So I come home from work and lay down and I'm kind of half napping, half vegging out when my phone rings. Not one of my contacts, unrecognized number/area code but, I'm curious; so I answer.
A woman with an Indian accent begins speaking saying she's calling from the IRS and says that they've found problems with my past tax-returns that's resulted in a large underpayment and penalties. I cannot contest the fees or fight them, they're due and if I fail to pay I could lose my driver's license (?!) and be subject to lose of assets, possessions and see jail-time.
As she's saying all of this I'm just giving sort-of answers like, "I see," "okay", "I understand," etc.
She has a good grasp of English, a few syntax errors but nothing that couldn't be chalked up to just mis-speaking and not due to her lack of command of the English language. In the background I hear what sounds like a TV playing, loudly.
She says I need to set-up payment for the fees right away and offers to transfer to me her supervisor to make the payment arrangements. I hang up. I was playing along and wanted to go one but lost interest quickly.
The underpayment was supposedly several thousand dollars. Incredible considering I'm single, short-form, use standard deductions, have filed 0 at my job and have no meaningful assets to be taxed.
Obviously a phishing scam. A reverse-look up of the number find it to be a Washington, D.C. area code and the exchange connect to a mobile carrier. IRS my ass, they're more likely to first contact you using the mail than they are a phone number.
Looking up the number on-line also turns up others reporting this number trying to pull the same, or similar, scams.
It's amazing to me that there must be some people out there who fall for this stuff. I suppose the very elderly and the very young and naive are more susceptible but that still means a great deal of people who'd fall for this and likely would've gone on with the scam and given out critical personal information.
Anyone else have similar experiences with phishing scams over the phone? Sometimes it's really odd to me what the phishers thing they can get away with. I swear with the TV in the background I heard children noises or other conversation. Any time I've spoken with someone from a call center it's a pretty quite conversation without much if any background noise.
A woman with an Indian accent begins speaking saying she's calling from the IRS and says that they've found problems with my past tax-returns that's resulted in a large underpayment and penalties. I cannot contest the fees or fight them, they're due and if I fail to pay I could lose my driver's license (?!) and be subject to lose of assets, possessions and see jail-time.
As she's saying all of this I'm just giving sort-of answers like, "I see," "okay", "I understand," etc.
She has a good grasp of English, a few syntax errors but nothing that couldn't be chalked up to just mis-speaking and not due to her lack of command of the English language. In the background I hear what sounds like a TV playing, loudly.
She says I need to set-up payment for the fees right away and offers to transfer to me her supervisor to make the payment arrangements. I hang up. I was playing along and wanted to go one but lost interest quickly.
The underpayment was supposedly several thousand dollars. Incredible considering I'm single, short-form, use standard deductions, have filed 0 at my job and have no meaningful assets to be taxed.
Obviously a phishing scam. A reverse-look up of the number find it to be a Washington, D.C. area code and the exchange connect to a mobile carrier. IRS my ass, they're more likely to first contact you using the mail than they are a phone number.
Looking up the number on-line also turns up others reporting this number trying to pull the same, or similar, scams.
It's amazing to me that there must be some people out there who fall for this stuff. I suppose the very elderly and the very young and naive are more susceptible but that still means a great deal of people who'd fall for this and likely would've gone on with the scam and given out critical personal information.
Anyone else have similar experiences with phishing scams over the phone? Sometimes it's really odd to me what the phishers thing they can get away with. I swear with the TV in the background I heard children noises or other conversation. Any time I've spoken with someone from a call center it's a pretty quite conversation without much if any background noise.
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Frankly the people who perpetrate these scams are scum.
