I received a very genuine looking email today purporting to be from HM
Revenue and Customs saying that I had a Tax Refund. I was suspicious
when it asked for my creditcard details and phoned HMRC. They
confirmed that it was a Phishing attack and asked me to forward the
email to them.

On Wed, 11 Jun 2008 08:16:23 -0700 (PDT), g6zru
 wrote:

>I received a very genuine looking email today purporting to be from HM
>Revenue and Customs saying that I had a Tax Refund. I was suspicious
>when it asked for my creditcard details and phoned HMRC. They
>confirmed that it was a Phishing attack and asked me to forward the
>email to them.

Tax refunds come in anonimous brown envelopes and you will get no
warning of their arrival, anything that comes through e-mail like that
is always just a phishing trip.

Bill Lord
I've taken a vow of poverty To annoy me send money

e-mail messages to bill dot lord at uku dot co dot uk 
( Get rid of the spaces  and use symbols for the hyphen at and dots )

"g6zru"  wrote in message 
news:c427071d-c98c-4474-9107-7881f6090fd5@m36g2000hse.googlegroups.com...
>I received a very genuine looking email today purporting to be from HM
> Revenue and Customs saying that I had a Tax Refund. I was suspicious
> when it asked for my creditcard details and phoned HMRC. They
> confirmed that it was a Phishing attack and asked me to forward the
> email to them.
And I bet most of them responded!

bill lord  wrote in 
news:10m054pfgg8afedfjo08nconibccnl58a9@4ax.com:

> Tax refunds come in anonimous brown envelopes and you will get no
> warning of their arrival, anything that comes through e-mail like that
> is always just a phishing trip.
> 

http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/security/fraud-attempts.htm makes interesting 
reading.

I know that the Revenue is keen to get everyone interacting with them 
online, but IMO these scams seriously undermine the usefulness of the 
Internet for that. HMRC do notify their "customers" by e-mail, and even if 
you cannot guarantee that a message is genuine, you are not permitted by 
law to ignore many HMRC demands. So HMRC's move to online interaction has 
created a window of opportunity for the scammers.

Geoff

"Geoff Lane" <geoff@nospam.invalid> wrote in message 
news:Xns9ABB4E5ECF45Dgeoffnospam097akdsh@138.199.67.64...
> bill lord  wrote in
> news:10m054pfgg8afedfjo08nconibccnl58a9@4ax.com:
>
>> Tax refunds come in anonimous brown envelopes and you will get no
>> warning of their arrival, anything that comes through e-mail like that
>> is always just a phishing trip.
>>
>
> http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/security/fraud-attempts.htm makes interesting
> reading.
>
> I know that the Revenue is keen to get everyone interacting with them
> online, but IMO these scams seriously undermine the usefulness of the
> Internet for that. HMRC do notify their "customers" by e-mail, and even if
> you cannot guarantee that a message is genuine, you are not permitted by
> law to ignore many HMRC demands. So HMRC's move to online interaction has
> created a window of opportunity for the scammers.

One of my old email accounts gets 50 of these sorts of emails a day. You 
must get more "street" wise and ignore anything that does NOT come from 
someone you know or have business with. If in doubt, open the email as plain 
text or by viewing its property details first so you don't run any scripts. 
Its ridiculous to think HMRC would contact you by email and certainly never 
ask for payment that way. Just think it through. The fact you took it 
seriously enough to not delete it straight away and even contacted HMRC, 
worries me greatly and shows you are vulnerable to influence by these scams. 
Your default reaction should be NO. The fact it looks official means nothing 
these day whether printed on paper or in emails/websites. Get wise. Its a 
tricky world out there and the old ways of trusting that many old people 
still adhere to make them very vulnerable.

