The Federal Trade Commission publishes a lot of fraud material, and most of it sits a few clicks apart. The trouble is knowing which page holds what. This guide walks through the pages the FTC lists, what each one is for, and how to read any complaint report without stretching it past what it shows. It does not quote loss totals or complaint counts. The pages we reviewed only show titles and navigation, and the PDFs could not be read as text. Open the documents yourself for the numbers.
Here is a four-step path through the material:
- Start at the Consumer Sentinel Network page and note the links it offers.
- Open the Data Book 2024 and read its opening pages before any table.
- Check the older-adults report and the report to Congress for that age group.
- Keep complaint counts and dollar losses in separate columns in your notes.
Where the Consumer Sentinel Network Fits
The FTC's Consumer Sentinel Network page sits under the agency's Enforcement section. It offers a link to a Reports page, a Report Fraud option and a Report Identity Theft option. It also points to consumer.gov for basic consumer protection information and militaryconsumer.gov for servicemembers.
That is about all the page itself tells you. It does not explain how complaints are collected, who can see the data, or how entries are sorted and checked. Those details may exist elsewhere, but we could not confirm them from these pages. If you need them, look for the methodology section inside the Data Book itself.
The Consumer Sentinel Network Reports page is the better starting point for research. It is the shelf where the annual publications are listed.
The Data Book 2024
The FTC lists a document titled Consumer Sentinel Network Data Book 2024. The title tells you the data year. If you see a figure quoted somewhere, check which year's book it came from before you repeat it.
The listing page gives no totals, loss amounts, complaint counts or year-over-year changes. So any number you see attributed to it elsewhere should be checked against the document. Do not trust a screenshot or a social post that lacks a page reference.
When you open the book, read the front matter first. Look for how the report defines a loss, what time period it covers, and what counts as a report. We could not read the PDF, so we cannot say how the book handles medians, averages or duplicate entries. Those are good questions to put to the text, and the answers will tell you how far a given table can be pushed.
Older Adults: Two Separate Publications
The FTC also lists Protecting Older Consumers 2025-2026: A Report of the Federal Trade Commission. A related press release dated October 2026 announces the annual report to Congress on the agency's actions to protect older adults.
The titles suggest a focus on what the agency has done for this group. Whether the report ranks scam types or age bands, we cannot say, because the pages we saw show only titles and navigation. Read the full report before you cite any finding about older adults.
The older-adults report covers 2025-2026, while the Data Book is for 2024. Do not line up numbers from the two as if they described the same period.
Reading Complaint Data Without Overreading It
A complaint count measures reports filed. A loss figure measures money reported lost. They answer different questions, and one category can rank high on one and low on the other. Put them side by side in your notes and ask which one fits your question.
Reports like these generally depend on people choosing to file, so they are unlikely to capture every incident. That is a general limit of self-reported data, and the FTC pages we reviewed do not discuss it. Check the Data Book's own notes for how the FTC describes this.
Be careful about reading a jump in one category as proof that the scam grew. More reports can reflect more fraud. They might also reflect other things, such as easier reporting. The pages do not say which, so treat any change as a lead to check, not a conclusion.
For the FTC's charts, try the separate Data and Visualizations page. Charts help you see patterns fast. Then go back to the report text for definitions. One concrete habit helps: write down the year, the category and the unit (reports or dollars) next to every number you copy.
Please seek a professional. This article is general information, not financial, tax or insurance advice. Please seek a licensed financial, tax or insurance professional about your own situation.
