It was a shock for Dori when she found out she had just $11 for groceries in February.
“It was a tough hit for me,” she said.
Someone had stolen her SNAP benefits, the nearly $300 in government assistance she receives each month to buy food.
“I’m also on disability so I’m on a very limited income. When that money is gone it’s very hard to replace. I mean what do you do?” Dori said.
Dori reported the theft to the police and the Massachusetts Department of Transitional Assistance (DTA), the state agency that distributes SNAP benefits.
Despite reporting it, no help or replacement money came.
Dori had to rely on her friends and family for the month to get by.
“I’m fortunate to have people to lean on but I needed that,” Dori said. “Those funds really help out a lot.”
She isn’t the only one left with nothing.
More than 28,000 SNAP benefits were reported stolen in Massachusetts in 2023 and 2024. The theft stripped the state’s most vulnerable of $12.2 million worth of benefits.
In just the first two months of this year, 7,800 people reported their benefits stolen to DTA.
“It’s absolutely devastating and there’s no other way to put it,” said Michael Cole, DTA’s chief operating officer.
Criminals are stealing the benefits through skimming and phishing schemes.
“Placing a device on a point of sale in a grocery store or a corner store. You go to use your card and it captures the card information and that can be used to replicate a card and steal the benefits,” Cole explained.
Dori said her benefits were whipped out by criminals using her card information in New York the same day she received the funds.
“This is really a sophisticated and organized scheme and they are working hard to steal these benefits,” Cole said.
SNAP cards are especially vulnerable to skimming schemes because, unlike ordinary debit cards, they aren’t protected with chip technology.
Massachusetts Governor Maura Healey filed a supplementary budget this month. The bill proposes $15.5 million to replace the benefit cards with chip cards.
Cole said upgrading the cards is the best long-term solution to stop the criminals, but it doesn’t bring immediate relief.
“It’s a relatively long timeline. We’d want, of course like everyone, overnight be able to flip a switch and have these cards in a more secure place,” Cole said.
Until the funding comes through and the upgrade happens, the current cards remain vulnerable to skimming.
The federal government used to replace stolen benefits but it was a temporary provision that ended last December.
“It is really hard to tell families that no relief is available,” explained Betsy Gwin, a senior economic justice attorney at the Massachusetts Law Reform Institute (MLRI).
Gwin has heard from dozens of families impacted by the thefts for years and said the loss has a ripple effect on families.
“Families call us and say, ‘I’m skipping meals this week. I’m not able to pay for the medication I need because I don’t have the dollars I need for groceries this month,’” Gwin said.
She and MLRI is pushing for funds to be allocated at the state level to replace the stolen benefits.
“We can’t just wait until chip cards roll out and are in the hands of low-income consumers. We need to act now to ensure that their benefits are being replaced in the meantime,” Gwin said. “Replacing stolen benefits is the right thing to do.”
State lawmakers have filed bills to replace stolen benefits earlier this year but no action has been taken.
In the meantime, DTA officials said they are working to inform families about the threat and what steps they can take to stay protected.
“Our hands are tied in a lot of ways, but that has never stopped us from continuously trying to figure out where we can pull levels and what we can do to try to minimize the impact and in some cases prevent it,” Cole said.
The DTA has added an online feature that allows people to lock their cards when they aren’t being used to prevent unauthorized purchases. Cole also recommends people change their card’s PIN often and encourages people to still report the theft in case funding does become available.
Individuals can report theft here: https://www.mass.gov/how-to/report-stolen-benefits-to-dta