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New IRS Tax Scam...beware!

Obliviax

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Gold Member
Aug 21, 2001
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1
  • Scam artist sends your checking account a tax refund check for something like $550 via a mobile remote deposit (takes a photo of the check on a mobile phone)
  • The scammer then calls you before it clears and says he/she represents the IRS. They mistakenly sent you a check for $550 and you have to return it under penalty of law.
  • Victim sends the address $550. Which gets taken out of the account ASAP.
  • mRDC check for $550 is eventually denied, but too late for the victim that is already out the $550 check they wrote back to the “IRS”
 
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  • Scam artist sends your checking account a tax refund check for something like $550 via a mobile remote deposit (takes a photo of the check on a mobile phone)
  • The scammer then calls you before it clears and says he/she represents the IRS. They mistakenly sent you a check for $550 and you have to return it under penalty of law.
  • Victim sends the address $550. Which gets taken out of the account ASAP.
  • mRDC check for $550 is eventually denied, but too late for the victim that is already out the $550 check they wrote back to the “IRS”

We've had a really tough time with fraud lately. We have T-Mobile phones and I guess they were part of the Equifax hack a few months ago (and they never told us; we found out from the VA DOT). Anyway, I get a call one night (while my wife is out running errands) from a T-Mobile store in Connecticut (we live in Virginia). Salesperson asks if my wife is trying to purchase a phone upgrade on our account. I say no, she's in VA and we're not looking to do anything. Salesperson says this person has a Driver's License with all her information on it but if fraudulent, she'll call the cops - I said 'call the cops.' So, she did, and my wife went nuts - got LifeLock, called the police, registered on the .gov fraud website. Everything. Anyway, just last week we get a text from a T-Mobile store in California asking us how our visit went. Turns out someone did the same thing - except this time they were successful. They used our upgrades with a fake ID to get two new iPhone 8's. They paid the $200 deposit and we would have been on the hook for the rest. Thankfully we caught it before they could transfer phone numbers or anything. We now have PWs for in-store and online purchases but this kind of fraud is easy because it doesn't require a credit check or anything; just a fake enough ID so that a store clerk (especially one on commission) will not ask too many questions. Worse is that the paperwork they give as receipts has a bunch of PII on it - address, phone numbers, account numbers, etc. And we have copies of everything because they keep it online.
 
Your account info is on every check you write. The info is there for the scamming.
 
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  • Scam artist sends your checking account a tax refund check for something like $550 via a mobile remote deposit (takes a photo of the check on a mobile phone)
  • The scammer then calls you before it clears and says he/she represents the IRS. They mistakenly sent you a check for $550 and you have to return it under penalty of law.
  • Victim sends the address $550. Which gets taken out of the account ASAP.
  • mRDC check for $550 is eventually denied, but too late for the victim that is already out the $550 check they wrote back to the “IRS”
Whatever happened to the Nigerian prince's inheritance bit? Those were the days my friend....
 
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Got a bill from our life insurance company the other month: interest due on a $50K loan on my policy, which I did not take out. We won't be on the hook but they did send me the loan application and there was enough of my information there to really worry us.
 
  • Scam artist sends your checking account a tax refund check for something like $550 via a mobile remote deposit (takes a photo of the check on a mobile phone)
  • The scammer then calls you before it clears and says he/she represents the IRS. They mistakenly sent you a check for $550 and you have to return it under penalty of law.
  • Victim sends the address $550. Which gets taken out of the account ASAP.
  • mRDC check for $550 is eventually denied, but too late for the victim that is already out the $550 check they wrote back to the “IRS”
Granted I am a Darwinist, but if you fall for that you deserve what you get.
 
  • Scam artist sends your checking account a tax refund check for something like $550 via a mobile remote deposit (takes a photo of the check on a mobile phone)
  • The scammer then calls you before it clears and says he/she represents the IRS. They mistakenly sent you a check for $550 and you have to return it under penalty of law.
  • Victim sends the address $550. Which gets taken out of the account ASAP.
  • mRDC check for $550 is eventually denied, but too late for the victim that is already out the $550 check they wrote back to the “IRS”
RULE # 1 with the IRS:

IRS always contacts you by letter first, never by phone. And by the time that happens, the check will have cleared if legit.

IRS has made that very clear. If people haven't learned that, well ......
 
Granted I am a Darwinist, but if you fall for that you deserve what you get.

These kind of things work with the elderly. Someone called my grandparents (in their 90s) posing as me last year. Said I was traveling, had been in an accident and needed cash and Apple gift cards. They came damn close to sending it. Manager at the Apple store had seen it before and wouldn’t sell them the cards.
 
