When you are walking through the mall, or at a fair, or even online, chances are you’ll get asked to fill out a form for a chance to win some wonderful prize or receive something for free.
And why not, it costs you nothing and someone’s got to win that new laptop, or the car, or the trip to the moon. A pen in hand and 60 seconds later you feel like you may be getting a call or letter for some fantastic prize. And you were sure to put down your phone number, so when you win, they’ll call right away.
We all like to be optimistic. We all want to think we have got a shot at the big one! I don’t know what the big one is, but it’s big!
Now let’s take a walk to the other side of the isle called reality. In reality there is no real prize, or the person who won it lives in the Arctic circle and the company cannot deliver it. If there is a prize, the barriers to get it may be out of reach. You get the picture, they are trying to get your personal information for a much bigger catch.
But what you may ultimately end up with, is your identity stolen, and you’ll become the victim of identity theft.
When you filled out that form for a prize, you labeled yourself as an optimist. The company who requested the information, may be legitimate, and there may be the prize,, and but may sell that list of names collected to a marketing company. You may end up on a “sucker list”.
Identity thief rings buy “sucker lists” from direct marketing companies. You’ll then be a target for a phone scam or “vishing”. You’ve already given them a good reason to call because you are optimistic or in their terms a “sucker”. Now your wide open, and they will throw every trick in the book at you. This is what they do, this is what they are good at.
The odds of getting your identity stolen are much greater than winning anything, so don’t bother trying to win by giving up information. You will have taken a significant step in defending your identity.
Showing posts with label Scam. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Scam. Show all posts
Monday, June 18, 2007
Saturday, April 14, 2007
National identity theft awareness week
While identity theft is a year round event, this coming week, could just qualify for National Identity Theft Awareness Week. The week could get this designation because it is becoming one of the more prevalent ones for identity theft due strictly to the time of year. No, there is no such week, but if there were any good time to raise awareness, this week is it.
We wouldn’t be human if we did not have some worry this time of year regarding filing our income taxes.
The forms, the documents, the receipts, the calculator, the room you barricade yourself in, and vow not to emerge until the deed is done. Those are all recurring items that we’ve been through before and will go through again, but we still feel anxiety regardless.
While getting your taxes done is paramount for this time of year, you need to be on alert for more than just an audit. The thieves and con artists go into overdrive this time of year. They feed on your sense of commitment and urgency to get that return done and in on time.
So what should you be concerned about? Here are my top 10 awareness items to think about this week for protecting yourself from an identity thief:
1) Shred all those printed copies that you found mistakes on, and had to reprint.
2) Keep your hard copy of your tax returns locked up.
3) If you use a tax preparer or a CPA, be sure they are securing your information, after you leave the office. Look around to see and verify that they use a shredder. Ask them how they secure your information when they are done for the night.
4) Give some consideration to where you are copying a tax return. It has recently come to light that copiers retain digital information of every copy they make, and some are not being properly erased.
5) If you used software at home on your own PC, save your tax returns to a disc and delete it from your hard drive. Keep in mind if you loose a laptop do you want your tax return available to anyone who acquires it?
6) Ignore and delete emails from the IRS. They don’t have your email address, do you remember providing it to them?
7) Only eFile through the links on the IRS website http://www.irs.gov/ . Recently thieves have been setting up fake eFile sites and collecting your information.
8) Don’t provide any information to any who calls claiming to be from the IRS.
9) Don’t leave your return in your mailbox. Take it to the post office directly.
10) Use a reputable tax preparer. Remember that you are handing them the keys to your identity, if you don’t know them, they may just drive off with it, or sell the information to a third party.
We wouldn’t be human if we did not have some worry this time of year regarding filing our income taxes.
The forms, the documents, the receipts, the calculator, the room you barricade yourself in, and vow not to emerge until the deed is done. Those are all recurring items that we’ve been through before and will go through again, but we still feel anxiety regardless.
While getting your taxes done is paramount for this time of year, you need to be on alert for more than just an audit. The thieves and con artists go into overdrive this time of year. They feed on your sense of commitment and urgency to get that return done and in on time.
So what should you be concerned about? Here are my top 10 awareness items to think about this week for protecting yourself from an identity thief:
1) Shred all those printed copies that you found mistakes on, and had to reprint.
2) Keep your hard copy of your tax returns locked up.
3) If you use a tax preparer or a CPA, be sure they are securing your information, after you leave the office. Look around to see and verify that they use a shredder. Ask them how they secure your information when they are done for the night.
4) Give some consideration to where you are copying a tax return. It has recently come to light that copiers retain digital information of every copy they make, and some are not being properly erased.
5) If you used software at home on your own PC, save your tax returns to a disc and delete it from your hard drive. Keep in mind if you loose a laptop do you want your tax return available to anyone who acquires it?
6) Ignore and delete emails from the IRS. They don’t have your email address, do you remember providing it to them?
7) Only eFile through the links on the IRS website http://www.irs.gov/ . Recently thieves have been setting up fake eFile sites and collecting your information.
8) Don’t provide any information to any who calls claiming to be from the IRS.
9) Don’t leave your return in your mailbox. Take it to the post office directly.
10) Use a reputable tax preparer. Remember that you are handing them the keys to your identity, if you don’t know them, they may just drive off with it, or sell the information to a third party.
Tuesday, April 10, 2007
The IRS does not use email?
Around this time every year millions of emails arrive proclaiming the IRS needs you to verify your information, needs more information, has money to give back to you, and the list goes on and on. To conform, all you need to do is cough up some very valuable information.
They all invoke some type of high emotion, either fear or excitement. Both can cloud clear judgment, and reasoning. And it works, all too well.
Lets look at this from a logical and simple point of view. What is the main goal of the IRS? To collect tax revenue. What else do they do? Audit you to try and collect more tax revenue. Have you ever heard of them doing anything else?
Those two functions just about wrap it up.
So if we look at what they don’t do here is my simple list of 5 rules, and read rule #1 at least 50 times:
Rule 1)The IRS doesn’t ask for an email address on your 1040
Rule 2)The IRS doesn’t ask for missing information via email (See rule #1)
Rule 3)The IRS doesn’t ask for more information via email (See rule #1)
Rule 4)The IRS certainly doesn’t offer additional refund money via email (See rule #1)
Rule 5)The IRS absolutely doesn’t locate bonus or extra money just for you
Now go back and read rule #1 above again. If you can remember that, you can be assured that any message you get proclaiming anything from the IRS is a fake and a phishing scam.
So when you see the words IRS in an email for any reason instantly think of my IRS #1 rule and then hit the DELETE key.
They all invoke some type of high emotion, either fear or excitement. Both can cloud clear judgment, and reasoning. And it works, all too well.
Lets look at this from a logical and simple point of view. What is the main goal of the IRS? To collect tax revenue. What else do they do? Audit you to try and collect more tax revenue. Have you ever heard of them doing anything else?
Those two functions just about wrap it up.
So if we look at what they don’t do here is my simple list of 5 rules, and read rule #1 at least 50 times:
Rule 1)The IRS doesn’t ask for an email address on your 1040
Rule 2)The IRS doesn’t ask for missing information via email (See rule #1)
Rule 3)The IRS doesn’t ask for more information via email (See rule #1)
Rule 4)The IRS certainly doesn’t offer additional refund money via email (See rule #1)
Rule 5)The IRS absolutely doesn’t locate bonus or extra money just for you
Now go back and read rule #1 above again. If you can remember that, you can be assured that any message you get proclaiming anything from the IRS is a fake and a phishing scam.
So when you see the words IRS in an email for any reason instantly think of my IRS #1 rule and then hit the DELETE key.
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