Sri Lanka CERT has issued a public warning about a scam in which fraudsters impersonate Inland Revenue Department (IRD) officials, threaten taxpayers with legal action over alleged tax arrears, and pressure them to make payments through fraudulent links.
The agency said the warning followed a complaint from a businessman who received a call from a number beginning with “0113”, with the caller identifying himself as an officer at the IRD head office. The caller addressed the businessman by name, requested his Taxpayer Identification Number (TIN), and claimed unpaid tax obligations could trigger legal proceedings unless an immediate payment was made.
The caller said a payment link would be sent and asked for the target’s WhatsApp number or email address. The businessman, who was unaware of any such payment route, ended the call. When he later tried to call back, there was no answer. A second call followed minutes later, during which the caller became more aggressive and warned of consequences if payment was not made. The businessman ignored further calls and lodged a complaint with CERT, Newswire reported.
CERT clarified that the Inland Revenue Department does not send payment links to taxpayers. All tax payments must be made through authorised banking channels and official procedures. Had the businessman clicked the link and entered his details, sensitive personal information could have been compromised and money potentially stolen, the agency said.
CERT urged the public to verify the authenticity of calls claiming to be from the IRD, refrain from sharing TIN numbers with unknown callers, and seek tax information only through official IRD channels.
The advisory adds to a sequence of recent public-facing fraud warnings in Sri Lanka. Police last week flagged fake social media messages offering a traffic-fine payment facility, while a Computer Crimes Unit case in May saw an arrest over a Rs. 408,000 phishing fraud that used a banking Trojan app to seize remote access to the victim’s phone.
