With tax season mostly wrapped up – save for a few hundred thousand returns on extension – spammers and schemers are at it again.
In addition to the myriad of “your refund is delayed” type emails that we’ve seen flitting about for months now, there are two new email scams to add to the list.
The first one is a pretty sad attempt. It’s from a Gmail account and is replete with spelling and punctuation errors. There’s no logo, etc., and the only allusion to IRS is the subject: You Have a Google Doc Message Form Internal Revenue Service Tax Refund (IRS).
The “click here” takes you to a site in Mexico. You know the drill. Don’t click through, just delete.
The second one is a much better attempt to attract your attention and is a recycled version of an email that made the rounds about six years ago. It has the IRS logo and at least purports to come from IRS.gov – though it most certainly does not. The IP address has been blacklisted galore and the hostname has been deemed “suspicious.”
If you read through it, however, you’ll quickly realize that the content is largely gibberish. The IRS doesn’t address business disputes (they have enough on their plate for goodness sake) nor does it deal with product liability, personal injuries, and the like. And this gem is completely ridiculous:
The decision as to whether your dispute or any part of it can be arbitrated rests solely with the IRS.
My favorite part, however, is the footer, which is meant to indicate a trademark by Council of IRS, Inc.
Unlike the first email, this one doesn’t have a link for you to click. Rather, there’s an attachment as a zip file. Do not open the file. The prior version from 2007 actually contained the Trojan virus. I’m not sure what’s in the updated version but I do know that I don’t want to find out the hard way (and neither do you). Same drill as always: don’t open, just delete. If you want, you can also forward it to IRS via phishing@irs.gov for investigation.
Remember that the IRS will not initiate contact with you via email. These emails are intended to either harvest information from you in order to steal your identity or they may contain malware or spyware. You can find out more on the IRS web site (yes, the real IRS web site).
