If you are a signatory on an offshore or foreign bank account but you do not earn income from that account, you likely do not think about it very often. Many family members have joint accounts with multiple signatories and non-beneficiary owners often have no actual transactions with the account over the course of the year. 

From 2005 to 2013, a company called Sovereign Management & Legal LTD (Sovereign) reportedly helped U.S. citizens perpetrate and carry out schemes to defraud the government of income tax revenue.  The Internal Revenue Service, as well as local prosecuting authorities, are trying very hard to find out exactly which U.S. taxpayers may have sought help from Sovereign and taken steps to hide assets and income. 

Investors who have money in offshore accounts need to be aware that the Internal Revenue Service is looking to make examples out of those who do not declare their accounts. Just recently, a new indictment was announced against a U.S.-citizen/Kentucky resident with money that was kept in undeclared offshore accounts. This investor who has been indicted faces up to five years of incarceration if he is convicted of the charges he faces.