4/12/2016 – A Real-Life Tax Scam: This Is What IRS Phone Fraud Sounds Like

The Internal Revenue Service says it’s seeing a surge in phone scams. More than 5,000 victims have been duped out of $26.5 million since late 2013. It’s hard to know what exactly con artists are thinking when they target their victims. But now, we know what they are saying. Pindrop Security, an Atlanta-based company that investigates phone fraud, recently gave NPR a recording. It’s a grueling conversation, more than an hour long, between an active fraud ring and a presumed victim, who is in reality a Pindrop researcher. Pindrop set up honeypots — dummy phone numbers, some of which are entered into online raffles (win a free iPhone, anyone?) that are run by criminal rings. Pindrop has traced at least 28 fraud incidents to this specific ring.

Read the full NPR story here.