores, the message over the air as they were shopping were, do not pay apple itunes card to pay public debt. do not pay apple itunes card to pay government. we think that worked but it was very expensive. that project cost apple $140,000 to fund that. if we can get that cooperation, funds set up where the retailers and companies are required to put aside money to educate and continue usually educateducate. it's so difficult to penetrate. i am astounded by how difficult it is. i cake calls myself at my desk. just this morning i took a call from a victim and they had no idea that there was an impersonation scam. it perplexes me. what are other things that we can do to reach that. >> that's why it's constant. the education has to be constant. because people are not really listening. and let me just say one thing as well. and i found this in nevada. part of it, too, is when they become victims and we've heard it here, but they're embarrassed to come guarforward. we have to give them a venue to be able to say it did happen, it's all right. it's happening across this country. to make sure that they're willing to come out and educate themselves and others about this type of scam. >> thank you, senator. and we've enjoyed the cooperative relationship with your former office as well. you mentioned how do we get out into the community. well we've held some 33 common ground conferences throughout the country. one was in vegas with the help of your former office. working with grass root members, legal service providers, attorney general's office, local law enforcement and the discussions vary nationwide. but a lot of focus is on issues 0 affecting seniors in the community. and we learned from those conferences, we push out our consumer education materials. we will continue to do more on that front. money transfer services, well, i'd like to sit here and be cautiously optimistic that the near half billion dollar settlement with western union will squeeze some of the fraud out of that system. and i think it will. it's ordered with very rigorous requirements that if they ad here to them should make a difference. we're squeezing money out of that system then it's going to find another path of less resistance to move to. there's no silver bullet in this. education has to compliment law enforcement and that's what we're committed to doing. we certainly look forward to working with each and every one of you to build upon what we've been doing. thank you. >> thank you. and let me just add one final thing, diane, the senior medicare patrol unit was in my office. it is instrumental. i will always continue to support it. i can't tell you how many seniors not only were excited to be a part of it but we were able to uncover fraud. i can't say enough about the journals, the diaries, health care diaries and journals we would hand out to individuals. it matters. they pay attention when you talk about it. and when you have their peers talking to them about how to address medicare fraud and m medicaid fraud, it made a difference. i'll continue to support programs and advocacy. thank you for what you do. >> thank you, senator. senator flake. >> thank you. madam chair, thank you. sorry if i'm plowing old ground here. but could you tell me what innovative programs are already out there that the states have come up with for addressing these senior scams? anybody who wants to start there. >> as far as the states are concerned? >> yes. >> we work with multiple states and we work with law enforcement agencies local and federal partners. i'm not uniquely aware that any of the states that we're working with have come up with inveigh tiff approaches but i'm probably not to one that's best suited to answer that. >> many states have wonderful robust programs addressing fraud targets seniors. many have offices that directly focus on that and to the extent possible we work closely with them. i mentioned earlier our pass it on materials. we freely distribute those to the state. we urge everyone to put their own name on it. we have no copyright interest in it. we just want to pass on the materials to be used. >> can i just add that one of the tools that we have at the state level is the older adult protective services office which often gets the first report on these cases. and i want to say that one of our recommendations is to make sure that those programs are strong enough to do what they need to do. one of the things that they often lack is forensic accountants, for instance, to be able to take on a case and figure out what's happening. so we need more resources in that program. and at the same time we're aware that the social services block grant funding is under -- you know, is under question at this point. and that's the money that often supports those programs at the state level. we need to -- while we need to enhance the funding for the programs, we need to at least maintain the funding for the programs because they're the front line. when senator rubio asked to who report to, i didn't answer his question but what i meant to say was just report it. it doesn't matter. when you report it to one place it will get to the right place eventually. that's what protective services does, it's the first line and it's very helpful to get that person into the system. >> thank you, ms. menio. you mentioned in your testimony that a beneficiary called to thank you for the timely scam wire alert she received in her home, delivered a package shortly thereafter. are there any reoccurring services that seniors use when companies -- where companies can include the fraud alerts so they can be delivered more -- >> yes. we also distribute those to