A disturbing number of social media viewers have apparently fallen for viral social media posts claiming that the US Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is asking all residents to disclose a list of their crypto wallets.
Despite hundreds of thousands of impressions and viral indignation, however, the news is completely fake.
The claim originated with a viral photo of an IRS tax form which many viewers immediately and erroneously assumed was a section of the new Form 1040 — the most popular individual tax return filing for US residents.
The false assumption takes a variety of forms, including today’s assertion that the IRS is “asking for all associated blockchain wallets on tax forms.”
Another enraged poster lamented the supposed requirement, amplifying the complaint to tens of thousands of additional viewers.
“Why do I need to list my holdings?” they wrote. “I should only report when I conduct a taxable event.”
Read more: Michael Saylor says he’s paying bitcoin taxes, unlike ‘crypto-anarchists’
No, the IRS isn’t requesting everyone’s public keys
Although the IRS is changing certain cost basis disclosure rules on January 1, 2026, it’s not changing any disclosure rules that would require most taxpayers to list their crypto wallets or public keys for the US government.
Moreover, no new version of Form 1040 includes any requirement to list crypto wallets or public keys.
The viral screenshot is actually from a follow-up request from the IRS to an individual taxpayer. Rather than an initial request, this taxpayer has photographed Form 9297.
Only received by a tiny number of people each year, a US taxpayer typically receives IRS Form 9297 if a revenue officer formally requests information about delinquent returns or unpaid taxes.
A process server often physically hands this form to the delinquent taxpayer once a case escalates from automated collection to a field office. This means that the IRS views non-compliance or the underpayment as significant enough for personal handling.
The form usually includes a relatively short response deadline. Delays or failure to respond can quickly escalate to enforced collection of federal debt.
In other words, the internet jumped to conclusions about a viral photograph of a scary IRS tax form. Although many people assumed the prompt applied to most US residents, it doesn’t.
Almost no US resident needs to “list all virtual currency you own” to the IRS, and almost nobody needs to “attach a statement with each currency’s public key and who has access to the private key.”
