WASHINGTON – Following the lead of Sen. Susan Collins, the U.S. Senate unanimously passed a resolution to designate the week of Aug. 25 as National Fraud Against Senior Citizens Awareness Week.

Seniors in Maine are particularly vulnerable to telephone and mail fraud, and a large part of the problem is a lack of awareness, according to Collins, R-Maine.

To remedy the problem, Collins introduced the resolution to promote awareness of the dangers, methods and reporting procedures of crimes and fraud.

Last year alone, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service responded to 66,000 mail fraud complaints, arrested nearly 1,700 mail fraud offenders and secured nearly 1,500 convictions, she said.

The elderly are often especially vulnerable to these attacks, she said.

“The friendship and compassion that these telemarketers appear to offer manipulate thousands of dollars in life savings away from those who are dependent upon their savings for a comfortable retirement,” she said in a press release.

White-collar criminals view seniors as easy targets because they are more likely to be polite toward strangers, and elderly women living alone are especially enticing to con artists, according to the Federal Trade Commission, one of the agencies that handles fraud complaints.

AARP, the National Association of Attorneys General, and the Federal Trade Commission estimate that 85 percent of telemarketing fraud victims are age 65 or older.

According to the Maine Attorney General’s Office, one of the more notorious scams in Maine is the Canadian lottery scam, in which victims are pressured into buying phony Canadian lottery tickets through the mail at a high cost. The perpetrators then place follow-up phone calls to the victims demanding payment for taxes on winnings that are never delivered.

According to the Better Business Bureau, sending lottery materials through the mail and buying foreign lottery tickets is illegal in the United States.

Pyramid schemes also target seniors.

The “Sharing Equally” scheme, which operated in the Bangor area, is one of two Maine pyramids brought to light recently by the Attorney General’s Office. The scheme asked recruits to provide a $2,000 gift to whoever recruited them.

Maine law strictly prohibits pyramid, or “multi-level marketing,” schemes because they inevitably collapse, leaving investors hanging out to dry.

As part of the awareness effort, national spokeswoman and actress Betty White will appear in radio and television ads warning seniors of the dangers of mail and telephone fraud. On Sunday, Aug. 25, announcements will run in newspapers in 13 states, including Maine, that have reported the most complaints of fraud by seniors.

Another important element of the campaign is educating seniors on the reporting procedures in cases of fraud.