public libraries, senior houses, we distribute them to a large number of places, grocery stores, places with people gather, older people do business. and the home-delivered meals project that we do is really focused on people we won't reach by going to a library or a senior center or those kinds of places. it's the people who are home bound and don't get out and wouldn't get the message otherwise. we're trying to do that through many different public venues. >> thank you, madam chair. >> thank you, senator flake. before you were here ms. menio mentioned the senior safe act which you were cosponsor of in the last congress and which we've reintroduced senator casey as a cosponsor. just yesterday aarp as endorsed that bill, along with -- we have endorsements from legal services for the elderly, the national american securities administrators association, the conference on state bank supervisors, the national association of insurance commissioners. and a wide variety of regulatory groups. and that is one concrete action we could take in this congress that would really make a difference in empowering the fro fron front-tellers, the witnesses we're describing, who can make a real difference in stopping fraud right up front. so i'm going to ask unanimous consent that all of those endorsement letters be entered into the record. senator warren. >> thank you very much, madam chairman. thank you very much for holding this hearing, you and the ranking member. and i want to follow up. i think your point about how to better empower people on the front lines is really important. i want to look at another aspect of that. as we know, the conartists who perpetuate irs impersonation scams, identity theft and other forms often target seniors. when the senior needs to report that they were the victim of fraud, it is frequently the men and woman who work in our government enforcement and consumer protection agencies in washington and in all 50 states who are on the front lines taking their calls and investigating their cases. so it seems pretty obvious to me that one easy way to protect america's seniors from fraud is to strengthen that workforce. but instead of staffing up the workforce that cracks down on scammers and fraudsteres that hurt our seniors, on his first full day in the oval office president trump issued an executive order freezing federal hiring and starving our enforcement agencies of their most important resource, american workers. so mr. camus, you're deputy inspector general for the investigations at the treasury inspector general for tax administration. your job is to protect seniors against scammers who pretend that the irs is calling. and trying to collect back taxes. almost 2 million people have reported this scam to your office and these scams have cost americans more than $54 million. it's a lot of money. does a hiring freeze help you achieve your goal of protecting seniors from fraud? >> as you point out, senator, these are -- it's a huge issue and every one of these victims is a significant challenge on our resources. so naturally, i've been told i'm not allowed to pander for resources at these events. >> we'll let you know if you've crossed the line into pandering here. >> i'm proud and an efficient agency. but certainly this has stretched the agency very thin. we're seeking the exemption in the president's order to, under a public safety cloause, at leat for the social agent portion of our workforce. >> according to testimony from your office, back in 2016, quote, reduced staffing has affected the irs's ability to deliver its priority program areas, including customer service and enforcement. given that your enforcement team is already understaffed, i worry that this kind of hiring freeze is music to criminals' ears. now mr. camus, you also work with the department of justice to help protect seniors from criminals who are trying to defraud them. will the hiring freeze help you with the doj? >> again, you know, it's -- we're only limited, all of us are only limited by how much resource we have. we're all very passionate about protecting all americans but most especially the most vulnerable. it's a challenge. resources are a challenge on a good day. any disruption in that is certainly a cause for concern. i'm not sure whether the internal revenue service or the department of justice have a exemptions able to them under the order. >> if they don't? >> i can't comment. >> i want to point out. we've seen this movie before. a 201 is hiring freeze at the social security administration eliminated 15% of the agency's workforce and closed 64 field offices. mr. m mismenio, you're the executive director for the rights of the elderly in philadelphia. can you explain how the 201 is social security personnel freeze affected the seniors that your center works with every day? >> well, certainly it takes a lot longer to make an appointment. >> increased wait times. >> i can tell you that we're -- you know, interestingly, the social security -- i'm in downtown philadelphia and the social security office is in our building. they have the top floor. and the way that it works is no one goes upstairs until the guard lets them go upstairs. so they get the message you can send more people up. and that line gets quite long and people are standing there with their walkers and with their canes waiting to go upstairs. so that's something i see every day. i can also tell you that my staff spends a lot of time when they're helping consumers doing three-way calls because we like to empower people and work with them. but sometimes it's difficult for them to make the call on their own. we'll sit with them. they tell