Graham

Graham said the following on 16/06/2008 10:09:
> "Geoff Lane" <geoff@nospam.invalid> wrote in message 
> news:Xns9ABB4E5ECF45Dgeoffnospam097akdsh@138.199.67.64...
>> bill lord  wrote in
>> news:10m054pfgg8afedfjo08nconibccnl58a9@4ax.com:
>>
>>> Tax refunds come in anonimous brown envelopes and you will get no
>>> warning of their arrival, anything that comes through e-mail like that
>>> is always just a phishing trip.
>>>
>> http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/security/fraud-attempts.htm makes interesting
>> reading.
>>
>> I know that the Revenue is keen to get everyone interacting with them
>> online, but IMO these scams seriously undermine the usefulness of the
>> Internet for that. HMRC do notify their "customers" by e-mail, and even if
>> you cannot guarantee that a message is genuine, you are not permitted by
>> law to ignore many HMRC demands. So HMRC's move to online interaction has
>> created a window of opportunity for the scammers.
> 
> One of my old email accounts gets 50 of these sorts of emails a day. You 
> must get more "street" wise and ignore anything that does NOT come from 
> someone you know or have business with. If in doubt, open the email as plain 
> text or by viewing its property details first so you don't run any scripts. 
> Its ridiculous to think HMRC would contact you by email and certainly never 
> ask for payment that way. Just think it through. The fact you took it 
> seriously enough to not delete it straight away and even contacted HMRC, 
> worries me greatly and shows you are vulnerable to influence by these scams. 
> Your default reaction should be NO. The fact it looks official means nothing 
> these day whether printed on paper or in emails/websites. Get wise. Its a 
> tricky world out there and the old ways of trusting that many old people 
> still adhere to make them very vulnerable.
> 
> Graham 
> 
> 
Regard it the same as for door to door selling - if you haven't asked for 
it you don't want it!

Roy

"Roy"  wrote in message 
news:485649a0$1_4@mk-nntp-2.news.uk.tiscali.com...
> Graham said the following on 16/06/2008 10:09:
>> "Geoff Lane" <geoff@nospam.invalid> wrote in message 
>> news:Xns9ABB4E5ECF45Dgeoffnospam097akdsh@138.199.67.64...
>>> bill lord  wrote in
>>> news:10m054pfgg8afedfjo08nconibccnl58a9@4ax.com:
>>>
>>>> Tax refunds come in anonimous brown envelopes and you will get no
>>>> warning of their arrival, anything that comes through e-mail like that
>>>> is always just a phishing trip.
>>>>
>>> http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/security/fraud-attempts.htm makes interesting
>>> reading.
>>>
>>> I know that the Revenue is keen to get everyone interacting with them
>>> online, but IMO these scams seriously undermine the usefulness of the
>>> Internet for that. HMRC do notify their "customers" by e-mail, and even 
>>> if
>>> you cannot guarantee that a message is genuine, you are not permitted by
>>> law to ignore many HMRC demands. So HMRC's move to online interaction 
>>> has
>>> created a window of opportunity for the scammers.
>>
>> One of my old email accounts gets 50 of these sorts of emails a day. You 
>> must get more "street" wise and ignore anything that does NOT come from 
>> someone you know or have business with. If in doubt, open the email as 
>> plain text or by viewing its property details first so you don't run any 
>> scripts. Its ridiculous to think HMRC would contact you by email and 
>> certainly never ask for payment that way. Just think it through. The fact 
>> you took it seriously enough to not delete it straight away and even 
>> contacted HMRC, worries me greatly and shows you are vulnerable to 
>> influence by these scams. Your default reaction should be NO. The fact it 
>> looks official means nothing these day whether printed on paper or in 
>> emails/websites. Get wise. Its a tricky world out there and the old ways 
>> of trusting that many old people still adhere to make them very 
>> vulnerable.
>>
>> Graham
> Regard it the same as for door to door selling - if you haven't asked for 
> it you don't want it!
>
Or in my case, how dare you knock on my door and disturb me. Now **** off 
and be thankful you got away with you life.

Graham

"Graham"  wrote in
news:JYSdnWfk_YFHsMvVnZ2dnUVZ8tfinZ2d@posted.metronet: 

>> I know that the Revenue is keen to get everyone interacting with them
>> online, but IMO these scams seriously undermine the usefulness of the
>> Internet for that. HMRC do notify their "customers" by e-mail, and
>> even if you cannot guarantee that a message is genuine, you are not
>> permitted by law to ignore many HMRC demands. So HMRC's move to
>> online interaction has created a window of opportunity for the
>> scammers. 
> 
> One of my old email accounts gets 50 of these sorts of emails a day.
> You must get more "street" wise and ignore anything that does NOT come
> from someone you know or have business with. If in doubt, open the
> email as plain text or by viewing its property details first so you
> don't run any scripts. Its ridiculous to think HMRC would contact you
> by email and certainly never ask for payment that way. Just think it
> through. The fact you took it seriously enough to not delete it
> straight away and even contacted HMRC, worries me greatly and shows
> you are vulnerable to influence by these scams. Your default reaction
> should be NO. The fact it looks official means nothing these day
> whether printed on paper or in emails/websites. Get wise. Its a tricky
> world out there and the old ways of trusting that many old people 
> still adhere to make them very vulnerable. 

