Fife Councilor Cautions about E-mail Scam about Tax-Refund

Dave Dempsey, Conservative Group Head of Fife recently, cautioned about one advanced Internet scam promising victims reimbursement of tax payment, thus published fifetoday.co.uk dated February 9, 2015.

Having just filed his tax-payment documents, Councilor Dempsey got 2 e-mails, one which was real and titled "Your tax summary" and another which wasn't and titled "Tax Refund Notification," he said.

Explaining that he was suspicious, Cllr Dempsey said he wasn't expecting a refund while also found the e-mail sender's id ending with .co.uk, instead of .gov.uk.

According to him, the e-mail's language seemed slightly odd also. Cllr Dempsey, who was once a software engineer, out of interest in the technicality of these things perused the e-mail and encountered one well-crafted web-page having the logo of UK government's taxing agency Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC) along with plentiful web-links leading onto more tax topics.

All the web-links, however, took onto the identical tax-reimbursement form which solicited name, birth date and e-mail.

Councilor Dempsey accessed HMRC at its 'phishing' line to report his discoveries like the real electronic mail advised, and further maintained communication with police and Trading Standards.

Digital Security Head Gareth Lloyd at HMRC stated that HMRC didn't ever dispatch e-mails to tax-paying individuals regarding reimbursements else other financial topics, instead it sent such information only via postal letters. Iexpats.com reported this, February 11, 2015.

According to Lloyd, HMRC could and did shutdown such bogus websites; however, they could emerge in few hours as also continue tricking taxpayers. The agency maintained strong connections with global agencies of law-enforcement and police to work for targeting the criminals, he said.

HMRC didn't ever ask taxpayers to provide personal else other confidential details like bank/credit card account particulars or passwords over e-mail, Lloyd reiterated.

He further said that a typical sign of scam e-mails was hurrying users to respond, therefore contained phrases like "urgent action needed" or "there are just 3 days for replying." The majority of HMRC letters gave tax-paying citizens 30-or-more days to respond.

Anyone getting an e-mail asserting as message sent from HMRC that promises tax refund should forward the same to phishing@hmrc.gsi.gov.uk before erasing it wholly.

» SPAMfighter News - 2/20/2015