IRS on Identity Theft Scams

The Internal Revenue Service reminds consumers toavoid identity theft scams that use its name, logo or website in an attempt toconvince taxpayers that the scam is a genuine IRS communication.   

In an identity theft scam, a fraudster, oftenposing as a trusted government, financial or business institution or official,tries to trick a victim into revealing personal and financial information, suchas credit card numbers and passwords, bank account numbers and passwords,Social Security numbers and more. Generally, identity thieves use someone’spersonal data to steal his or her financial accounts, run up charges on thevictim’s existing credit cards, apply for new loans, credit cards, services orbenefits in the victim’s name and even file fraudulent tax returns.

The scams may take place through e-mail, fax orphone. When they take place via e-mail, they are called “phishing” scams.  A bogus e-mail, which claims to come from theIRS, tells the recipient that he or she is eligible to receive a tax refund fora given amount. It instructs the recipient to click on a link contained in thee-mail to access and complete a form for the tax refund. The form requires theentry of personal and financial information.

The IRS does not initiate taxpayer contact viaunsolicited e-mail or ask for personal identifying or financial information viae-mail. Taxpayers do not have to complete a special form to obtain a refund. 

Taxpayer refunds are based on the tax return they submit to the IRS.  If you receive a suspicious e-mail claimingto come from the IRS: 

•   Do not open any attachments to the e-mail, incase they contain malicious code that will infect your computer.
•   Do not click on any links, for the samereason. Also, be aware that the links often connect to a phony IRS website thatappears authentic and then prompts the victim for personal identifiers, bank orcredit card account numbers or PINs. The phony websites appear legitimatebecause the appearance and much of the content are directly copied from anactual page on the IRS website and then modified by the scammers for their ownpurposes.
•   Contact the IRS at 1-800-829-1040 todetermine if the IRS is trying to contact you. 
•   Forward the suspicious e-mail or url addressto the IRS mailbox phishing@irs.gov, thendelete the e-mail from your inbox.

The only genuine IRS website is IRS.gov.  All IRS.gov webpage addresses begin with http://www.irs.gov/. Anyone wishing to accessthe IRS website should initiate contact by typing the IRS.gov address intotheir internet address window, rather than clicking on a link in an e-mail.