AARP BankSafe Initiative Launches New Resource to Protect Older Adults Experiencing Cognitive Decline

Older adults with declining cognitive abilities are prime targets for financial scammers. AARP’s new BankSafe Dementia Hub aims to enable staff at banks, credit unions and investment firms to spot the signs of cognitive decline and potential exploitation, which can lead to major financial losses. Older Americans lose up to $60 billion a year to elder financial exploitation, according to the Federal Trade Commission.

The new Dementia Hub is built on BankSafe’s existing model, which provides financial professionals, like bank tellers and managers, loan officers and financial advisers, with evidence-based tools to help them detect and respond to red flags. BankSafe has four core pillars: preventing financial exploitation, empowering financial caregivers, helping those with dementia and making banking easier to access.

The new Dementia Hub provides information about how to evaluate and detect warning signs of dementia, such as rapid loss of income, unusual purchases and significant deductions from bank accounts.

BankSafe-trained employees save their customers an estimated 16 times more than their counterparts who had not been trained, according to a 2019 Virginia Tech study. AARP found the initiative prevented nearly $140 million in losses in 2024 and more than $450 million in losses since it was launched in 2019.

The Dementia Hub helps financial institutions and their employees understand what cognitive decline is, how to spot it and how to protect older customers who live with dementia. The resource center provides advice and information to help teams take action before harm occurs. It’s education that is increasingly needed, said Jilenne Gunther, national director of AARP’s BankSafe Initiative, in testimony about scams and fraud to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on June 17.

“With nearly 1 in 10 older Americans currently living with dementia, and a growing aging population, financial exploitation and mismanagement are critical concerns for the financial industry,” Gunther told lawmakers.

The Dementia Hub’s resources address a critical window of vulnerability: early recognition of cognitive decline and intervention. The hub includes information on ways financial professionals can recognize early warning signs and how they can create a support network for customers and caregivers to address issues. Bank tellers, fraud risk managers, financial advisers and other financial institution employees “often see subtle changes in behavior, such as hesitation, confusion, nervousness or unusual transaction requests, that may be invisible to even close family members,” Gunther said in her testimony.

“We know that in 1 out of every 2 interventions by trained frontline staff, financial exploitation is successfully prevented before any money is lost,” she added.

Employee training prevents financial exploitation

The hub’s training is designed to help banks and other financial institutions work within their rules and regulations to hold up suspicious transactions and mitigate potential losses for older customers.

“On average, older adults lose up to half of their median net worth before receiving a dementia diagnosis,” Gunther testified. This can happen through scams, unusual purchases that go unchecked or loss of income. Lack of communication with caregivers or loved ones can exacerbate the problem.