 internal revenue service IRS tax news dirty dozen scammers use every trick in their communication arsenal to steal your identity personal financial information money and more and wow how many tricks do those scammers have up in their arsenal well at least a dirty dozen the dirty dozen sounds familiar is not the name of that donut shop yeah the donut shop across the street they attract customers with the baker's dozen but we we provide the people with the dirty dozen donuts donuts dumped in the deep fryer filled with equal parts six month old bacon grease and dirty motor oil once fried to a hot sticky mess the dirty dozen donuts are flung from the fryer directly to the dirt where they sit marinating in the dink damp dark until pickup wow that sounds like horrible customer service honestly is that donut shop run by the IRS IR 2022 dash 121 June 8 2022 Washington suspicious communications in all its forms designed to either trick surprise or scare someone into responding before thinking is number seven on the 2022 quote dirty dozen in quotes scams so donut number seven on the dirty dozen donuts that's like that ransom jelly filled donut that we're worrying about here it's on their warning list for the IRS the internal revenue service announced today warning everyone to be on the lookout for bogus calls texts emails post online to gain trust or steal so obviously this would include some of that fishing stuff that we're familiar with but because of the changing of the landscape with new technologies out there and then the laws changing and us dealing with responses to the pandemic that's gonna cause more people to be in a situation where they're more likely to be responding to some of these kind of methods that we're familiar with but you know you could be a whole lot of different variations to them as we have different circumstances so criminals have used these methods for years and they persist because these tricks work enough times to keep the scammers at it so obviously some of these tricks you can think of as the shotgun kind of approach where they're basically gonna send a whole lot of stuff out and because there's changes to the laws and uncertainty that is happening then all they need is to is to have a few people that will will take up these kind of shotgun gun approach methods in order to possibly make that a profitable thing or you could have more targeted email kind of scams where they can't basically hit as many people but they can get quite creative if they're going after say one individual and trying to gain trust from one individuals with scammy kind of stuff so victims are tricked into providing sensitive personal information money or other information this can be used to file false tax returns and tap into financial accounts among other scams so obviously the tax returns are a big incentive these days so if you can get if they can get the personal information to do stuff like file the tax returns or if there was unemployment kind of stuff that they can file for and that kind of stuff it's becoming more valuable because of the changes in the laws because you've got a lot of lot more stuff especially on the low income side of things with the refundable credits and therefore that kind of identity theft is going to become more attractive to scammers so quote if you are surprised if you are surprised or scared by a call or text it's likely a scam to proceed with extreme caution said Commissioner Chuck Reddick so clearly when you're thinking about these kind of things there's usually going to be some kind of call to action that they're going to want and there's going to be some kind of threat which could just simply be a timing thing they might say well you got a refund or something like that we were the month the government's giving out a bunch more money may not have heard about it but we're giving out money and you have to respond like right now which obviously is a timing threat or you can have actual negative threats which would be of course you know do this now or the iris is going to come to your door like in the next five seconds or something like that anything that has that kind of kind of set up which is designed to have a panic in you to trigger a panic response so that you give the information or click on whatever link immediately is usually someone that's you know not being not being kind right trying to do something scammy so quote I urge everyone to verify suspicious email or other communication independently of the message in question in quote so obviously if you're in a panic situation then you want to fix it fast so you click on the link you go to the website you try to handle whatever problem that someone says that you have or that they have or whatever but it's best of course if you were to put the put that down and then go to the iris website possibly directly if it has something to do with the iris for example and say oh is there a 25th stimulus payment that they just sent out like this week or is that just just email that's just making stuff up or something like that and then check it out from the source even though that takes longer the IRS has compiled the annual dirty dozen list for more than 20 years as a way of alerting taxpayers and the tax professional community about scams and schemes the list is not a legal document or a literal listing of agency enforcement priorities it is designed to raise awareness among a variety of audiences that may not always be aware of developments involving tax administration as part of the security summit all here we go with the security summit they're just like the Justice League kind of but and they come in and save the world so it's part of the security summit effort with the states and the nation's tax industry the IRS has made great strides in preventing and reducing tax-related identity theft but it remains a serious threat to taxpayers and tax professionals probably because Lex Luthor's got into the tax scam and the game of things and the security summit has to respond who don't adequately protect social security numbers so obviously social security numbers are a target because those are the things they could possibly be used to file tax returns and do other kind of stuff and possibly then try to get access to this increase in money that is there due to the fact that we have more of these kind of refundable credits and clearly the social security number system is kind of antiquated these days because obviously we've got one social security number that we've been giving to you know we've been probably trying to memorize it on the grade on our at grade school by repeating it to ourselves and everybody at that point in time then we gave it to every financial institution and everybody that we worked with and so on so it be nice I'm not I'm not saying that we should go to some high-tech thing or chip in our forehead or something but maybe you know we should be changing the social security number every once in a while or something I don't know it seems like that number could be compromised for many people so it was another personal information for example criminals I can quickly file a fake tax return using a stolen social security number in the hope that it has not already applied on another filed return and that's of course an attempt to tap in to some of these refundable credits so even if they have a very low income is something like that they might try to they might try to get some refund for it even though there's no withholdings or anything that's being reported for example so people frequently don't know they are a victim of identity theft and they until they are notified by the IRS of a possible issue with their tax return or the return