I got the same call on Friday afternoon, at 4:50 Omaha time, which would be 10 minutes til 6 east coast time. What made me think the call was fraudulent was the fact that the caller said she was from the Internal Revenue Services (Services, plural). She also referred to a lawsuit and said it was the final notice and that I must call 571-290-2051 immediately.
Caller showed up as "Private caller" in caller ID. The message said that the IRS was filing a lawsuit against me and to call them back at 571-290-2051. On the IRS website http://www.irs.gov/uac/Newsroom/IRS-Repeats-Warning-about-Phone-Scams, it states that "Taxpayers should remember their first contact with the IRS will not be a call from out of the blue, but through official correspondence sent through the mail."
This appears to be phishing aimed at either gaining personal info (SSN) or collecting money directly.
This is a Pakistan or India based IRS scam. Do not fall for it. The IRS does not initiate any legal action via phone.
Read http://www.treasury.gov/tigta/press/press_tigta-2014-03.htm
As general background information, here are a few things you can do:
1) Report it to TIGTA under http://www.treasury.gov/tigta/contact_report_scam.shtml especially if you have become a victim (lost money, gave personal information etc.). You can also file a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission at ftc.gov/complaint (include “IRS Telephone Scam" in your complaint). This way you can also help the government establish specific fraud patterns.
2) Help kill their phone lines but not by calling them back directly (the number may be spoofed and repeat calls by you may - under exceptional circumstances- amount to harassment). The scammers use Voice over IP lines (e.g. magicJack (Ymax corporation)) to make it seem as if they are calling from the US. This is always against these companys' terms of service and can lead to immediate termination of their contract and blocking of their IP addresses for future attempts to register. Do a reverse look up of their telephone number (e.g. www.whitepages.com) to identify the Voice over IP provider and report it to the company and/or law enforcement (local police and/or state attorney general)
3) If you are really annoyed: call or write to your representative in Congress. As these scams happen all over the country maybe this will trigger a reaction and provide US law enforcement agencies with the political backing and the resources they need to work in India and Pakistan together with local authorities (it can happen, read: http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/ex-call-cen ... mmission-320427). A US task force has already been set up in Jamaica to nab scammers there (see http://www.ice.gov/doclib/news/library/reports/cornerstone/cornerstone7-1.pdf). You can use the following template for your letter (more powerful!) or email:
I got the same call on Friday afternoon, at 4:50 Omaha time, which would be 10 minutes til 6 east coast time. What made me think the call was fraudulent was the fact that the caller said she was from the Internal Revenue Services (Services, plural). She also referred to a lawsuit and said it was the final notice and that I must call 571-290-2051 immediately.
I just got the same call. Threatened a federal lawsuit and arrest by local sheriff if I didn't call them immediately at 571-290-2051. Clearly a male Indian or [***], Middle Eastern accent and the call was very garbled. Funny thing is my phone never rang. The call went straight to voice mail and the caller started talking before the call started recording so I don't know if he has my name or not or if he identified himself as the IRS.