IRS warns of e-mail scam

[Kathryn41 3,205]

Cop briefsCop briefs

IRS warms of e-mail Scam

By Saeed Ahmed

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Published on: 06/05/07 8:11 PM

The Internal Revenue Service on Tuesday sent out an alert warning taxpayers about an e-mail scam that claims they are the subjects of a criminal investigation, and then asks them to click on a link that allows the scammer to take over the person’s computer remotely.

When a hard drive is hijacked in such a way, the scammer has access to all the information a computer user has saved on his hard drive.

The e-mail claims to be from the agency’s Criminal Invesigation division and says that the recipient is under criminal probe for submitting a false tax return to the California Franchise Boar.

It then asks the person to click on a link or open an attachment to find out more about the complaint against him or her.

Once the person does so, the link or attachment can allow the scammer to remotely access the person’s hard drive.

IRS spokespman Mark S. Green pointed out that the agency does not send out unsolicited e-mails or asks for a person’s personal or financial information.

The agency said that anyone who has received such an e-mail, or any other questionable able claiming to come from the IRS, should not open any attachments or click on any links contained within the e-mail.

Instead, the agency said, the person should forward the e-mail to phishing@irs.gov The instructions can be found on IRS.gov by entering the term “phishing” in the search box.

Since the establishment of the mail box last year, the IRS has received more than 17,700 e-mails from taxpayers reporting more than 240 separate incidents of phishing - where scams try to trick victims into revealing personal and financial information over the Internet.

The agency has identified host sites in at least 27 different countries, as well as in the United States, Green said.