 Internal Revenue Service IRS tax news. IRS warning. Scammers work year-round. Stay vigilant. But first, an attempt at a joke, I apologize in advance. I was finally about to get my 15 minutes of fame. However, after taxes, I was only left with 6.17 minutes. And I had to spend those filling out the tax form 1040. But during those 6.17 minutes, as I filled out the form 1040, I could totally tell that my dog over there, good old great-haired couch killer, was really impressed by the way I listed those deductions. Or possibly, he was just staring at me wondering why lunch was 6.17 minutes late. Hey, wait a second couch killer. You're lucky you even get lunch. Most dogs don't even get a midday meal. Don't you roll your eyes at me like that. IR 2022-25 February 3, 2022 Washington. As the new year begins, the Internal Revenue Service reminds taxpayers to protect their personal and financial information throughout the year and watch out for IRS impersonation scams along with other schemes that try to trick people out of their hard-earned money. These schemes can involve text message scams, email schemes, and phone scams. This tax season, the IRS also warns people to watch out for signs of potential unemployment fraud. Quote, with filing season underway, this is a prime period for identity thieves to hit people with realistic-looking emails and texts about their tax returns and refunds. So there's various schemes and scams, some of which we've seen for some time now, so we need to be continually vigilant on them. Some of which are evolving and becoming new, both with the new technologies and just creativity of these types of people that come up with these schemes. And of course, because the environment that we are in at this point in time is still one which is changing a lot, which puts a lot of room for the schemers to put more schemes in place. And the incentives are also higher for things like identity theft and trying to get access to people's refunds because they've increased the level, especially at the low end of refundability, especially with these refundable type of credits. So you've got to be on a heightened awareness. Also, obviously people's income situations and their household income situations and so on are also changing with these time frames, which makes more uncertainty about you can't really rely on what has happened in the past. Number four, you've got to be on a heightened alert for these types of schemes that are taking place. So this was said by IRS Commissioner Chuck Redick, quote, watching out for these common scams can't keep people from becoming victims of identity theft and protect their sensitive personal information that can be used to file tax returns and steal refunds, and quote, the IRS state tax agencies and the nation's tax industry working together in the Security Summit initiative, there's a link to that here, have taken numerous steps since 2015 to protect taxpayers' businesses and the tax system from identity thieves. Well, as long as the security summits on it, that's like the Justice League of this tax, actually, you know, I'm not sure, I'd still take your own precautions there, the security summits gives you some advice, they give you some advice, which is nice. So Summit partners continue to warn people to watch out for common schemes or scams and schemes this tax season. Taxed message scams, so this is the good old text message. Last year there was an uptake in text messages that impersonated the IRS. These scams are sent to taxpayers' smartphones and have referenced COVID-19 and or quote, stimulus payments and quote, these messages often contain bogus links claiming to be IRS websites or other online tools other than IRS secure access. The IRS does not use text messages to discuss personal tax issues such as those involving bills or refunds. It's kind of interesting because on the one hand we would like the IRS to kind of move away from this old way of doing business and do everything through basically the mail to at least be using some emails and some of this other contact type of information but at the same time it's kind of nice to be able to say, hey, you know, the IRS usually works pretty slowly with pretty old kind of communication methods that classics tried and true communication methods through the mail and so they're not typically going to give you a text message. That might be changing at some point in the future because they're trying to update their website and trying to update to the more modern types of text leaks. But at this point in time, they're still not generally sending texts. They might be able to move it up to possibly using emails or something like that at some point in time instead of the actual mail but not usually the text messages. Obviously these types of texts were more effective for a couple different reasons. One is that now you've got these stimulus payments which is a new law where people are worried about this new thing and whether or not they're going to get access to that stimulus payment and it was a change in the law, something that we didn't have in the past and text messages can be effective because people are basically looking at text messages as they're doing other things so they're trying to take care of 20 things at one time and that is going to result in people making errors and possibly trying to fix or reconcile something and being more able or subject for nefarious people to do nefarious things like impersonating the IRS and stealing your personal information. So the IRS also will not send text messages via social media platforms if a taxpayer receives an unsolicited SMS slash text that appears to be from either the IRS or a program closely linked to the IRS the taxpayers should take a screenshot of the text message and include the screenshot in an email to phishingatirs.gov with the following information. So obviously once you do this when you see these kind of scams and what not oftentimes you're like man I got to report this to somebody because I need to do something about this and that's great because we should report it but just note that obviously when you report it you're going to put it down on the record that you have it reported which is good but it's probably not going to have an impact on your personal case what it does do hopefully is help the IRS to build a record to try to determine once they compile this information together the information so that they can then go after these people so that's what you want to do you want to