Commissioner Nikki Fried & FDACS Join FTC in Recognizing Military Consumer Month, Raising Awareness of Scams Targeting Servicemembers

Tallahassee, Fla. — Today, Commissioner Nikki Fried and the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (FDACS), the state’s consumer protection agency, joined the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in alerting members of the military, veterans, and their families about targeted scams. July is Military Consumer Month, a month-long education campaign aimed at raising awareness among military communities on how to protect against targeted scams and fraud.

“During Military Consumer Month 2021, our team at FDACS’ Division of Consumer Services is honored to reaffirm our commitment to protecting the brave men and women in uniform who serve our state and nation, joining the FTC in this important educational outreach,” said Commissioner Fried. “Florida is the proud home of over 65,000 active duty military personnel, over 202,000 military retirees, and over 1.5 million veterans. Despite their sacrifices in service to our nation, there are some that would take advantage of Florida’s military community. My message to these scammers is this: we will not allow for it and you will not get away with it. We will find out and find you, shut you down, and hold you accountable.”

In 2020, FDACS conducted an investigation into the Children of Wounded Warriors charity, which claimed to be raising money for the children of injured or slain military members and first responders. The investigation concluded that the organization engaged in the improper and personal use of funds, committed perjury, misled donors, and was involved in other illicit actions. The group’s charity status was revoked, and they were fined $60,000.

Background: Shortly after taking office in 2019, Commissioner Fried directed the FDACS Division of Consumer Services to begin tracking complaints submitted by military members and veterans. Since that time, FDACS has received over 1,400 complaints from Florida’s military community. The continued collection of this data will help identify patterns about the specific types of scams that military members and veterans encounter to better raise awareness of how to protect against fraud in the future.

While servicemembers and veterans are prone to many of the same scams as Florida’s civilians, the following are scams that disproportionately affect the military community:

• Identity Theft: Identity theft occurs when an individual's personal information such as their name, Social Security number, or credit card number are used without their consent to commit fraud and other crimes. Servicemembers are especially at risk for identity theft due to frequent moves and deployments required of military life that make it more difficult to monitor their finances for the irregularities that identify theft causes. 
• Rental Scams: These scams target servicemembers looking for housing near their home base. The scammers pretend to be real estate agents and post fake ads for rental properties on websites. The ads often offer military discounts and other incentives. They attempt to get servicemembers to send them money upfront; scammers then take the money and the victims end up losing this income and are left without housing. 
• Charity Scams: Charity scammers use deception to steal money from people who believe they are donating to legitimate causes. They siphon money away from those in need and use it to line their own pockets. Some scam artists set up military or veteran charities to exploit the generosity that our military and veteran communities, and the general public, have towards causes that help servicemembers, veterans, and military families. 
• Unfair Car Deals: New members of the military are often first- or second-time car buyers that may not have a lot of experience in the vehicle purchasing process. Knowing this, some sellers will target these new servicemembers and set them up with payment agreements that include hidden fees and high interest rates. With the steady income that servicemembers have, these car sellers are able to garnish their wages in order to collect on the unfair car deals.

File a Consumer Complaint with FDACS: Servicemembers, veterans, and military family members who think they have fallen victim to a scam or experienced a solicitation that they believe could be a scam should file a consumer complaint with the FDACS Division of Consumer Services at 1-800-HELP-FLA (1-800-FL-AYUDA en Español), or online at FloridaConsumerHelp.com and report concerns to the Federal Trade Commission at FTC.gov/complaint.

About the Division of Consumer Services: FDACS is Florida’s state consumer protection agency responsible for regulating charities and handling consumer complaints. FDACS handles more than 400,000 consumer complaints and inquiries, oversees more than 500,000 regulated devices, entities, and products like gas pumps and grocery scales, performs over 61,000 lab analyses on products like gasoline and brake fluid, performs nearly 9,000 fair ride inspections, and returned over $2.8 million to consumers through mediations with businesses.

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