How do they get your account number to make a deposit?
I dunno... Equifax?

I'm editing this because it pisses me off so fing much that we're required to be vetted by this 3 ring circus and they have access to every freaking bit of your life and bank data etc... and somehow, this bunch of aholes at Efax can not only F Up royally and screw us all over, they do so with impunity.

No punishment... just goes on with their business (of screwing us) and it comes out they never told the truth about how much they gave up to hackers (who barely had to do a damned thing to obtain the info... THAT bad was the security), which turned out to be far worse than they let on.

AND they have the audacity to want to charge us to help fix any glitches.

They make UM and the Pattycakes from NE look like choirboys.
 
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michael-scott-2.jpg
 
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I dunno... Equifax?

I'm editing this because it pisses me off so fing much that we're required to be vetted by this 3 ring circus and they have access to every freaking bit of your life and bank data etc... and somehow, this bunch of aholes at Efax can not only F Up royally and screw us all over, they do so with impunity.

No punishment... just goes on with their business (of screwing us) and it comes out they never told the truth about how much they gave up to hackers (who barely had to do a damned thing to obtain the info... THAT bad was the security), which turned out to be far worse than they let on.

AND they have the audacity to want to charge us to help fix any glitches.

They make UM and the Pattycakes from NE look like choirboys.

^^^ This. It's mind boggling. Nothing beats buying off politicians.
 
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I dunno... Equifax?

I'm editing this because it pisses me off so fing much that we're required to be vetted by this 3 ring circus and they have access to every freaking bit of your life and bank data etc... and somehow, this bunch of aholes at Efax can not only F Up royally and screw us all over, they do so with impunity.

No punishment... just goes on with their business (of screwing us) and it comes out they never told the truth about how much they gave up to hackers (who barely had to do a damned thing to obtain the info... THAT bad was the security), which turned out to be far worse than they let on.

AND they have the audacity to want to charge us to help fix any glitches.

They make UM and the Pattycakes from NE look like choirboys.

Preach on brother! The average joe can do everything right - complex passwords and changing them on a consistent basis, shredding documents with personal data, properly disposing of things like computer hard drives so they can't be tapped for data, etc. but when equifax gets breached, and faces no consequences or punitive fines for their negligence in keeping their data safe, it kind of makes you wonder what's the point of protecting your data at all. And as a kicker - the guy appointed to head the agency investigating the equifax breach just stopped the probe in its tracks.

Biggest breaches in the last few years:
Yahoo - 3 Billion!
Adult friend finder - 412 million
Equifax - 145 million and growing
eBay - 145 million
Target - 110 million
Anthem (Health Insurance) - 78 million - $115 million fine to pay for 2 years of credit monitoring. BFD since SSN are good for only 2 years right?
JP Morgan - 76 million
Home Depot - 56 million
Citigroup - 4.5 million
BlueCross/Shield - 10 million
 
I dunno... Equifax?

I'm editing this because it pisses me off so fing much that we're required to be vetted by this 3 ring circus and they have access to every freaking bit of your life and bank data etc... and somehow, this bunch of aholes at Efax can not only F Up royally and screw us all over, they do so with impunity.

No punishment... just goes on with their business (of screwing us) and it comes out they never told the truth about how much they gave up to hackers (who barely had to do a damned thing to obtain the info... THAT bad was the security), which turned out to be far worse than they let on.

AND they have the audacity to want to charge us to help fix any glitches.

They make UM and the Pattycakes from NE look like choirboys.

Kind of like a modern day "Brinks Job".

All the information is out there. Doesn't matter that it was taken from Equifax... they collected it from data you provided them.

The weak point is always the point of sale. Unfortunately now you get treated like a criminal first everywhere because of these scams.

Another scam which is popular in my area is for someone to call from the power company. Say you are behind on the bill.

They collect data on the bill from you (they ask you then repeat it) or others answering your phone.

Then they say your electric will be shut off and you need to pay immediately.

LdN
 
A couple of years ago, a guy called my wife's mom (in her early 80s) and said they were a policeman and her grandaughter had been arrested and she was making her one phone call. They put a little girl on the phone who franticly said that she got into trouble and please pay the police to get them to let her go. Also to please not call her parents because she'd be in such big trouble. The policeman gets on and gives them payment information.

My mother in law hung up and called me, in a state of panic. I was in the car with my daughter and convinced her that my daughter was with me and it was a scam.
 