do it generally for the good of kind of others most likely and not typically for your own personal case because most likely you know it is what it is you want to report it though. So date time time zone they receive the text message phone number that received the text message the IRS reminds everyone not to click links or open attachments to unsolicited suspicious or unsuspecting text messages so obviously these days even people you know you can't even trust these days right because they can impersonate them or whatever so you don't want to be clicking on the links on the text message I wouldn't even answer the phone you know just say no thank you and you know or open the text if it's kind of an unfamiliar area and again if it's the IRS then generally you know the IRS doesn't text people so and also if you get something that you think might be legitimate from an IRS or some organization then you want to take the time to actually go to the IRS website possibly login to your account and usually you can look at it from that source where you're logged in somewhere that you know is secure that you can trust as opposed to some person that's contacting you and you don't know exactly if they're doing some kind of nefarious thing so whether from the IRS state tax agencies or others in the tax community unemployment fraud as a new tax season begins the IRS reminds workers to watch out for claims of unemployment or other benefit payments for which they never applied state and states have experienced a surge in fraudulent unemployment claims filed by organized crime rings using stolen identities criminals are using these stolen identities to fraudulently collect benefits so obviously unemployment this was a huge thing last year continuing on this year these states and are trying to basically create programs to help people out as there's a reduction or you know as the covid thing happens and clearly every time there's going to be an increase in money that's going out from the government for things like this there's going to be an increase in identity theft so the scammers have once again an increased level of incentive to try to up their game on the scamming kind of things and many people that are filing for unemployment may never have filed for it before they have no idea that you know that about these kind of scamming type of things they might not have been of that situation so it's an area where scammers can try to scam it was last year probably will continue this year possibly not to the same level but still to an increase level in comparison to normal times so because unemployment benefits are taxable income states issue form 1099 g certain government payments to recipients and to the IRS to report the amount of taxable compensation received and any withholding any any worker receiving a fraudulent or inaccurate 1099 g should report it to the issuing state agency and request a corrected form 1099 g that typically goes with any kind of 1099 in general get a 1099 from the government for unemployment or from somebody else and you're saying it's wrong the 1099 is wrong I didn't get that money I didn't get the unemployment then you want to file your taxes correctly but if you file your taxes and you don't get the 1099 corrected the IRS is going to delay the taxes because it's not going to tie out what's on their records to what's on your tax return because they have a copy of the 1099 g because the state sends it to them too so to fix it in the most act or easiest way you got to go back to the state and say you got to reissue the 1099 because I'm going to file my tax return it's going to conflict with the truth what I reported on it and I'm going to it's going to delay the whole process so you got to go to the issuer of the 1099 and try to fix it it's a pain but that's you know that's the way it has to happen you're not going to fix it on the IRS side of things because that's just not going to happen right that's that's what has happened so the details are how to report fraud to state workforce agencies how to obtain a corrected form 1099 g how to find a list of state contacts and other steps to take related to unemployment fraud taxpayers can visit the US Department of Labor's dol.gov forward slash fraud page there's a link to that here individuals may be victims of unemployment identity theft if they received mail from government agencies about an unemployment claim or payment for which they did not file so if you got something in the mail and you're going hey there's this unemployment claim this doesn't apply to me maybe just throw it away or so I didn't apply for unemployment whatever but you know that's kind of an indication that someone maybe did and so you want to look into it and see if that is indeed the case and see if you can fix it this includes unexpected payments or debit or debit cards and could be from any state the IRS form 1099 g reflecting unemployment benefits they weren't expecting or didn't receive box one on this form may show unemployment benefits they did not receive or an amount that exceeds their records for benefits they did receive so in other words when you get the 1099 which is the thing that reports the kind of unemployment you got which typically you have to report as income on the federal side of things if it if you didn't get the unemployment it's quite possible someone stole your identity and they got the unemployment and you just got the 1099 so that you could pay the taxes on the money that you didn't pay because someone else told your identity and took the unemployment so that would be of course an indication at the tail end of of this whole process to indicate yes someone stole your identity possibly at that point and so what are you going to do you got to go to the state and try to figure it out you know I didn't get the unemployment reissue the 1099 and blah blah and from that point so the form itself may be from a state in which they did not file for benefits a notice from their unemployment indicating the employer received a request for information about an unemployment claim email phishing scams the IRS does not initiate contact with taxpayers by email to request personal or financial information so again the iris is typically a slow-moving old-fashioned bureaucratic agency they will roll over you but it takes a long time like a slow-moving boulder or something like that kind of like the glacier running over somebody very slowly it's running over your toe for like a thousand years until it then