Advertisement

Phone Scammers Pretending to Be IRS Agents

Phone Scammers Pretending to Be IRS Agents
Advertisement
By Bill Hughes
Aug. 21, 2014 | PADUCAH, KY
By Bill Hughes Aug. 21, 2014 | 06:08 PM | PADUCAH, KY
The Internal Revenue Service has repeated a warning about phone scammers who try to collect money or information from taxpayers.

The IRS and the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration have received about 90,000 complaints about the calls, with close to 1,100 victims losing a total of about $5 million to scammers.

IRS Spokesperson Jennifer Jenkins said that scammers use fake names and IRS badge numbers, and may be able to create fake caller ID information.

Jenkins said there may be several things that vary from call to call, but the caller usually has a foreign accent, and is very aggressive.

"The clear red flag should be that the caller - the IRS impersonator - is making threats over the phone and demanding immediate payment. This is not the way the IRS would do business," Jenkins said.

Jenkins said the IRS almost always contacts taxpayers first by US Mail, so if you get a call like this, hang up, then call the IRS or TIGTA to report it. Unsolicited emails claiming to be from the IRS should be deleted, too. More details on this scam are available at the IRS website, www.irs.gov. You can find a link below.

On the Net:

IRS Warning About Phone Scams
ADVERTISEMENT
Advertisement


Latest McCracken County
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT

Latest McCracken County

Advertisement
ADVERTISEMENT