The Internal Revenue Service is warning taxpayers about a sophisticated phone scam in which scammers are posing as IRS agents.
Reports of fraudulent calls are popping up around the nation, and the warning is timely because Presidents Day weekend is typically a busy period for tax filings, said Mark Hanson, IRS media relations representative for North Carolina, Virginia and West Virginia.
Scammers are telling their potential victims that they owe money to the IRS and it must be paid promptly through a pre-loaded debit card or wire transfer.
The ruse is particularly effective, Hanson said, because the scammer knows the victim’s name, the last four digits of the person’s Social Security number — sometimes the entire Social Security number. Furthermore, the tricksters have found a way to manipulate caller ID so that the call looks as though it’s coming from a legitimate IRS phone number, Hanson said.
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