May 5, 2004
Protect Yourself Against Fraud and Scams The Tax Investigation Scam
There's yet another email scam under way, but this one may be scarier to some than earlier ones: the email being sent fraudulently informs recipients that they're under investigation for tax fraud.
The IRS issued a warning in a press release Friday about the new scheme. The fraudulent email is aimed at tricking taxpayers into providing their Social SecurityNnumbers, driver's license information, and bank and credit card numbers via a website set up to look like it belongs to a federal agency.
Information such as that noted above can be used by identity thieves to take over a person's financial accounts, run up charges on credit cards, apply for loans, and file fraudulent tax returns.
The IRS says the fake Web address presented and the email itself contained grammatical errors, which should raise a red flag. However, it said new versions could surface later, so taxpayers should remain aware of the possibility of such scams.
Taxpayers who suspect they've received one of these emails should call the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration at (800) 366-4484. They can also call IRS at (800) 829-1040 to verify if an email sent over IRS's name is legitimate.
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