RULE # 1 with the IRS:

IRS always contacts you by letter first, never by phone. And by the time that happens, the check will have cleared if legit.

IRS has made that very clear. If people haven't learned that, well ......
I always try to keep those idiots on the phone as long as possible. I ask them a bunch of "stupid" questions about the details of what I owe and would they accept a personal check, etc. Then I insist on getting a physical location at which to deliver the check because I want to make sure they get it. After a couple of minutes they get pissed off and tell me I'd better have a good attorney, which I assure them I do and he'd be willing to meet with them to discuss the issue. Eh, it's more entertaining for me than most of what's on tv. My goal is to try to get the scammers to hang up on me....I consider it a small victory.
 
Also, if you get a telephone call from the IRS its BULL$HIT anyway because they will not call you...or anyone
 
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A couple of years ago, a guy called my wife's mom (in her early 80s) and said they were a policeman and her grandaughter had been arrested and she was making her one phone call. They put a little girl on the phone who franticly said that she got into trouble and please pay the police to get them to let her go. Also to please not call her parents because she'd be in such big trouble. The policeman gets on and gives them payment information.

My mother in law hung up and called me, in a state of panic. I was in the car with my daughter and convinced her that my daughter was with me and it was a scam.

Obi,
I had one of these calls just last week. I am not sure why I was targeted since I am not on Facebook, Twitter, or Snapchat. It was a young sounding lady with a little bit of an Indian accent. She was going, "Granpa, Granpa, I am in trouble". Besides the accent, I am called "Grand Dad", not "Granpaw". And I only have grandsons who are too young to call. Although the trouble part is believable if messy diapers qualify. I just hung up. I used to curse people like this out, but I am now quiet. After all, they have my phone number.
 
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This will keep happening until the laws in this country change. Right now, if somebody takes credit in your name, it is entirely up to you to prove that it was not you. People giving credit really have very little to lose. Now if the burden of proof was shifted that they actually have to prove it was you that requested the credit, we would be much safer. It would be much harder to get credit so it would have some negative economic impacts but I really think we just need to bite the bullet on this one.

I know somebody that has had her identity stolen. A few times she just paid creditors sometimes thousands of dollars because it was cheaper and easier than to fight it.
 
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Obi,
I had one of these calls just last week. I am not sure why I was targeted since I am not on Facebook, Twitter, or Snapchat. It was a young sounding lady with a little bit of an Indian accent. She was going, "Granpa, Granpa, I am in trouble". Besides the accent, I am called "Grand Dad", not "Granpaw". And I only have grandsons who are too young to call. Although the trouble part is believable if messy diapers qualify. I just hung up. I used to curse people like this out, but I am now quiet. After all, they have my phone number.
Horrible....but I think this is just a numbers game. Phone numbers are pretty public as well as age....I think they just call old people and take a shot they have a g-son or g-daughter.
 
  • Scam artist sends your checking account a tax refund check for something like $550 via a mobile remote deposit (takes a photo of the check on a mobile phone)
  • The scammer then calls you before it clears and says he/she represents the IRS. They mistakenly sent you a check for $550 and you have to return it under penalty of law.
  • Victim sends the address $550. Which gets taken out of the account ASAP.
  • mRDC check for $550 is eventually denied, but too late for the victim that is already out the $550 check they wrote back to the “IRS”
This is an offshoot of the Craigslist scam where a 'buyer' sends you a check for more than the amount and asks you to wire the difference back...and then the original check is bogus. Some a-hole tried that on me and I had some fun with them.
 
I'm sorry, but LifeLock and similar services are scams too.

I have to laugh at the latest LifeLock commercials advertising a "dark web scan" for your pii. LOL

It really only works if someone is trying to use your SSN to get a line of credit or something.
 
It really only works if someone is trying to use your SSN to get a line of credit or something.

And even then.....it's still ridiculous.

Monitor all of your accounts regularly (daily if possible), make sure all of your accounts have some sort of fraud protection (most do already) setup, 2FA or pin numbers to login/do business, etc. Hell, even use Visa/Amex prepaid cards to do business online if you want.....but don't waste money on LifeLock or other similar garbage.

The bottom line is if someone wants your information, they're going to get it, and there's nothing you can do about it. My Visa was actually used last month in Ypsilanti, MI to purchase $66 worth of gas at a Speedway gas station. The CC company notified me the very second it hit as a pending transaction, and within 5 minutes, the card was canceled, money was "refunded", and a new card was on its way.
 
