They get to hold onto any money we don't spend for years, industry experts say. And this year, as a congested global supply chain is causing a shortage of some popular gifts, more than one in five people plan to use gift cards when shopping during the holidays, according to a YouGov survey commissioned by CNET parent company Red Ventures. That's already up from $1 trillion in 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic supercharged consumer spending, according to Research and Markets. It's still growing, too, and surveys suggest its use is pretty evenly split along racial, gender and economic lines.īy 2027, gift card spending is expected to reach $2.7 trillion - topping all but the US, China, Japan, Germany and the UK. The gift card industry is already larger than the gross domestic product of all but a handful of countries. All told, the FBI tallied $4.2 billion in fraud losses reported by victims last year. The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center, for example, said it receives more than 2,000 complaints each day about all sorts of internet scams, from fraudulent business impersonation to fake romances to gift card scams. 'This is only the tip of the iceberg,' said John Breyault, vice president for public policy, telecommunications and fraud at the National Consumers League. So when the Federal Trade Commission counted more than $245 million in money lost to gift card scams since 2018, most experts said the actual number is likely many multiples worse than that. Many victims don't report the crime to authorities, often because they're embarrassed and quickly learn the hard truth that they're unlikely to get their money back. It's impossible to fathom how much money these scammers have taken. 'If someone coerces you, then you're out of luck,' said Kathy Stokes, director of fraud prevention programs at AARP. Even identity fraud insurance, which would cover ID theft in the case of a data breach, often doesn't apply when you've given the information willingly.

When a victim shares the card number with a scammer, they've effectively authorized its use.

But it's different with gift cards - they have no such legal protections. The fees we pay help cover the losses to that fraud.

But it tends to feel more like an inconvenience than theft, because you usually get your money back thanks to a nearly half-century-old law designed to protect consumers from any ' unauthorized' credit charges. That's because it cost Americans a staggering $56 billion last year, according to Javelin Strategy and Research. When you think of computer crimes, identity theft usually comes first to mind.

Steam wallet gift card scams