Category: Mark Sipos
Tax Scams and Equifax
As if paying taxes isn't painful enough, there are also scammers, hackers, and thieves out there who want to make the process even more challenging. We want to take a little time this issue to remind you of how to avoid year-end tax scams, and what you can do if the Equifax hack has affected you and your family. Perhaps the best thing to do is to remind everyone what the IRS won’t do. In the past several years, thousands of people have lost millions of dollars and their personal information to tax scams, identity theft, and illegitimate IRS communications. Criminals will often use mail, telephone, fax or email. Always remember that the IRS doesn’t initiate contact with taxpayers by any means to obtain your personal or financial information. The IRS also does not threaten taxpayers with lawsuits, imprisonment or other enforcement. They also don’t use channels like social media or text messages and don’t send unsolicited emails. They won’t call to demand payment – they’ll always send a bill in the mail first. If you do get a bill, look up the number for the IRS and call them first. Don’t call the number on the bill – if it is a scam, criminals are often sophisticated enough to include their own phone number. Make sure that this is a number for the IRS that you get from a source you trust. The IRS won’t demand payment over the phone, and that includes asking for debit or credit card numbers. They also sho
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