Identity theft: What taxpayers need to know
Tax-related identity theft is something we’ve all heard of. Unfortunately, some people get to have first-hand experience of it by losing their personal details to criminals. If someone manages to get their hands on your personal information, such as your name, address, date of birth and, worse still, Social Security number, there could be problems lying ahead.
You can take some precautionary measures, such as investing in an identity theft protection software package. These can be handy for keeping tabs on things like your credit reports, and often come with other useful tools built into the software suite that allow you to manage things like internet security and your internet usage with a built in VPN.
There are many variations on the theme, but get yourself an identity theft protection package and you’ll have a head start on managing your personal and tax data. On top of that, you’ll want to be a little more diligent on the security front by taking another look at what you do with your information. Just by taking a few simple steps to lockdown personal details and being a little more stealthy with your data could pay dividends over time.
Tax filing
If you’re one of the millions of US citizens who has to go through the process of tax filing each year then this is a process that is gradually being made harder for fraudsters to infiltrate. However, tax-related identity theft is still an issue, which is probably why the IRS continues to try and make its systems as robust as possible. You’ll need to make a bit of an effort from your end too though.
Thankfully the IRS has now come up with a way of allowing you to boost the safety and security of your identity and associated data. If you’re using an online application to get your tax filing done its latest option means that you can log in with your username, password and a third personal item. This is likely to be a phone number. Unsurprisingly, if you use this trio of secure options then your identity can be kept much safer.
Constant threat
Nevertheless, there are still plenty of threats out there that you need to be aware of. Many cases of tax-related identity theft can initially go unnoticed and…