me it's 30 minutes to an hour sometimes they're waiting for that call to get through. we had a client who called her recently from the western part of the state who, her husband died and she was collecting -- she wanted to switch her social security so she could collect on his account, i believe something like that. and what happened was -- you know, i think this is illustrative of the short staffing. she got lost in the system. she didn't get a check at all for three months and that meant her medicare part b wasn't being paid. she didn't even have her health care during that time. eventually we were able to get that back. nevertheless it was a stressful time for her. probably took more man hours from the social security office to fix this than it would have taken to help her in the first place. those are some of the kinds of things we're seeing. i also know that the senate on budget and policy priorities put out a report and they said that less than 1% of their operating -- of their expenses are spent on overhead. i can't run my agency on less than 1 -- i wish i could, to be honest with you, but i can't. and so that just isn't realistic. how can you continue to provide the level of services to this aging population, to many of us who are ready to, you know, go into the social security system and to medicare. we need to be able to get that information as quickly as we can and work with people without going through a lot of red tape and spending hours on the phone and in offices. >> and i appreciate that. you know, i just want to add a couple of statistics if i can and then i'll quit. thank you, madam chair. appeals times go up. the appeals time go up. almost 20,000 people died waiting for a disability eligibility decision in fy-2016. with all of these negative consequences you would at least hope that these freezes save money. but what the data actually show is that they don't save money. we have a workforce that is more stressed, more inefficient, you spend more time trying to fix the problems that are broken because you didn't solve it early on. i just want to say i appreciate the work you're doing and i hope that we can give you better support to do it. thank you. thank you, madam chair. >> thank you. senator tillis. >> thank you, madam chair. and thank you all for coming before the committee. and at least in one case returning to the committee. i've got a more general question. you know, this committee is intended to provide insights into the senior accuse caregiver programs, those sorts of things over the course of the last two years that i was on it. and then we've had discussions about legislative proposals here at the federal level and we've talked about potential best practices down in the states. but it doesn't seem to me we've made much progress. so could you give me, in any of your opinions in the capacity before the committee, examples of where i should be kinder in my assessment? what kind of progress are we making at the state or federal level that is moving the ball in the right direction. mr. camus, i want to start with you. >> one i've been working with staff here. as we investigate crimes we learn, we learn how they're doing it, how they're shifting. as senator colins pointed out, the criminals are watching every single thing we do all over the world and they're adapting to what we do. it's literally a cat and mouse game and they will continue to victimize our most vulnerable citizens because they can get money. so, any ideas that we have, we're happy to meet with staff and talk about this is how the crime happened. so, legislatively, what are the areas that can be explored? one of the things we're excited about through the ftc's help is we started working with the federal communications system. and what we learned is that they have task forces through the consortium working on technology to block robo calls that are coming in. >> not political ones, right? no, i'm kidding. >> in the robo call area, in a pilot, they were able to block about 2 million spoofed calls that were coming in, that could have hit the seniors. how many people would have been victimized by those calls. and the other area we're excited about the technology is there's a trace back task force as well. and what that will allow us to do is when bad guys are coming in offshore, quickly determine where that call came from and work with our partners to get them eliminated or taken out of service. >> how do we get to a point where we're scaling some of those things to where we're going from kind of a good proof of concept to a pervasive capability that clearly something like that could have a significant effect on a lot of the nets that are being cast and then capturing seniors and taking advantage of them? i think that's more of a -- we'll go down and get an assessment as to why i should feel better about things that we can scale but give me your read down the panel. >> thank you, senator. appreciate the opportunity to be here, again. aggressive continued law enforcement is ongoing. and it is making a dent. it may not be a sustained dent, but that's not a reason not to do it. i'll point again to the recent western union settlement, $586 million with significant injuncturive relief, requiring the company to change how it does business in terms of fraud protect -- prevention. the recent crackdown with doj on entities in the u.s. sbiand ind targeting the u.s. those make a difference. we need to figure out how to sustain them and implement them on a more permanent basis. mr. camus just referred to some of the work going on with robo calls. we've been at this for years. and what has happened as a result of