It’s tax filing season — prime time for scum of the earth con artists to crawl out from under their rocks with novel ways to steal identities and scam people out of their hard-earned money.

That means it’s time for us, as one of Southern California’s premier women-owned tax planning and financial strategy firms, to let you know what to watch out for and how to protect yourself. By remaining vigilant and reporting suspicious activity to relevant government agencies and law enforcement, we can start gaining the upper hand over these criminals.

In this post, we call your attention to four primary methods used to steal identities and tax refunds. We’ll also reveal common warning signs and offer guidance on what to do when you notice suspicious activity.

Text Message Scams

Text message scams usually involve someone pretending to be from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). Over the last couple of years, fraudulent text messages have focused mostly on COVID-19 or “stimulus payments,” and included one or more links claiming to point to IRS websites or relevant online tools.

If you receive an unsolicited text/SMS message that appears to be from either the IRS or a program closely linked to it, take a screenshot of the text message and email it to phishing@irs.gov with the following information: Continue reading…