Firstly, I'm not naive enough to use a MS virus magnet. My mail client 
will not open off-page resources or run scripts and it displays the 
actual address of all links, thus allowing me to confirm they are what 
they appear to be.

Secondly, HMRC do contact me via e-mail. They contact me to advise me to 
file business and personal tax returns, VAT returns, etc. They have 
twice contacted me via e-mail to advise that I have a tax refund due and 
that they will pay that into my bank account. Some of their on-line 
forms (e.g. personal self-assessment) do ask for bank details so that 
they can transfer funds to your account. They have also contacted me via 
e-mail to confirm receipt of a return and to advise that I must pay on 
or before a certain date. As I wrote, HMRC do notify their "customers" 
by e-mail. As I also wrote, you cannot ignore HMRC demands.

It is thus far from ridiculous to think HMTC would contact you by e-
mail, or that they never ask for payment that way. The default reaction 
must not be to bury your head in the sand and pretend on the grounds it 
might be a scam that you haven't received something that could be 
genuine. However, you cannot take anything for granted these days and 
you have to take adequate steps to ensure the veracity of such 
communiques.

WRT contacting HMRC, FYI they ask that we notify them of suspected 
fraud, as you'd know if you bothered to follow the link I gave. If 
nobody reports these scams, the Revenue, bank, or whoever cannot take 
action.

Get wise! it's a tricky world out there and that, FYI, is why I wrote 
that these scams seriously underline the usefulness of the Internet for 
interaction with the Revenue etc.

Geoff

"Geoff Lane" <geoff@nospam.invalid> wrote in message 
news:Xns9ABF84CAC73Cgeoffnospam097akdsh@138.199.67.64...
> "Graham"  wrote in
> news:JYSdnWfk_YFHsMvVnZ2dnUVZ8tfinZ2d@posted.metronet:
>
>>> I know that the Revenue is keen to get everyone interacting with them
>>> online, but IMO these scams seriously undermine the usefulness of the
>>> Internet for that. HMRC do notify their "customers" by e-mail, and
>>> even if you cannot guarantee that a message is genuine, you are not
>>> permitted by law to ignore many HMRC demands. So HMRC's move to
>>> online interaction has created a window of opportunity for the
>>> scammers.
>>
>> One of my old email accounts gets 50 of these sorts of emails a day.
>> You must get more "street" wise and ignore anything that does NOT come
>> from someone you know or have business with. If in doubt, open the
>> email as plain text or by viewing its property details first so you
>> don't run any scripts. Its ridiculous to think HMRC would contact you
>> by email and certainly never ask for payment that way. Just think it
>> through. The fact you took it seriously enough to not delete it
>> straight away and even contacted HMRC, worries me greatly and shows
>> you are vulnerable to influence by these scams. Your default reaction
>> should be NO. The fact it looks official means nothing these day
>> whether printed on paper or in emails/websites. Get wise. Its a tricky
>> world out there and the old ways of trusting that many old people
>> still adhere to make them very vulnerable.
>
> Firstly, I'm not naive enough to use a MS virus magnet. My mail client
> will not open off-page resources or run scripts and it displays the
> actual address of all links, thus allowing me to confirm they are what
> they appear to be.
>
> Secondly, HMRC do contact me via e-mail. They contact me to advise me to
> file business and personal tax returns, VAT returns, etc. They have
> twice contacted me via e-mail to advise that I have a tax refund due and
> that they will pay that into my bank account. Some of their on-line
> forms (e.g. personal self-assessment) do ask for bank details so that
> they can transfer funds to your account. They have also contacted me via
> e-mail to confirm receipt of a return and to advise that I must pay on
> or before a certain date. As I wrote, HMRC do notify their "customers"
> by e-mail. As I also wrote, you cannot ignore HMRC demands.
>
> It is thus far from ridiculous to think HMTC would contact you by e-
> mail, or that they never ask for payment that way. The default reaction
> must not be to bury your head in the sand and pretend on the grounds it
> might be a scam that you haven't received something that could be
> genuine. However, you cannot take anything for granted these days and
> you have to take adequate steps to ensure the veracity of such
> communiques.
>
> WRT contacting HMRC, FYI they ask that we notify them of suspected
> fraud, as you'd know if you bothered to follow the link I gave. If
> nobody reports these scams, the Revenue, bank, or whoever cannot take
> action.
>
> Get wise! it's a tricky world out there and that, FYI, is why I wrote
> that these scams seriously underline the usefulness of the Internet for
> interaction with the Revenue etc.

