Published: March 22, 2024

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS), which enforces tax laws, recently warned that financial scams are on the rise, especially during tax season. Reduce your risk of becoming a target by staying alert and knowing what to watch for.

Spotting the most common tax scams.
Scammers may contact you via phone, email, text, or social media and then impersonate the IRS to make you think there鈥檚 a problem with your tax return. Common scam strategies include:聽

  • Using false phone numbers or accounts to mimic a legitimate text or call from the IRS. This is called .
  • Adopting fear tactics, such as suggesting your tax return has an error or that you owe a large sum of money or a penalty, as well as taking urgent action to address these types of issues.
  • Instructing you to provide unusual payment methods (such as gift cards, money transfers or cryptocurrency) to pay your taxes.
  • Asking you to share personal information to facilitate tax refunds.

Three tips to safeguard against tax scams:

  1. The IRS always initiates contact about any tax issues with a letter on official IRS letterhead. They will never contact you by phone, text, email or social media.
  2. Don鈥檛 give your personal information to anyone contacting you via phone calls, texts, email or social media.
  3. You can verify the legitimacy of any communication you receive using the published IRS phone number: 1-800-829-1040.

Remember, real government or immigration officials will never call you to ask for personal information; they will never threaten you over the phone. Don't give them any personal or financial details.

If you鈥檙e targeted by a scammer, ignore it instead of responding.

Reporting Scams

If you experience a scam, ISSS encourages you to report the scam to the local police in addition to any of the following offices:

  • Visit the for instructions on reporting tax scam attempts
  • Report fraud to the
  • (if applicable)
  • (if applicable)

If you released any information to a scam caller, contact the following on-campus offices to seek additional support or assistance:

For more information, carefully review the ISSS webpage on scams and