WASHINGTON — Fake IRS agents have targeted more than 366,000 people with harassing phone calls demanding payments and threatening jail in the largest scam of its kind in the history of the agency, a federal investigator said Thursday.
More than 3,000 people have fallen for the ruse since 2013, said Timothy Camus, a Treasury deputy inspector general for tax administration. They were conned out of a total of $15.5 million. The scam has claimed victims in almost every state, Camus said. One unidentified victim lost more than $500,000.
The scam is so widespread that investigators think there is more than one group of perpetrators, including some overseas.
“The criminals do not discriminate. They are calling people everywhere, of all income levels and backgrounds,” Camus told the Senate Finance Committee at a hearing. “The callers often warned the victims that if they hung up, local police would come to their homes to arrest them.”
