Chippewa Falls Police warn of Internet scam

Last modified: Thursday, December 6, 2007 10:24 AM CST

Chippewa Falls Police warn of Internet scam

By The Chippewa Herald

The Chippewa Falls Police Department on Thursday issued this press release on an Internet scam about the Internal Revenue Service:

Within the past week, it has been learned that Chippewa Falls residents have been the targets of Internet scams in which fraudulent e-mails are sent to citizens that appear to be from the Internal Revenue Service. The fraudulent e-mails alert the recipient that they are due a tax refund.

The e-mails direct the recipient to a Web link that requests personal and financial information, such as social security, bank account or credit card numbers. The practice of tricking victims into revealing private personal and financial information over the Internet is known as “phishing” for information.

The IRS does not send out unsolicited e-mails or ask for detailed personal and financial information, nor does the agency notify taxpayers of refunds by e-mail. Additonally, the IRS never asks people for PIN numbers, passwords or similar secret access information for their credit card, bank or other financial records.

The information obtained by the scammers is used to steal a tax payers identity and then his/her financial assets.

Recipients of questionable e-mails claiming to have come from the IRS should not open any attachments or click on any links in the e-mails. Instead, recipients of such e-mails should forward the e-mails to phishing@irs.gov. (Instructions may be found on IRS.gov by entering “phishing” in the the search box.) Examples of the “phishing” e-mails can be viewed on the IRS.gov Web site; also by entering “phishing” in the search box.

The only genuine IRS Web site is IRS.gov. Some internet sites bear a striking resemblence to the real IRS site but with a .com, .net, .org or other designation in the address instead of .gov.; or they may contain a prefex followed by the symbol “@;” which is not indicative of the genuine IRS Web site.

As always, one should exercise caution when unsolicited e-mails are received from senders that one does not know.