• We’re currently investigating an issue related to the forum theme and styling that is impacting page layout and visual formatting. The problem has been identified, and we are actively working on a resolution. There is no impact to user data or functionality, this is strictly a front-end display issue. We’ll post an update once the fix has been deployed. Thanks for your patience while we get this sorted.

So I called back an IRS scam call - talked to this guy in India.

Zeze

Zeze

Lifer
This AM I received a call from 'unknown number' on my cell. It was an automated message saying that I'm in trouble with IRS for tax evasion. The message instructed me to call 214-275-9484. Since my day was slow in the afternoon, I called that number back posing as a aloof guy.

A live person answered with an accent. He said he was Officer Steve Mercer (LOL) with IRS and I was under criminal investigation for tax evasion. He also threw in a bunch of thinly-veiled scripted lines such as:

"The IRS has launched a confidential investigation against you, that's why you didn't receive any mails."
"I am a federal officer. If you are an honest person, you will be listening to my instruction."
"Over the course of last 5 years, you have failed to pay $5480 dollars with fees and penalties."

After about 15 minutes, he grew impatient with me acting scared but dumb. At one point, he said, "You want to learn how to say 'f your sister' in Hindi?" He realized jig was up. I didn't want to berate him. He probably gets that all day and he would just hang up. I was just interested what kind of person he was.

I asked him how much he was making. He said $25K usd/week. (LOL) I asked why are you doing this? You sound like a well-spoken guy. Do you have family? You obviously know you're hurting people.

He lives in Delhi, "you know? capital of India." He's doing this from home. Yes he does have family, and a girlfriend he wishes to marry in few years. No, no one knows that he's doing this kind of job. Yes he can try to find a legitimate job, but he'd be making chump change in rupees. He needs money because he has stage 2 bone cancer on his left collar bone (lol), and he's undergoing chemo.

I told him he may be hurting people who have cancer like him. He said no, when he receives credit card information and balance, he knows they're not poor. He's just taking only $5,000. I said, dude, that's a LOT of money to me. He kind of talked in circles after that. I guess that's his justification.

I told him I work with people that are from India - very smart people. And he was making Indian people look bad. He kind of grew quiet and said "yea...". I told to have a nice day and he wished me the same.
 
There are enough of these calls recorded on Youtube, if you wanted to save yourself some time. Granted, maybe it's not as entertaining, if calling scammers is your cup of tea.
 
Crono said:
There are enough of these calls recorded on Youtube, if you wanted to save yourself some time. Granted, maybe it's not as entertaining, if calling scammers is your cup of tea.
Click to expand...
I wanted to see who this very person was. What kind of world he's in - the things he deals with, etc.

I was pretty surprised he kind of opened up to me.
 
I had a rather interesting conversation with one too but it involved a lot of swearing directed at me. Was one of those fake MS tech support scammers and I played along with him for a while then called him out on the scam.

I also noticed that if you tell them you run windows 3.1 they hang up on you. Would be hilarious to get one to actually remote into an old system like that. I did have one remote into a regular XP VM, but I trottled the connection speed to dialup. I kept complaining to him about how slow my computer was and to please make it faster. I loaded that VM up with a ridiculous amount of spyware.
 
when i was a teenager i played a telemarketer along once for about 10-15 minutes, then yelled some dumb line and hung up

then i felt really stupid about it, and just say "no thanks" and hang up immediately ever since
 
Last edited:
It's fun to lead on telemarketers for a bit, then just stop talking and see how many times they say "hello?". Or just play a random youtube video like an ISIS explosion with allah akbars being yelled.

"Just a minute" RATATATATATATATATA ALLAH AKBAR!! "Yeah I'm going to have to let you go" *explosion*
 
I've received about 25 of these calls in the last 3 months. Yes, it's a known scam and the best thing to do is just erase the message from the answering machine. Interesting that you got to talk to the scammer but doubt it will stop him from pursuing future scams. Hopefully, the American public ... or at least those who actually pay an income tax will become saturated with information so that they brush these threats off without thinking ...
 
The scary part about these scams is that it is likely for someone to perhaps ignore a REAL call of that nature, then they end up actually being arrested because they thought it was a scam. It's kinda like fake lawsuit emails and such. I don't even look twice at those, but if a real one came in and I ignored it, then I automatically lose the lawsuit for not showing up to court on the prescribed date. Heck that would be an easy way to win a lawsuit you word the summons email to be rather sketchy sounding so the person thinks it's a scam. I wonder if you can fight that though if you run your own mail server. Erase all logs and traces and then there is no proof you ever even got it. AKA Hillary Clinton style. 😛
 
Red Squirrel said:
The scary part about these scams is that it is likely for someone to perhaps ignore a REAL call of that nature, then they end up actually being arrested because they thought it was a scam. It's kinda like fake lawsuit emails and such. I don't even look twice at those, but if a real one came in and I ignored it, then I automatically lose the lawsuit for not showing up to court on the prescribed date. Heck that would be an easy way to win a lawsuit you word the summons email to be rather sketchy sounding so the person thinks it's a scam. I wonder if you can fight that though if you run your own mail server. Erase all logs and traces and then there is no proof you ever even got it. AKA Hillary Clinton style. 😛
Click to expand...