it is that new technologies have been developed. they are in the marketplace. one of the first ones was a result of an ftc challenge back in 2012. these are technologies that work and then there's a great more cooperation and coordination among industry and government to bring these technologies to the forefront and also to develop -- though it's not going to happen overnight, caller i.d. authentication. that will provide a significant tool, technological change. so i think there's good reason to be optimistic. >> well, i wish i had some of their answers for you. but we're not on that scale. but i think on a very large scale, in a sense, are senior medicare patrol is a good example of this work. and it's in every state in this country. and i can tell you right now we're working -- we had some consumers, some beneficiaries call us about something that we think is a scam -- not totally -- we're not sure yet and i'm not going to say what it is because it's being investigated right now. but what we were able to do is get on the phone with people from your state and from, i believe -- i think -- i'm not sure if it's maine or not, but one of the new england states. a number of states with our colleagues who are doing the same work we're doing. and we were finding out that the same scam is -- or the same situation is happening in each of those places. which made it a lot easier for us to go to the inspector general with this. so, it's being investigated now. we think it might be a very large scale issue. that's the way -- but, again, it gets back to that working in collaboration with other people is so important because we get two calls. we'll say, well, maybe it's a problem. maybe it's not. it sounded fishy so we wanted to look into it further. with those two calls, nothing was going to happen when we called the oig. once we get our colleagues from other states identifying these problems as well, then that makes a case. and i think something can happen to protect people in the future through that situation. so -- >> well, thank you. and madam chair, i know that the chair has put together great proposals for programs instead of working their way through congress and authorizing maybe additional initiatives that will be helpful but it also points to why we have to get to regular order of appropriations process so that we then have the financial resources behind these programs to scale and get them implemented. so we can come back and start measuring what i think are the results that can come about. a lot of great ideas. a lot of great pilots. a lot of great proofs of concept. a lot of great law enforcement actions that we just got to scale. and we also, if i had more time -- i'm way over now. at the end of the day, most of what we're talking about here are the cure. we've got to work on the prevention side, which means we have to continue to focus on education, destigmitizing. so that very early in the cycle of abuse, you prevent that from ever happening. thank you. >> thank you very much, senator. i certainly agree with your comments about the appropriations process. i would indicate that compared to the very first hearing that we held on scams, we have come a long, long ways. and law enforcement has stepped up to the plate, has started aggregating these scams rather than dismissing them because they're only $2,000 here or $3,000 here. and when gao came out with 2.9 billion annually, i really think it helped. and our hearings helped raise the awareness of the public and the need for aggressive enforcement, the cases that were described earlier today. so, i'm actually encouraged that we're making progress. but these criminals are relentless and will continue. >> me, too, madam chair. i'm just mad at the people that do this and i want them to suffer badly as a result of it, as quickly as possible. >> well, there's nothing like putting people in jail, to be a good deterrent. that's for sure. senator blumenthal? >> thank you, madam chairwoman. and thank you for having this hearing. and your very persistent drive to enforce our laws and like our colleague from nevada, i was state attorney general for some years. in fact, 20 years. we established a unit quite a while ago to focus on elder abuse and criminal activity that victimizes them. and i agree as well that education is among the best preventive steps. an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. recovering money after the fact is very difficult but it is possible. and educating the bad guys is important, at least as important as educating the good guys. educating them through deterrence, the chair is absolutely right, that prison time teaches a very valuable lesson. so with that in mind, i introduce the bill called the robert montava criminal victim abuse prevention and restitution act. it became with bipartisan support the elder abuse prevention and prosecution act, which was approved by the judiciary committee. in fact, it's bipartisan. senator grassley and i together led it. and it would improve the current law in a number of ways. it's now out of committee. it's on the house floor. we can approve it. if we got bipartisan support there and if our distinguished leadership there puts it on the floor, i'm sure it will be approved near unanimously. it will expand data collection, information sharing to better prevent and respond to elder abuse and exploitation. it would increase training, sharing among agencies and it would increase penalties for perpetrators of these crimes. so, the anger that my colleagues feel could be channeled very positively, effectively against those bad guys bypassing this measure, including mandatory