Scammers beware: We WILL find you
LIKE many Mail readers, I was horrified to watch a video of a man smirking as he threatened a vulnerable person with calling the police unless they paid thousands of pounds in a ludicrous scam.
It makes my blood boil to see people conned out of their life savings by criminals posing as HMRC.
People should be confident that the money they set aside for their taxes is going towards supporting our schools, hospitals and other vital public services.
As the Government minister in charge of HMRC, I’m determined to continue using every power in our arsenal to stop fraudsters in their tracks and keep your hardearned money safe. These scammers think they can get away with it because they are calling from overseas. But they should think again: my message to them is that wherever you are, we will find you and put an end to your grubby schemes.
HMRC has been actively working against scammers for years.
Working with industry, we have already introduced ways of protecting people against scam texts and phishing emails and our experts now have their sights set on defeating phone scams, using cutting-edge technology to track down scammers and ensure they’re brought to justice.
HMRC staff have contacts with law enforcement agencies around the world, meaning no one is beyond their reach. I’ve specifically asked them to look into the details presented by the Mail, and we will be pressing our counterparts abroad to take the very toughest response.
Fighting scammers, fraudsters and money launderers is a relentless battle, but the good news is we’re making significant progress. Last year, we shut down 14,000 fake websites and disconnected 450 phone lines belonging to crooks. Over half of these types of scams are now shut down before potential victims can be duped. Our swift action against email and text phishing scams has meant a rising number of criminals are turning to high-pressure methods to reach their victims.
Increasingly, our intelligence suggests fraudsters are aggressively cold-calling honest people on their home landlines and hassling them until they hand over money. This is totally unacceptable.
While the Government will continue to hunt the fraudsters down, we can’t do it alone. Here are a few quick steps you can take to protect yourself and others from fraud.
FIRST, look out for the signs it’s a scam. Genuine organisations don’t call out of the blue. I can assure you that HMRC will only ever call you asking for payment of a debt if you have already received a letter about it or because you’ve told us you owe some tax, for example through your Self-Assessment return.
Second, keep your details safe – don’t give out private information, don’t respond to aggressive callers and don’t download attachments or click on links in emails you weren’t expecting.
Third, if you do receive a call to your landline out of the blue from someone claiming to be from HMRC who threatens legal action or prison if you don’t pay up, hang up and report it – it’s a hoax!
These simple steps can make a big difference.
If you are still in doubt or just not 100 per cent sure it’s HMRC, then hang up and call us back using the number on our website – and together we can stop the scammers in their tracks.