Err no, all legal matters are through registered mail. I have had court police show up to my door trying to deliver a summon to previous owners.
 
sdifox said:
Err no, all legal matters are through registered mail. I have had court police show up to my door trying to deliver a summon to previous owners.
Click to expand...

What about online based lawsuits though, ex: you host a website and someone wants to sue you because something you post hurt their feelings and you can sue for anything in the states. The only contact they may have is your email.
 
Who knows. Maybe the guy was lying to you and your recorded voice will be used against you and other paranoid stuff. Or maybe you connected to a real person and caused him to take a look at what he was doing and perhaps leverage that to make a change.

I know one thing, swearing at him and threatening him wouldn't work. If someone is redeemable, change happens because someone with genuine interest gives them the benefit of the doubt and helps them see something different to aspire to.
 
Red Squirrel said:
What about online based lawsuits though, ex: you host a website and someone wants to sue you because something you post hurt their feelings and you can sue for anything in the states. The only contact they may have is your email.
Click to expand...

still comes through mail

you cannot sue someone's email addr
 
Red Squirrel said:
What about online based lawsuits though, ex: you host a website and someone wants to sue you because something you post hurt their feelings and you can sue for anything in the states. The only contact they may have is your email.
Click to expand...

That's a cease and desist (or other non-legal communication/documentation) that's usually sent via email, not service of a lawsuit. If they have your email address, they have to contact the email provider, ISP, registrar, etc depending on the situation and find out the person and physical address to pursue litigation.
 
Last edited:
WilliamM2 said:
Use it against you how? They don't even know who you are.
Click to expand...

There is a scam going around where if you answer the phone, they ask a simple question and the act of you saying yes is enough to be used against you. Basically it becomes legally binding as you having agreed to some kind of service where they charge your credit card or w/e. I presume they have all the rest of they info they need thanks to the fact that companies don't care about your privacy and just sell info to the highest bidder, or allow it to leak (ex: Equifax).
 
Crono said:
That's a cease and desist (or other non-legal communication/documentation) that's usually sent via email, not service of a lawsuit. If they have your email address, they have to contact the email provider, ISP, registrar, etc depending on the situation and find out the person and physical address to pursue litigation.
Click to expand...

Hmm that's good to know. So whois privacy + host your own email and you're probably more or less safe. 😀 Though I guess if they go after the registrar they are probably obliged by law to spill the info to them.
 
Zeze said:
This AM I received a call from 'unknown number' on my cell. It was an automated message saying that I'm in trouble with IRS for tax evasion. The message instructed me to call 214-275-9484. Since my day was slow in the afternoon, I called that number back posing as a aloof guy.

A live person answered with an accent. He said he was Officer Steve Mercer (LOL) with IRS and I was under criminal investigation for tax evasion. He also threw in a bunch of thinly-veiled scripted lines such as:

"The IRS has launched a confidential investigation against you, that's why you didn't receive any mails."
"I am a federal officer. If you are an honest person, you will be listening to my instruction."
"Over the course of last 5 years, you have failed to pay $5480 dollars with fees and penalties."

After about 15 minutes, he grew impatient with me acting scared but dumb. At one point, he said, "You want to learn how to say 'f your sister' in Hindi?" He realized jig was up. I didn't want to berate him. He probably gets that all day and he would just hang up. I was just interested what kind of person he was.

I asked him how much he was making. He said $25K usd/week. (LOL) I asked why are you doing this? You sound like a well-spoken guy. Do you have family? You obviously know you're hurting people.

He lives in Delhi, "you know? capital of India." He's doing this from home. Yes he does have family, and a girlfriend he wishes to marry in few years. No, no one knows that he's doing this kind of job. Yes he can try to find a legitimate job, but he'd be making chump change in rupees. He needs money because he has stage 2 bone cancer on his left collar bone (lol), and he's undergoing chemo.

I told him he may be hurting people who have cancer like him. He said no, when he receives credit card information and balance, he knows they're not poor. He's just taking only $5,000. I said, dude, that's a LOT of money to me. He kind of talked in circles after that. I guess that's his justification.

I told him I work with people that are from India - very smart people. And he was making Indian people look bad. He kind of grew quiet and said "yea...". I told to have a nice day and he wished me the same.
Click to expand...


There are videos where a guy starts talking to a girl, gets a sob story, she is quitting the next day, blah, blah, blah. The next day they call back and she answers. Do not believe a word they say, its not the first person to go into a sob story, act all nice etc. Just search youtube for IRS scammers, heck even watch tech scammer videos also.
 
This dude ZeeZee talks shit to people in america under the beliefe they're actually in india, takes hi res photos of big piles of dirt and his wife's hot ..... wtf am i doin wrong here 😵
 
Capt Caveman said:
Stupid to even speak to them, if they record your voice they can edit it to say that you said yes to something and then screw you over.
Click to expand...


Yeah, I've read that voice can be altered and in fact someone's voice can be altered in a video. It's gonna get to the point where you can't trust audio as evidence. Well, I think audio as evidence is pretty iffy right now anyways.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

TRENDING THREADS

Back
Top