forfeiture, to deter future offense. everybody knows what drives these crimes is money. if you require mandatory forfeiture, it hits them where they live. and mandatory forfeiture, in fact, will enable more restitution so that we prevent, by deterring, but we also make people whole, or at least work to make them whole. to any of you who would like to answer, do you believe that mandatory forfeiture, restitution will be effective in deterring future criminal activity? that's the softest ball that anybody has thrown to you in quite a while. >> as a current law enforcement man, yes. we work really hard and we dedicate resources to investigate these. and there's nothing like at the end of the day when my agents can go to court and the perpetrator especially picking on our vulnerable citizens gets a significant sentence. so the more that we can punish them and the more that we can rapidly recover any monies that are available, in many cases, there may or may not be assets available, the better for us. so, we wholeheartedly agree with increased deterrence through increased penalties. >> senator, it's a delightful softball. we're civil law enforcement agency so i cannot speak to it. i have to defer to my criminal colleagues. anything that ramps up deterrence and helps us on the civil side would be greatly appreciated. >> thank you. >> and i would just like to add one of the reasons that elderly are targeted often times the perpetrators feel they're not going -- i'm talking more about that homespun type of financial exploitation that happens. they think they're going to get away with it, because they do. one of the things we're advocating for in pennsylvania is enhanced sentencing for people who commit crimes against the elderly. and so i think it's very, very important. because the other issue that we have, often, with crimes against the elderly is that if someone does have dementia, often times we're finding the police aren't arresting because that person isn't a good witness in court, they're not a good reporter. so, we've got to get past that as well. and i can tell you of some horrendous crimes that are committed against people without capacity. and we've got to come up with a system to make sure there's a reason for people not to do this, that they're going to be a little afraid of taking advantage of the elderly. thank you for that. >> thank you all for your support. and thank you for your great work. thank you, madam chair. >> thank you. i want to thank all of our witnesses today for your very important contributions, whether it's law enforcement or education or civil actions against those who would rip up some of the most vulnerable citizens in our country, our nation's seniors. as we've heard today and as our committee's new program makes clear, criminals are relentless in their pursuit to swindle seniors out of their hard-earned savings. we see infinite varieties of these scams. once one is closed down, another pops up. i, too, have had those phone calls on my home answering machine in bangor, maine. i called the ag's office up immediately. i was so excited. i thought i could help entrap one of these criminals. and it turned out that the numbers expire after three days. so, that by the time i got home for the weekend, the numbers were no good. so i was so crushed, because i thought i could help bring these people to justice, which is exactly what is the commitment of each and every one of us here. while much remains to be done, i'm proud that this committee has been just as relentless as the criminals in fighting back against this fraud. and the important work that all of you are doing really contributes to our efforts. i look forward to continuing to work with our ranking members and with our returning and new members of the committee as we continue this fight in the new congress. committee members will have until friday, february 24th, to submit questions for the record. as a reminder, at the risk of sounding like one of those late-night infomercials, the committee's toll free fraud number is 1-855-303-9470. 1-855-303-9470. and the reason i mention that is those 2300 calls we got last year enabled us to identify new scams so that we could warn people and come up with tips for avoiding people becoming victims. so, we have distributed so many copies of our fraud book and our postcard. and we're going to continue those educational and prevention efforts as well. i would call on our ranking member. do you have any concluding remarks that you would like to make, senator casey? >> thank you, madam chair. 1-855-303-9470. thank you for your message, very much. >> thank you. this concludes our hearing. it is now adjourned. the conservative political action conference kicked off this morning just outside washington, d.c. at 1:50 eastern on our companion network, c-span will have education secretary betsy devos speaking at the event, followed by white house chief of staff reince priebus and chief strategist steve bannon. and then at 7:00 pm eastern this evening, vice president mike pence will address cpac also live on c-span. watch c-span as president donald trump delivers his first address to a joint session of congress. >> this congress is going to be the busiest congress we've had in decades. >> live, tuesday, 9:00 pm eastern on c-span and c-span.org. and listen live on the free c-span radio app. the house commerce subcommittee on digital commerce and consumer protection recently held a hearing on self-driving cars. auto executives testified about their work on self-driving cars, testing the cars themselves and safety of government regulation. 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