The early bird gets the worm. The second mouse gets the cheese. The late tax filer gets nothing. Why? April is tax fraud time. The best way to avoid losing your tax refund to a scammer is to file as early as possible, before the tax fraudster can get it done. Having said that, this information would be more valuable in January than in April. From US-CERT.
Tax Guidance as Deadline Approaches
03/30/2018 08:34 PM EDT Original release date: March 30, 2018
As this year’s April 17 tax deadline approaches, NCCIC/US-CERT offers taxpayers guidance to help protect their personal, financial, and tax information. Hackers can take advantage of taxpayers by using social engineering scams to attempt to steal personally identifiable information. NCCIC encourages taxpayers to review the following resources and recommendations:
- Avoid tax scams. Look for the telltale signs of tax scams:
- emails that appear to come from your tax professional, requesting information for an IRS form
- emails containing links to a supposed IRS website
- bogus questionnaires claiming to be from the IRS or law enforcement agencies
- calls where scammers leave urgent callback requests
- Safeguard personal data.
- Use strong passwords.
- Keep software updated.
If you believe you have been a victim of an IRS-related phishing attempt, visit the IRS’s page at https://www.irs.gov/privacy-disclosure/report-phishing to report suspicious IRS-related communications.
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About the Author:
I am a cybersecurity and IT instructor, cybersecurity analyst, pen-tester, trainer, and speaker. I am an owner of the WyzCo Group Inc. In addition to consulting on security products and services, I also conduct security audits, compliance audits, vulnerability assessments and penetration tests. I also teach Cybersecurity Awareness Training classes. I work as an information technology and cybersecurity instructor for several training and certification organizations. I have worked in corporate, military, government, and workforce development training environments I am a frequent speaker at professional conferences such as the Minnesota Bloggers Conference, Secure360 Security Conference in 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, the (ISC)2 World Congress 2016, and the ISSA International Conference 2017, and many local community organizations, including Chambers of Commerce, SCORE, and several school districts. I have been blogging on cybersecurity since 2006 at http://wyzguyscybersecurity.com