As austerity bites, it’s not just lags nicking metal for scrap or banksters stripping our public assets who are taking advantage at this time of teetering economy.
Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs has issued a warning regarding a surge of email phishing scams targeted at those of us with tax returns due in by the end of this month.
Recipients are informed that they are due a tax rebate, and directed to a clone of HMRC’s website that asks for their credit card or bank details. The criminals then try to empty victims’ accounts before selling on personal details to other organised criminal gangs. Commonly, the scam email starts with a sentence such as “we have reviewed your tax return and our calculations of your last years accounts a tax refund of XXXX is due”.
Over the last three months, HMRC says it has helped close down 185 criminal websites found responsible for issuing fake tax rebate emails.
- Advice is available at www.hmrc.gov.uk/security/index.htm to check received emails against the HMRC list of offenders
- Antone believing they have fallen victim to such an email scam should report the matter to their bank/card issuer as soon as possible. More information can be found at www.hmrc.gov.uk/security/fraud-attempts.htm
Nice to see HMRC doing something worthy of positive comment for a change! 
