Tax scams, identity theft, and fraud schemes to watch out for — how they work, how to spot them, and how to protect yourself.
‘Tis the season, folks. Expect more and more bogus emails in your inbox as tax season heats up. Scams to steal your identity and/or financial information are rampant, causing the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to include phishing and identity theft at the top of their “Dirty Dozen” list for 2012. The newest version making the…
Spam is infuriating. Porn and solicitations are bad enough but it’s even more infuriating when it targets good people and their livelihoods. The newest spam in my box is an email claiming to be from the AICPA. The AICPA (American Institute of Certified Public Accountants) is a real organization with some pretty cool folks. To…
There is yet another Internal Revenue Service (IRS) email scam making the rounds, this one focusing on your tax refund. It is not a legitimate email from IRS. Here’s what it says: After the last annual calculations of your financial activity we have concluded that you are eligible to get a tax refund of $464.You…
With tax season ramping up, tax scams are on the rise. Scams aren’t limited to in person scams; online scammers are in on the action, too. The latest tax-related scams to make the rounds might have landed in your inbox as early as last month but they’re still going strong; I received three just this…
If you read the blog regularly, you are aware that there are a bunch of emails that pop up from time to time purporting to be from the IRS, asking you to click on all kinds of links or submit personal information. This sort of thing is a scam. That said, a reader sent me…
You have to give scammers credit: they sure don’t give up. There’s another set of IRS phishing emails making the rounds this week. I’ve seen two versions, one purporting to be from “info manager@irs.gov” and another from “support manager@irs.gov.” Both have headers announcing “IRS notification.” To be clear, both are scams and should be ignored,…
It seems that the spammers, phishers, scammers, and schemers are upping their game these days. In addition to the EFTPS scam making the rounds, I received word that there is a phishing scheme involving the Canada Revenue Agency. The email read: Online Refund Form After the last annual calculation of your fiscal activity we have…
By now, you have to have received one of the scam emails purporting to be from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) with the subject line: “Notice of Underreported Income.” I’ve received 59 of them just since September 18, 2009. Persistent little spammers. But if you’re smart or if you follow me on Twitter (not that…
It’s time for the Census! According to best estimates, there are 307,216,361 people in the US as of the publishing of this blog entry. The ticker on the US Census web site was plugging along quite nicely as I was writing, so chances are, there will be a few hundred more by the time you…
I just received an email with the subject line “Confidential Information” in my inbox. The attachment was a form which requested a long list of information including: Billing Address Social Security Number Mother’s Maiden Name Drivers License Social Security Number Phone Number Credit Card Number with Signature Panel Code and Expiration, plus PIN Bank Name…