swallows your shin and it really hurts at that point but it's slow-moving that's the point they might be improving some of their communication skills but typically right now they send letters through the mail and not typically through the email that might change shortly or slowly like the iceberg moves forward they might move into the new world here of communication but at this point you're not typically getting an email and they're certainly not going to ask for personal information by email so that's the case so the IRS initiates most contacts through a regular mail delivered by the United States Postal Service if a taxpayer receives an unsolicited email that appears to be from either the IRS or a program closely linked to the IRS that is fraudulent report it by sending it as an attachment to phishing at irs.gov there's a link to that here there's the email link list here there'll be a link to this in the description so you can see it the report phishing and online scams page at irs.gov provides complete details there are special circumstances when the IRS will call or come to a home or business these visits include items when a taxpayer has an overdue tax bill a delinquent tax return or a delinquent employment tax payment that's a scary scary times the IRS may also visit if they need to tour a business as part of a civil investigation such as an audit or collection case or during a criminal investigation the IRS provides specific guidance on how to know it's really the IRS knocking at your door so you can check that out so they're saying hey if someone comes to your door and says they're the IRS it's not light I mean if someone comes to your door and says they're the IRS it's probably not the case and if it was you're probably well aware of the circumstance because you would like I said the slow moving iceberg of letters probably at that point would have piled up and you'd be well aware of it at that point it's not it's but they're saying they could it could happen an IRS agent comes to your door so you can look up here to see when or how to know if it is really an IRS agent so if they say something like give us money or we're gonna you know pull the FBI in or something like that right now at this point in time then no that's not the IRS right that's not how they work typically so in any case phone scams the IRS does not leave or pre-record urgent or threatening messages in many variations of the phone scams victims are told if they do not call back a warrant will be issued for their arrest so again these kind of things where you get a where you get a phone call this is a classic scamming type of thing you get a phone call and they threaten you in some way some way shape or form if you don't take immediate action on something and that's a classic scamming type of thing because you got a time constraint you've got a threat going involved in it and and so on and you've got an authoritative agency like the IRS which you know in theory of course has the power to take action if they actually we're doing something like that but not the case because the iris again is a slow moving iceberg that doesn't really call you you know like out of the blue and say give me money now or the iris is going to be knocking at your door in five seconds or something like that that's not typically how it works so if you get a call of someone threatening you you would typically want to say no thank you and then hang up on them and then go to the go to the iris website which can be difficult when someone's threatening you if you think there's any truth to it or something like that but generally you'd like to say okay I'm gonna I'm gonna look into it myself I'll check the iris website I don't trust this phone call hang up go to the source which is the iris website and see if there's any validity to it from there if there's a letter that went out or some action that was taken it should be in the you know they should basically log it into your account which you should be able to access at this point in time and see the details of what's going on so other verbal threats including law enforcement agency intervention depart deportation or revocation of licenses so all different kinds of threats these people might use criminals can fake or quote spoof and quote caller ID numbers to appear to be anywhere in the country including from the iris office so the fact that you look at your phone and you're saying hey that looks like a valid number from the iris office you can't even trust that these days because these types of people you know are will scam that kind of thing they could spoof the number apparently so don't be don't let that do they do it with the emails of course to you get I got an email from someone I know but they're doing horrible things they wanted that's what it's probably maybe it's not them actually maybe that's like a spoofed email most likely these are kind of things that we that often times we understand at this point but but if you've never experienced that kind of this kind of stuff then it would be I could it would be intimidating thing so this prevents taxpayers from being able to verify the true call call number fraudsters also have spoofed local shares offices state departments of motor vehicles federal agencies and others to convince taxpayers the call is legitimate the iris and its authorized private collection agencies will never call to demand immediate payment using a specific payment method such as a prepaid debit card gift card or wire transfer now note this is always the one that kind of it kind of makes me laugh at something that the scammers basically are going to go through this whole rigor moral of having a convincing scam and then ask someone to pay them with a gift card and you know even if the scam is convincing you're like a man this person maybe that I do need to send a money or my uncle's going to die in some jail in Tijuana or something like that okay I'm going to give you the thousand dollar whatever but then they ask for the money with a gift card that's going to of course be an indication that they don't want the money to be tracked and that's usually a pretty good sign that something is not right these people are liars and you hang up on them so the iris does not use these methods for tax payments threaten to immediately bring in local police or other law enforcement groups to have the taxpayers arrested for not paying again that's not generally how the iris works the iris doesn't say give me the money now or