Grieving British pensioners are being ruthlessly targeted by cybercriminals at their most vulnerable moment, who con them into buying fake funerals, paying for fraudulent death certificates and peddling bogus funeral insurance, a damning new probe by the Express has uncovered.
Scams on the rise
The research has found a soaring number of scams are ruthlessly targeting recently bereaved widows and widowers, with heartless fraudsters “actively exploiting” the emotional and physical exhaustion of those who have recently lost a loved one. Their crimes are having devastating financial consequences on people at their lowest ebb, many of whom are losing their life savings to the gangs.
Incredibly, some gangs are even creating fake “grief networks” designed to gain the trust of those seeking emotional support before luring them into losing their savings with bogus investments.
How the scams work
The data highlights how a highly calculated approach is being taken by global criminals, with more than a quarter of victims (27%) being targeted by scams offering fake information about perceived trusted brands and services, while 26% of victims have fallen prey to fraudsters impersonating authoritative bodies to build false trust or incite fear.
Experts say that for those engulfed by the mourning process, spotting potential “red flags” can feel nearly impossible, as they struggle amidst the mountain of legal administration required following the death of a loved one.
Victims also revealed how their judgment was clouded by tiredness and a lack of sleep along with the financial worries, acute stress, and mental health challenges brought about by bereavement.
Victim's story
One elderly victim, Jane, 71, from Barnsley revealed how she lost “thousands” after falling prey to a fraudster she met on a fake online grief forum.
She said, “I was looking for advice, and a social media post led me to a website that I believed to be genuine. But it was all an evil scam. They found out quickly that I had received a life insurance payout from my late husband following his unexpected death from a heart attack, and I was encouraged to take out a funeral plan, as that was something we had not got round to doing. I thought it would be less of a burden for my children when I passed, but it turned out to be entirely fake, and I lost all my money. I was too embarrassed to tell anyone until it was too late.”
Expert insight
Alice Taylor, a senior scam and fraud researcher at Oxford Information Labs (OXIL), a UK-based cyber intelligence and consultancy firm specialising in cyber security and digital policy, who carried out the research exclusively for the Express, branded the calculated nature of these attacks on vulnerable older people as “chilling”.
She said: “The most chilling cases are where we see scammers clearly exploiting some of the most painful tragedies a person can go through.
“When a person is facing bereavement, they are experiencing layered vulnerability: the grief itself, and most likely emotional and physical exhaustion surrounding the death.”
Alice said the emotional stress placed on a next of kin to sort out the affairs of the deceased creates “a perfect storm” for fraudsters. She added: “It’s easy to assume that nobody would ever be so heartless as to strike when someone is that vulnerable, but that is precisely what scammers are looking for.”
Impact on victims
The fallout from these cons is severe. Half of all victims (50%) reported losing money that they were entirely unable to recover. The psychological impact also left 50% significantly more nervous about engaging online, despite it being crucial for modern-day living.
Yet despite the heavy toll, an alarming 80% of victims did not even attempt to report the crime to police due to shame, exhaustion, or overwhelming grief.
Alice added: “The fact that 80% of fraud goes unreported is a stark finding, but it’s also not that surprising. The real question is, what do fraud victims feel they actually have to gain from reporting? “Scam victims are often disbelieved, shamed, and made to feel like they enabled the attack by being ‘susceptible’. When scam victims do report, it is often to stretched staff who are expected to combat the biggest crime type with low levels of law enforcement funding. It is almost impossible for meaningful action to be taken, and for victims to feel supported.”
Case study: Peter McDonagh
A romance fraudster who swindled more than £120,000 in life insurance cash from a grieving widow was arrested as he prepared to board a one-way flight to Manchester.
Cunning Peter McDonagh, 33, met the woman at her late husband's wake after reading online about his death. He travelled from his Dublin home to attend the wake, claiming to be a long-lost friend of her husband. The fraudster then made further contact and struck up an online friendship where he pretended to be helping her through her grief process, whilst all the time grooming her for his scam.
He told her he needed money for non-existent private cancer treatment in the UK; to buy cars to live in as he was homeless; to pay for siblings' funerals; and even to pay debts to “dangerous people”.
The victim's money, which has not been recovered, came from a life insurance claim following her late husband's death.
His year-long fraud was exposed in late 2024 when his victim received a message from McDonagh's wife telling her he isn't single and that they had been holidaying abroad in places such as Barcelona and that they had spent the previous Christmas together.
In November 2024, the victim made a complaint to Gardai, and in February 2025, McDonagh was arrested in the departures lounge before he was about to embark on a one-way flight to Manchester. Earlier this year, he was jailed for five years and three months after pleading guilty to the cruel deception.
In her victim impact statement, the woman told McDonagh’s Dublin trial she had been “vulnerable and going through a traumatic time, grieving and in shock”.
She added: “My trust in people has been destroyed, and my life has been turned upside down.”