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Got a bill from our life insurance company the other month: interest due on a $50K loan on my policy, which I did not take out. We won't be on the hook but they did send me the loan application and there was enough of my information there to really worry us.
Sorry to hear that Jim.

We got a letter from the Chase fraud dept. recently. Someone, through the 10,000 hacks and info loss from the Cle. Clinic, Equifax, and so many other I'm surprised I have not seen my info here by now. DOB/SS#/Address, all of it.
Chase sent a CC to a man in Missouri who changed our address to one in that state and put a $10 charge on our acct. a week before we were notified.

Why they would take a totally different name, state, address, etc. and send him a credit card tied to our acct. is beyond me. They canceled the card immediately and issued new ones but that doesn't explain how someone we don't know got into our acct. They blamed us for a Yahoo email hack but there are no Yahoo irregularities so far (now over a full month) and I think Chase is copping excuses for hack into their system. This is the new way we can expect to be abused by criminals. No longer opening new accts. with our info but tagging onto our accts. Beware guys.
 
And even then.....it's still ridiculous.

Monitor all of your accounts regularly (daily if possible), make sure all of your accounts have some sort of fraud protection (most do already) setup 2FA or pin numbers to login/do business, etc. Hell, even use Visa/Amex prepaid cards to do business online if you want.....but don't waste money on LifeLock or other similar garbage.

The bottom line is if someone wants your information, they're going to get it, and there's nothing you can do about it. My Visa was actually used last month in Ypsilanti, MI to purchase $66 worth of gas at a Speedway gas station. The CC company notified me the very second it hit as a pending transaction, and within 5 minutes, the card was canceled, money was "refunded", and a new card was on its way.

I think it is more difficult than you think.

A person gets your SSN and opens a CC with a different address and mobile phone number. You have no idea until you see, down the road, that your credit rating has been hurt. That is the whole reason behind life lock...they monitor your SSN being used and try to be proactive.
 
If you have an elderly parent being preyed upon by telemarketers, or worse, you might consider getting rid of the land line and getting them a cell. Having a land line is a tip off to predators that an older person lives there, anyway. In any event we must be on guard constantly because, as my mother in law says to my horror, he sounded so nice on the phone or, even worse, he wore a nice suit.
 
And everything lifelock does is something you can easily do on your own.

The best and easiest thing I’ve done is set up purchase alerts for my CC’s for any transaction over a dollar. Tells you if the purchase was made in person or not too.
 
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Someone actually tried to impersonate my FIL and called Wells Fargo to try to gain access to his accounts. That’s pretty ballsy. This after at least two fraudulent $500+ online charges on his WF CC.
 
Someone actually tried to impersonate my FIL and called Wells Fargo to try to gain access to his accounts. That’s pretty ballsy. This after at least two fraudulent $500+ online charges on his WF CC.
I've had my care stolen several times. The reason is because it is a travel card (airline card to get the miles). Several steals have been done by waiters at restaurants. What the guy/gal does is steal the card in, say, Washington DC. They then exchange numbers with a counterpart in LA. Then your card gets used in LA. When you report it to the police, they aren't going to travel to LA to try and arrest someone for jacking $500 of card purchases. And the LA police aren't going to go to Washington.
 
They can get your phone number and account number off of a check. Just another reason to stop writing checks.
Hack into utility companies.. people routinely use their bank routing/acct numbers... and if you hack there, you pick up all kinds of other goodies.. one stop shopping. Unless the company is using encryption... of course, it's been presumed companies ARE using E and in many instances, they are not.
 
I think it is more difficult than you think.

A person gets your SSN and opens a CC with a different address and mobile phone number. You have no idea until you see, down the road, that your credit rating has been hurt. That is the whole reason behind life lock...they monitor your SSN being used and try to be proactive.

Obli, I'm not trying to be combative, but LifeLock is a scam. You can request fraud alerts/credit freezes at each of the 3 major firms, monitor accounts yourself, and there's literally no point to the "dark web scan" LifeLock advertises.

If it makes you feel better to pay $20+ or whatever it costs per month, by all means go for it--piece of mind is worth something I suppose.
 
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Obli, I'm not trying to be combative, but LifeLock is a scam. You can request fraud alerts/credit freezes at each of the 3 major firms, monitor accounts yourself, and there's literally no point to the "dark web scan" LifeLock advertises.

If it makes you feel better to pay $20+ or whatever it costs per month, by all means go for it--piece of mind is worth something I suppose.
I agree on Lifelock...it is a scam. What lifelock does it create a single place, which makes is a tiny bit easier....but there are tons of those kinds of scams out there. Just watch any infomercial....
 
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