HMRC impersonation scams are getting increasingly sophisticated and scammers have ramped up their activity during the pandemic.
Social engineering is about exploiting your emotions. Scammers and con artists identify psychological weaknesses and work them in order to get the information they need to take what they want from you. It’s why so many phishing scams play on greed or curiosity. It’s also why they play on fear.
Scammers pose as HMRC for this reason. Scams either promising a tax rebate or threatening legal action over unpaid taxes have become very common in recent months. The second approach, preying on people’s fears, has been particularly successful, and the scams are getting increasingly sophisticated and believable.
Getting to grips with AML: tax advice icaew.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from icaew.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Getting to grips with AML: asset transfers 26 January 2021: Instalment four of ‘Anti-money Laundering: The Basics’ focuses on asset transfers – how an accountant can avoid becoming complicit in hiding the proceeds of crime through the movement of assets.
Using the proceeds of crime to buy or transfer assets, thereby distancing the money from the illegal activity, are a classic means by which criminals cover their tracks.
The fourth instalment of IFAC’s and ICAEW’s AML series warns that professional accountants can inadvertently help criminals move the proceeds of crime by structuring an asset transfer or providing tax advice on transactions.
HMRC flags self assessment scam surge 7 January 2021: As the 31 January deadline for self assessment tax returns approaches, accountants and their clients are being warned of a flood in scams purporting to be from HMRC – and warning that if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
As HMRC issues thousands of SMS messages and emails as part of its annual self assessment tax return push, the department has warned taxpayers completing their returns to avoid being caught out by a rise in fraudsters using calls, emails or texts to offer fake ‘tax rebates’ or ‘tax refunds’.
Fraudulent HMRC communications have already become commonplace. In the last 12 months, the tax authority has responded to more than 846,000 referrals of suspicious HMRC contact from the public and reported over 15,500 malicious webpages to internet service providers.