IRS Identity Theft Scams Target Students With No “Federal Student Tax”

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More and more students and their parents are victims of an ongoing phone scam. In this scheme, thieves pose as IRS officials over the phone, demanding payment of federal student taxes that do not exist.

Over the past three years, taxpayers have lost over $ 49 million in IRS Identity Theft Scams. Caissie Davis, a senior at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut, usually doesn’t answer unrecognized calls, but on the second ring the crooks grabbed her, threatening her with arrest and even the possibility of losing her college degree. if she didn’t pay. , reports CBS News correspondent Michelle Miller.


The tax filing season officially began on Tuesday, w …

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Davis thought she knew better, but the journalism major from Quinnipiac joined the growing list of students scammed by bogus IRS agents.

Calling from a fake number that billed itself as a local police station and armed with her personal information, the scammer threatened to be arrested if she didn’t pay $ 2,900 for a federal student tax – a tax that did not ‘does not exist.

And while she may have been tricked into giving them money, her bank’s fraud alert system was not, warning her father, Billy Davis, who manages her account. That’s when he started texting her, frantically.

“They had me really wrapped around their finger believing every word they said,” Davis said.

Davis thought she knew better, but the journalism major from Quinnipiac joined the growing list of students scammed by bogus IRS imposters.

“I knew deep down it was really weird, but they kept giving me proof,” Davis said. “The number they were calling from was Hamden Police. They told me all my information, my address here and at home.

“So, have they done some research on you?” Miller asked.

“Yeah, sure. Like, way beyond digging,” Davis said.

Calling from a fake number that billed itself as a local police station and armed with her personal information, the crooks threatened to be arrested if she didn’t pay $ 2,900 for a federal student tax – a tax that didn’t does not exist.

“Basically they told me either fix this or your life is somehow ended,” Davis said.

And while she may have been tricked into giving them money, her bank’s fraud alert system was not, warning her father, Billy Davis, who manages her account. That’s when he started texting her, frantically.

“I just felt something was really wrong,” her father said.

Billy couldn’t reach the Caisse because her crooks kept her on the phone for four hours. She walked about 30 miles through various stores, paying in an unusual way – $ 2,000 on one gift card and $ 500 on another.

The crooks added additional fees that they claimed she owed. In total, she handed out $ 7,900 in gift cards for Target and iTunes.

During the ordeal, his father could only watch, helplessly, the fraud alerts.

“As a father, a parent, not being able to help your child,” Miller said.

“It hurts,” Billy Davis said.

“They are very persuasive, they are also very aggressive. So they tend to intimidate people into staying on the phone, ”IRS spokesperson Anny Pachner said. She said the only way to thwart attackers was to educate the public.

“What is most important for you to protect yourself from becoming a victim is knowing the signs,” Pachner said.

For example, the IRS does not call to request money in a specific form over the phone. They do not threaten immediate arrest and will never request credit cards with personal information over the phone.

Davis Credit Union said she was embarrassed but wanted others to learn from her mistake.

“If I could spare someone the mental strain and financial burden I went through, I would be completely honored to do so,” Davis said.

Police said they couldn’t find the cashier’s crooks because this type of thief usually demands payment through methods that cannot be found. The latest trend is gift cards. How it works? Victims are ordered to scratch the back of the card and read the sequence of numbers.

As the Caisse has learned the hard way, there is no way to track these purchases. Caisse said that when being told to pay in gift cards a red flag was raised, the scammer had an elaborate explanation for everything and she was too afraid not to comply.

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