Every year, we warn you about tax return identity theft: bad guys all over the world obtain enough personal information about U.S. taxpayers to file fake tax returns and steal our refunds. After a taxpayer’s identity gets stolen in this way, the Internal Revenue Service issues them a special identification number that they have to enter when filing their tax return. The problem is that these numbers are pretty easy to access, too, and the IRS doesn’t have a good replacement yet. [More]
fraudulent tax returns
IRS Agrees To Share Copies Of Fake Tax Returns With Victims Of Identity Theft
By 6.3.15
After lawmakers called on the Internal Revenue Service for more transparency for victims of identity theft, the agency says it will give those people copies of fake tax returns filed using their name and information. [More]
Lawmakers In House, Senate Investigating Fraudulent Returns Filed With TurboTax
By 2.17.15
Joining the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Internal Revenue Service on the case of bogus tax returns filed used Intuit’s TurboTax software will now be lawmakers from both the House and Senate, who have started probing the recent flurry of fraudulent activity. [More]
TurboTax Stops E-Filing Of All State Tax Returns While Investigating Fraudulent Activity
By 2.6.15
After Minnesota state tax officials stopped taking all TurboTax e-filed returns last night and other states pressed pause as well amidst possible fraudulent activity, Intuit has announced that it’s halting all state e-filed returns while it investigates criminal attempts to use stolen data to file fraudulent returns and claim refunds. [More]