right next second someone's going to you know come into your door like now that's not what happens typically so demand the taxes be paid without giving the taxpayer the opportunity to request or appeal the amount owed that's part of the law the law is what it is you can agree with the law or not and say hey the tax laws I don't think the tax law should be this way or that way but once the law is in place the iris agencies typically are supposed to act in accordance with the law and that includes being able to argue against whether or not the tax is valid in accordance with the current law on the books so as for credit or debit card numbers over the phone so they will never ask for that over the phone not typically by email either because the iris is trying to be as secure as possible and so they're not going to ask you generally for personal information in that way generally the IRS will first mail a bill to any taxpayer who owes taxes all tax payments should be made payable to the US Treasury and checks should never be made payable to third parties for anyone who doesn't owe taxes and has no reason to think they do did not give out any information hang up immediately and again it seems rude to do that it always seems rude to me someone's talking and even even when I totally know they're fraud they're like a fraudster it's like oh yeah I think I have to go and they're like no but the iris is going to knock on your door you know I hate to be rude you know you're kind of lying but I'm going to I'm going to I'm going to hang up now well no you know that's hard to hang up on them you know but that's all you can do you got to just say no thank you and just hang up on them so contact the Treasury inspector general for tax-adminished admission report the call at IRS impression scam reporting there's a link to that here report the caller ID and or a callback number to the IRS by sending it to phishing at irs dot gov subject irs phone scam report it to the federal trade commission there's a link to that here on FTC dot gov ad quote irs telephone scam in quote end the notes for anyone who owes tax or thinks they do view tax account information online at irs dot gov and that's what I would tell anyone that was scamming scamming in that way if they're trying to impersonate someone from any kind of institution I'd say hey you know what I'm going to I'm going to go right to the source I'm going to go to my account and I'll check it out right now if you're a valid person I will handle it if not then I'm not going to handle it goodbye and then hang up and then go to the iris website and just double check that everything is the way it should be so to see the actual amount owed taxpayers can also view their payment options call the number on the billing notice or call the irs at eight hundred eight to nine ten forty irs employees can help help for victims of ID theft unfortunately scams and schemes can often lead to identity theft well identity theft can have many consequences the irs focuses on tax related identity theft tax related identity theft occurs when someone uses an individual's stolen social security number the SSN to file a tax return claiming a fraudulent refund taxpayers may be unaware of this activity until they e-file a tax return and discover that a return has already been filed using their social security number so this is becoming more and more valuable these days as well because you have all these refundable credits like the child tax credit the the earned income tax credit and the recovery rebate credit for example that's starting to pile up to quite a substantial sum of money and therefore filing fraudulent tax returns is becoming more of a thing therefore stealing identities like social security numbers is becoming more of a thing to if someone files your tax return before you file the tax return with your name and social security number the software will kick your return out because they already have someone who has filed with that information that of course an indication that someone has stolen your identity or the irs may send them a letter saying it has identified a suspicious return using the SSN if a taxpayer learns their SSN has been compromised or they know or suspect they are a victim of tax related identity theft the irs reminds that these addition recommends these additional steps individuals should respond immediately to any irs notice call the number provided taxpayers should complete irs form 14 039 identity theft affidavit if an e-file tax return rejects because of a duplicated filing under their SSN or they are instructed to do so by the irs so you're going to this is the one that you use after the identity theft has already happened if you suspect an identity theft has happened you might get like a pen a pen number that will give you another level of safe security but if the identity theft has already happened because the tax return has been kicked back because it wouldn't accept your social security number most likely because someone else has filed that's when you want to file this form 14 39 possibly look at the instructions for more details identity theft affidavit so individuals can use a fillable form at irs dot gov then print and attach the form to their paper return and mail according to instructions victims of tax related identity theft should continue to pay their taxes and file their tax return even if they must do so by paper taxpayers who previously contacted the irs about tax related identity theft and did not have a resolution should call for specialized assistance at 1 800 908 4 4 9 0 more information is available at irs dot gov forward slash identity theft or the federal trade commissions identity theft dot gov there's links to those items the official irs website is irs dot gov irs dot gov people should be aware of information websites ending in dot com so if it says dot com and they're saying it's an irs website they're lying because the irs website has dot gov as the ending thing this applies to other irs tools to like free file they end in dot gov for more information visit tax scams and consumer alerts there's a link to that here on irs dot gov additional information about tax scams is available on irs social media sites included youtube videos more information can be found at the link below taxpayer bill of rights and there's links to all this wonderful information here and phone numbers and emails to report fishing scams it's all here and there'll be a link to this in the description.