Mayfair in Tampa Palms

From Channel 9 News Today--- New Cyber-scam!!

Aug 25, 2006

Beware of a new cyber-scam
Friday, August 25, 2006


Click here for an enlarged image of e-mail.
The Internal Revenue Service is warning consumers about a new cyber-scam that appears to be from the IRS.

An e-mail complete with the appropriate letterhead of the IRS is telling recipients they're going to receive a tax return and to get it, all they have to do is click a link.

However, the lengthy address is registered to a server in the Ukraine. It's one of more than 100 scams involving the IRS.

"The Internal Revenue Service is warning taxpayers to be on the lookout for these bogus e-mails and these e-mail scams where people are actually fishing to try to steal their identity, get your purpose information," IRS Media Specialist Gloria Sutton said.

Once people click on the link provided, they're asked to enter their social security number, name, birthdate and address.

"IRS would not send you unsolicited e-mail, we would never request your pin number, your personal information, your bank account, your credit card," Sutton said. "We don't need to secure that information from you via e-mail."

IRS officials said people who have fallen for the scam should immediately contact a consumer credit counseling company as well as the credit card company they accidentally gave to the scammers.