How the TikTok tax fraud overran a country town
The stories of the first four people convicted for tax fraud form a snapshot of how a scheme so simple it could be carried out online spread throughout a small community. But it spread much further, to at least 56,000 people nationally.
Catherine wanted her teeth done and new tyres for her car. Brylie said she “thought it was legit”. Walton blamed it on his brother-in-law, and Jennifer spent the money on “some stupid shit”.
The first four people to be convicted this year from the Tax Office’s Operation Protego separately obtained a total of $153,000 from fraudulent GST claims, in a scam which began spreading via social media influencers on TikTok in late 2020.
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