A friend of mine whose married name is Hispanic had her SS# used by an illegal for 11 years before they were able to get any action from anyone. Every year, they reported to the IRS that they did not owe taxes for the money that was paid to a worker at a furniture factory near San Francisco and that they did not even live in CA. Next year, they would receive another notice demanding payment for past taxes.
Finally, my friend’s husband called the furniture factory and told them that he was holding a W-2 from their factory in wife’s name and that she did not work in his factory. The factory person argued with him until my friend told him that he was going to notify the immigration authorities. That ended it.
I represented a client with the same problem. Took the IRS 8 months to cancel the bogus assessment. There were actually two of them, one in Arizona and the other in Tennessee. I asked the IRS how did my client work simultaneously in three different states? They never even thought about that. I asked the IRS why they don't go after the identity thieves and they said "We don't know where they are." I said that's BS, you've got a W-2 that tells you where they worked and it has their address on it...duh. The IRS actually protects these scumbags.