Well you are the idiot who fell for it enough to investigate it further. If 
you can't spot a scam in an instant then you have something to learn that 
others already know and you don't,  judging by your reply and by your 
refusal in life to listen to other people. I avoided mentioning gullible or 
naive in my post, but now you have brought it up... If the cap fits etc. I 
should have known better than to try to help a fucking ham. All the same. If 
you still want to believe HMRC would send you an email and ask for payment, 
then carry on, get out your credit card and fill in the form. See if I care. 
You have been warned, now you will learn the hard way. You are also naive to 
inform HMRC of the scam. There are so many of them that its impossible to do 
anything about it and all that will happen as you will get flagged by 
HMRC/banks or anyone you inform as a sap who might be a risk from such 
things.

Graham

"Graham"  wrote in
news:yoedne3OEoPN9MvVnZ2dneKdnZydnZ2d@metronet: 

> Well you are the idiot who fell for it enough to investigate it
> further. If you can't spot a scam in an instant then you have
> something to learn that others already know and you don't,  judging by
> your reply and by your refusal in life to listen to other people. I
> avoided mentioning gullible or naive in my post, but now you have
> brought it up... If the cap fits etc. I should have known better than
> to try to help a fucking ham. All the same. If you still want to
> believe HMRC would send you an email and ask for payment, then carry
> on, get out your credit card and fill in the form. See if I care. You
> have been warned, now you will learn the hard way. You are also naive
> to inform HMRC of the scam. There are so many of them that its
> impossible to do anything about it and all that will happen as you
> will get flagged by HMRC/banks or anyone you inform as a sap who might
> be a risk from such things.

Graham, You really don't get it, do you! It's not me who's refusing to 
listen to other people, it's you. I hear what you say, but I already 
know of the dangers you relate and take all the normal precautions. 
However, to spell it out so that hopefully even you can understand:

I recognised the scam for what it was - in an instant.

As requested by HMRC, I forwarded the phishing messages to their fraud 
team. It cost me all of a couple of minutes to bundle the lot up 
(including headers) and forward them on. There were a few phishing sites 
involved, all registered via GoDaddy, which HMRC should be able to get 
shut down. Reporting might also get the associated open relays closed. 
So there is a point to reporting such activity.

I suggest your re-read my posts. I merely expressed doubts that the 
Internet can continue to be a reliable medium for communication between 
the Revenue and taxpayers.

No matter whether you believe HMRC communicate with their "customers" 
via e-mail, the fact is that they have and do. You wrote, "its 
ridiculous to think HMRC would contact you by email ..." However, the 
half-dozen messages in my inbox from HMRC this year is evidence that you 
really don't know what you're burbling about. I'm not talking about the 
hundreds of phishing attempts I've seen. Here I'm talking about genuine 
and legitimate e-mail messages I've received from HMRC. For example, on 
24th May I received a reminder to file a VAT return for the last period. 
Since I'm registered for e-VAT, that message was expected (as were all 
the genuine ones).

Currently, many businesses are obliged to work with the Revenue online, 
and all businesses will be required to file online in the near future. I 
foresee that will apply to individuals soon after, and they've already 
cut the date to file self-assessment returns on paper to "encourage" 
taxpayers to e-file. Companies House is another Government department 
that likes to interact with "its customers" on line, and one of their 
forms for filing the shuttle return takes your credit or debit card 
details in respect of the filing fee. Another time they ask for your 
bank details is when you file your annual self-assement. Towards the end 
of the process, you're invited to give the sort code, account name, and 
number into which HMRC are to pay any refund.

In a nutshell, the Revenue et al. want to cut costs by forcing e-filing 
and other on-line working. So you can expect the amount of e-mail and 
web-form interaction with Government departments to increase, which 
means that we must be even more on our guard against the scammers. Tax 
communication doesn't only come in brown envelopes and I suspect it 
won't be long before some enterprising scammers manage to clone the 
Government Gateway and/or HMRC's online filing applications.

Unfortunately, if you're obliged to file online you have no option but 
file online. If you fail to obey the notice to file, you're liable for 
at least a fine.

Now you can ignore genuine communication from HMRC if you wish. However, 
you'll only have yourself to blame if you're fined for non-compliance or 
face an investigation.

Geoff