is rejected because the SS in social security number appears on return already filed so you try to file your tax return and the IRS says no someone you already filed someone who was you already filed it's like well that wasn't me but it looked like you because you're a number and we have that number already and you know that's how it goes so here are some common scams the IRS continues to see taxpayers should take extra caution with these schemes which continue to evolve and change so we got the text message scams these scams are sent to taxpayers smartphones and can reference things like COVID-19 and or stimulus payments so again the stimulus payments the response to the stimulus payments that was something we've not seen before changes to the tax law make people think well maybe the tax maybe the IRS is doing something crazy against crazy new thing and so they don't usually text message you however but obviously when people are checking their text messages while they're driving or on a roller coaster or something like that you might be more likely to try to just respond to it at that point in time so 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 the IRS also will not send taxpayers messages via social media so if you get if you get a tweet or if you get a face message I got a face message from the IRS auditor met me in the metaverse they don't that may I I can imagine that probably happening at some point but not now they're not meeting you in the metaverse it's not really an IRA so if a taxpayer receives an unsolicited ns in SMS text that appears to be from either the IRS or a program closely linked to the IRS the taxpayer should take a screenshot of the text messages and include the screenshot in an email to fishing at IRS dot gov with the following information why because are they gonna solve my problem over there at the IRS no they're gonna put it in their little database and and maybe maybe compiles some information so it's still nice to do you might have do your little part of helping to stop the scammers out there although you know it doesn't seem like anybody's really stuff but but you know you can send it out that's the thing we want to do so you're gonna be putting the date the time and the time zone they receive the text message phone number that received the text message the IRS reminds everyone not to click any links or open attachments and unsolicited suspicious or uns on unexpected text messages whether from the IRS state agencies or others in the tax community I just turned the phone off completely seems like everybody that's trying to contact you is trying to do something mean any case email fishing scams is the next on the list the IRS does not initiate contact with taxpayers by email to request personal or financial information so you got the good old email they're not texting you they're not doing the super fancy new thing they're just sending out the good old fishing email the IRS doesn't the IRS is more antiquated than that they don't even contact people with email still they're back in snail mail days so so so if you visit if it's not from the snail mail then it might not be from the IRS the IRS initiates most contacts to regular mail if a taxpayers receives an unsolicited and fraudulent email that appears to be from either the IRS or a program closely linked to the IRS report it by sending the email as an attachment to the fishing at IRS dot gov why are they gonna help me out with my problem are they gonna stop the email no they're not gonna they're gonna put it in their little database program so but you're gonna do your part you're doing your part by doing that and so it's important the report the fishing online scams page you can report it here there's a link to that on IRS dot gov provides complete details phone scams we got the phone scams the IRS does not leave pre-recorded urgent or threatening messages so if someone says this is the IRS we are outside your house right now if you don't send what money to this gift card account number then we're gonna attack or something that that's not what they typically do on on the phone scams usually they send a letter again it's usually like snail mail slow rolling bureaucratic agency hitting you with the stick of penalties and interest and until you're unaware until you finally realize that things have gotten crazy with penalties and interests and whatever and many variations of the phone scam victims are told if they do not call back a warrant will be issued for their arrest other verbal threats include law enforcement agency intervention department or a revocation of licenses we've got the SWAT team right outside your house right now if you don't send the past due amount that's not really how it works you criminals can fake or quote spoof quote end quote caller ID numbers to appear to be anywhere in the country including from an IRS office so they can say well check my authentication this phone message is coming directly from an IRS office the one that's kind of funny is when they say check the identification this phone message is coming from you because and that means I hacked into your system or something like that you're like no way they hacked into the system and now they're I don't know anyways this prevents taxpayers from being able to verify the caller's true number fraudsters also have spoofed local sheriff's offices state departments or motor vehicles federal agencies and others to convince taxpayers the call is legitimate the IRS 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 I still love the gift card thing the SWAT team is outside your house please send the money to this gift card says the IRS the IRS doesn't make you send money to a gift card that's that's weird they don't do that the IRS does not use these method for tax payments threatened to immediately bring a local police or other law enforcement groups to their taxpayers arrest them for not paying so they're typically not taking action like that the IRS is a slow moving bureaucratic agency you're typically well aware of the actions that they're going to be taking because they've told you at least 60 days and advances so demand the taxes and they tell you by letter typically so but any case demand the taxes be paid without giving the taxpayer the opportunity to question or appeal the amount owed so they're not just gonna be like well I don't owe the taxes because you know you have the right to basically say the you know to appeal the decision ask for credit or debit card number over the phone so they're not gonna ask for that information over the phone they don't do that kind of stuff generally the IRS will first mail a bill to any taxpayer who owes taxes all tax payments should only be made payable to the US Treasury and check should never be made payable to third parties so it's like to just make the check out to John Smith and then I'll give it to the IRS because I'm the agent you know no no that's not how I've I've paid the government directly to the Treasury so for anyone who doesn't owe taxes and has no reason to think they do do not give out any information hang up immediately and this is the hard thing for most people because the scammers prey on be nice people and you're like but I don't want to just hang up I don't I don't think this was legitimate I would just say you know I'm gonna I'm gonna contact the IRS directly myself if you're legitimate that's fine I'll go directly to the source and hang up and and don't feel bad about it for more information see IRS warning scammers work year-round stay vigilant there's a link to that here those links to all the other wonderful stuff we said there was a link to it'll be a link to this in the description