 internal revenue service IRS tax news latest spear fishing scams target tax professionals those SOB's but first an attempt at a joke I apologize in advance I totally missed watching the Super Bowl but that's okay because I've got my own Super Bowl I bought mine at Costco and you know how all their stuff is super big my Super Bowl being no exception it's a Super Bowl and not just a Super Bowl a Super Soup Bowl although you can't put Super amounts of cereal in it too and it's non-controversial without one commercial well maybe one on the cereal box but that's not my Super Bowl's fault I are 2022-36 February 16 2022 Washington with tax season and full swing the internal revenue service state tax agencies and tax industry today warned tax professionals of new email scams that attempt to steal their tax software preparation credentials honestly it's even more disturbing when you see this ruthless individuals trying to scam the poor tax professionals whose only objective in life is to serve given back to the community working towards world peace anyways let's get back to if the security summit partners warn these scams serve as a reminder that tax professionals remain prime targets for thieves so obviously there's an increase in a desire or demand of the scamming to get personal information due to in part changes in the tax law and some of the changes to deal with the whole downturn the COVID thing which are going through the tax law things that could result in for example refundable credits such as the earned income tax credits the stimulus payments the the child tax credit the advanced child tax credits and so on and so forth are going to make an increased desire for people to try to want to file fraudulent tax returns and therefore that's going to make the tax preparers a bigger target to try to pick up that type of information and do that type of scam so we got to be more vigilant in that area so these these try to steal client data and tax preparers identities in and attempt to file fraudulent tax returns for refunds and again this this has always been a thing but it's a bigger thing when there's so much in terms of refundable tax credits and so on that's going on at this point in time so you got to be more careful even than normal I would think so the latest phishing email uses the IRS logo in a variety of subject lines such as quote action required your account has now been put on hold in quote and this has always been kind of a problem with with the IRS kind of emailing or initiating an email they always used to contact through snail mail the actually old mailing process so you can kind of say well if I got an email from the IRS you know that's probably spam or something like that but they need to come into the new age so we we can get emails and whatnot from the IRS because every business does that every bank does that but as we do that you know we're more subject then because it's a new thing all these new changes mean new scams then you know it's more likely that you're gonna get scammed by an email that looks like an IRS letter because we're not used to that stuff as much so the IRS has observed similar bogus emails that claim to be from a quote tax preparation application provider in quote one such verification offers and quote unusual activity report in quote and a solution link for the recipient to restore their account so you can see they're getting kind of tricky with this the components of these fishing scams are always the same however they're gonna try to scare you you got some kind of scare tactic which is gonna scare people during tax time for tax professionals when they're trying to get through a bunch of work and they're dealing with sensitive information trying to keep tax clients happy and whatnot this an unusual activity report is going to be disturbing something that they're going to want to look into and then there's a short relative they usually have a time constraint on it you got to get to it now you got to go to it through this link you got to contact us by this thing and and so it's a typical same kind of thing with just a different twist on it and but they can get quite creative within that within that same range of the old email scams anyways quote scams continue to evolve and this one is especially sinister sent it since it threatens tax professionals accounts in quotes that irs commissioner chuck reddick quote tax professionals must remain vigilant and identifying and staying clear of these irs impersonation emails a little extra care can protect the tax professionals and their clients in quote so email claiming emails claiming quote your account has been put on hold in quote our scams the irs has observed similar bogus emails that claim to be from tax software providers so that's the other place you would expect this to happen whoever your tax software provider is they try to impersonate the software provider and then give an email which might actually be more effective because you're more likely to get an email from your sat tax software provider who's more up to date in how to communicate than the irs typically but in the case the scam email will send users to a website that shows the logos of several popular tax software preparation providers clearing on one of these logos request tax preparer account credentials I can't believe how long these websites could stay up without them have been able to do something that the that's the thing that shocks me about it I can see how you can create a bogus website but you would think once they know it's bogus can't you can't you take down the website somehow I don't get like why it doesn't seem like any case the irs warns tax pros not to respond or take any of the steps outlined in the email similar emails include malicious links to attachments that are set up to steal information there's a link to that or to download malware into the tax professionals computer no these people need to be stopped in this case if recipients enter their credentials into the pop-up window thieves can use this information to file fraudulent returns by using credentials that were provided by the tax professional an example of this type of bogus email states your account has has now been put on hold all preparers are required to apply security features to their tax pro account towards 2021 tax return processing you have failed to apply a new update before expiry date you you are restore and update your account immediately please click here to update your account now import failure to update your account within the next to the next 24 hours will lead to your account being terminated and be barred from filing tax returns claims for 2021 tax season your access will be restored once you have updated your details sincerely so obviously that's that is a scary email for tax professional and you know so in the case tax professionals who clicked on one of the urls and then entered into their account information should contact their software preparation provider support hotline tax professionals who get a scam email should save the email as a file and then send it as an attachment to phishing at irs.gov so you want to report them that they're doing this probably is not going to save you but it might help them to put something together to save future people from having a problem with this so they should also notify the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration at www.tigta.gov there'll be a link to this in the description so you can find all this stuff here to report the irs impersonation scam both the tigta and the irs criminal investigation division are aware of this scam we'll do something about it people you guys need to do something about this the poor tax professionals are being targeted this isn't right this isn't right okay the irs date tax agencies of the nation's tax industry working together in the security summit investigation have taken numerous steps since 2015 to protect taxpayers businesses and the tax system from identity thieves summit partners continue to warn people to watch out for common scams and schemes of this tax season for additional information help tax professionals should review publication five four five five seven safeguarding taxpayer data and identity theft information for tax professionals there's links to that stuff here don't be a link to this in the description