Tax return and other tax related identity theft is a growing problem that CPAs can help their clients with. The IRS is trying to combat the fraud from their number one worst problem even though the proposed ways are extremely ambitious for many smaller businesses to comply with. Currently the IRS just doesn’t have enough resources to help thwart this problem, which is why it is up to CPAs to help inform their clients about the growing problem. CPAs can help their clients to take preventative actions and corrective actions after theft has happened.
Tax return identity theft occurs when a thief acquires another taxpayers Social Security number. The thief then files for false claims to refunds or other credits. Normally thieves will file early in the tax return filing season, usually before the IRS has received supporting documentation, to prevent information matching and avoid receiving duplicate return notices from the IRS. Taxpayers discover that they may be victims of theft when they receive a notice from the IRS stating more than one tax return was filed with their information.
Tax return identity theft grew to more than 2 million cases in 2011 from 51,000 in 2008. Tax return identity theft has resulted into $5.2 billion in false refunds. The previously mentioned statistics have grown, as expected, exponentially.
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The electronic filing method provides an electronic postmark confirmation that a return has been filed on time. Now refunds can arrive in as little as 7 days, which is great for the taxpayers that honestly deserve it. Since filing and preparing have become electronic, “…businesses like the do it yourself tax software programs (H&R Block’s Tax Software and Intuits’ Turbo Tax) have made it even easier for identity thieves to file false returns”
Identity theft has been a problem facing police departments recently. It is a crime in which someone obtains and uses another person's personal information in a way that involves fraud. In the United States and Canada, for example, many people have reported that unauthorized people have taken money out of their bank. In 1998 Congress made identity theft a federal offense to therefore create stricter penalties for these criminals.
Ms. Synder advised she contacted the IRS and learned an income tax return was filed using her name and social security number ending in 8131 and her husband`s name and social security number ending in 6092 approximately one week prior to 01/25/2016. They were unable to learn any further details about the fraudulent income tax return.
Tax fraud is the major problem in the country we live in today. Every second of the day you will find someone committing these illegal activities. This is affecting the economy. Think about the use of the taxes we pay are being use in the economy. In times of a fire or a robbery who do we call? That’s right, we call 911. Without taxes these wouldn’t be available for us. We can also think about the road and highway that get us to our destination in a flash, we have our taxes to thank for this. People will just still your identity and social security number just to commit t tax fraud on you. This can affect the community in many ways. First the economy will drop then businesses will stop making profit. Now this is bad for employer, because companies
Having this name in the hands of police, they will still assume the victim as a criminal and issue a warrant for the victim’s arrest. It can be difficult for a criminal identity theft victim to clear their record. The steps required to clear the victim's incorrect criminal record depends on what jurisdiction the crime occurred in and whether the true identity of the criminal can be determined. (“Identity Theft” 1)
According to the report, “the IRS reported that it identified 42,148 tax returns with $227 million claimed in fraudulent refunds and prevented the issuance of $180.6 million (79.6 percent) of those refunds (McKenney). The report then further dives into the information and shares that this number has decreased continually for the past two years due to their expanded efforts to prevent the returns from entering the processing system. The Treasury Department shares that they have been able to refine a system to locate deceased individuals, which resulted in the closing of 30.4 million tax profiles in 2016 alone. This is just one small segment into the additional features that the IRS is implementing into their early detection fraud systems. With the expansion of artificial intelligence, the IRS is able to have an Electronic Fraud Detection Program that learns and is able to evaluate lapses in information and determine the validity of a genuine tax return, and a very similar fake one. Additionally, the report shares that the IRS has limited the number of direct deposit refunds that can be sent to a single bank account – limiting those looking to defraud the system.
EThe Federal tax code of the United States mandates that every U.S. citizen receiving income who meets a minimum income threshold is required to complete and file a federal income tax return prepared in accordance with a complex set of Federal codes (Internal Revenue Service [IRS], 1974; Publication 17 [Pub.17], 2015). This tax preparation model relies upon the principal-agent theory to ensure taxpayer participation. In this system, the government, as the principal, requires the taxpayer, as the agent, to voluntarily submit a compliant return. Accordingly, anyone acting on behalf of the taxpayer becomes the taxpayer’s agent.
In the past several years, technology advancement has made individuals identity more susceptible to be stolen. I find this topic to be very interesting because I have had my identity compromised. Several years ago when I was nineteen I was completing credit reports on several popular credit reporting websites. Each time I would finish answering the questions and putting all of my personal information into the website I would be directed to another questionnaire where I would be asked to list properties that I had owned, if I lived in a certain location, and if I knew certain people. I did not know any of these locations or individuals that the website would list. Being nineteen and naïve I would just take the incident as something being wrong with the website or just a minor error on my part. A few months went by I was filing my taxes like the year previous. I had no problems occur and everything seemed to be good. About a week later I was at work, and the Internal Revenue Service had called. I was extremely nervous. The IRS had called to tell me that my identity needed to be confirmed. I thought this was really strange. So while this was going on my tax return was just at a standstill. I was so aggravated, between the calls with my tax preparer and the IRS, I thought it was never going to be resolved. During this time, my bank had been trying to reach me, but the bank had the wrong information on file. One day I was sent a letter in the mail that informed me that my last
“Have you ever had a little brother or sister go through all of your belongings and find money and end up stealing it, knowing they were doing wrong. Just because this happened to you when you were younger does not mean that it can not happen to you when you are an adult. A Boston-area psychiatrist, for example, forfeited $1.3 million and was sentenced to several years in federal prison following his late-1990s conviction on 136 counts of mail fraud, money laundering and witness intimidation related to his fraudulent billing of several health insurers for psychiatric therapy sessions that never took place-using the names and insurance information of many people whom he actually had never met, let alone treated. (He also went so far as to write fictitious longhand session notes to ensure phony backup for his phony claims.)”(Webinar) Fraud is something that can happen on any level where a crime can be committed by a person, knowing they are doing it and still getting away with it or by accident knowing that their actions were innocuous, either way fraud is fraud and as sad as it is to say, it happens every day by millions of people, not just the IRS. “Few attempts have been made to actually see how
Identity Theft – especially around tax time, is at the top of the list. The IRS continues aggressive pursuit of criminals who file fraudulent returns using someone else’s Social Security number. Remain vigilant to avoid becoming a victim.
Unless fraud was deliberately committed by the individual, there is no reason to panic. The letter should be carefully read in order to understand what the IRS wants and then collecting this information.
In this tax season, when billions of dollars and tons of personal information is relayed to and from the government, it's more than disconcerting to hear that the Internal Revenue Service is still struggling to keep private information secure.
Another scam involves impersonating the Internal Revenue Service through the United States Postal Service. In this scam, the perpetrator attempts to obtain the victim’s Social Security information. If successful, the perpetrator uses this information to file the victim’s annual tax return and receive any refund that the individual is entitled to.
Especially in today?s times anyone can be a victim of identity theft. It is a crime that can happen anywhere at any
For a business firm, the services of the professional accountants are essential. A proficient accountant has the most recent data in regards to taxation and advertising strategies. Numerous
Identity thefts is a crime in which a thief steals someone's personal information for example, their name, address, credit card, social number to make use of it for their own, the thief can get medical services, purchase things with someone else's money and use of their identity in an atrocious way. When being a victim of identity theft will have consequences like having financial