With the due date for filing you federal income tax return approaching in a month, many people are filing their taxes at this time with almost 94% of individual income tax returns being filed electronically. TurboTax is a popular online tax preparation service and so identity thieves will take advantage of that popularity and call people posing as TurboTax employees informing the targeted victim that his or her electronically filed income tax return has been rejected by the IRS. The identity thief then attempts to lure you into providing personal information including your Social Security number that will be used to make you a victim of income tax identity theft.
In order to make their call appear legitimate, the identity thieves will use a technique called “spoofing” to manipulate your Caller ID so that the call looks like it has come from TurboTax.
TIPS
As I often say, trust me, you can’t trust anyone, particularly someone who asking for you to provide sensitive personal information. In this case it is important to note that TurboTax will not call you if your tax return has been rejected unless you have specifically requested a call. If you do receive such a call and think that it might be legitimate, merely hang up and call TurboTax at its customer service number of 1-800-446-8848..
Another thing you should do in order to protect yourself from income tax identity theft even if the identity thief has your Social Security number is to get a PIN from the IRS to include on your tax return. In 2022 the IRS announced an expansion of its Identity Protection PIN Op-In Program that provides individual taxpayers with a six-digit code that is required to be included on the individual’s income tax return. This will protect someone whose Social Security number had been compromised from becoming a victim of identity theft because the identity thief will not know the six-digit code. Here is a link to the section of the IRS’ website where you can apply for a PIN. https://www.irs.gov/identity-theft-fraud-scams/get-an-identity-protection-pin The PIN is only valid for a single year and must be applied for anew each year. The process will require you to verify your identity. Victims of income tax identity theft who have filed an identity theft affidavit with the IRS automatically receive an IP PIN by regular mail from the IRS.
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#incometaxidentitytheft #turbotaxscam