Beware of New Tax Season Scams

 
Certain Taxpayer Advocate Service (TAS) telephone numbers are being used in a new spoofing scam. In this most recent scam variation, callers “spoof” the telephone number of the TAS office in Houston or Brooklyn. Calls may be "robo-calls" that request a call back. Once the taxpayer returns the call, the con artist requests personal information, including SSN or ITIN.

Although phone scams increase during tax season, they remain active throughout the year. If you or your clients receive one of these phone calls, here's what to do:

• Hang up immediately.
• Report the call on the IRS Impersonation Scam Reporting form, or by calling 800-366-4484.
• Report the phone number to phishing@irs.gov, and put “IRS Phone Scam” in the subject line.

The IRS is also seeing many scams targeting payroll offices, human resources personnel and tax professionals. These are known as business email compromise (BEC) or business email spoofing (BES) scams. Help protect your business clients by warning them about scammers posing as:

• A business asking the recipient to pay a fake invoice;
• An employee seeking to re-route a direct deposit; or
• Someone the taxpayer trusts or recognizes, such as an executive, trying to initiate a wire transfer.