Cyber Crimes: Tax Frauds

Tax time is here and with the pressure and stress of this busy time comes the additional concern of cyber criminals using this as an opportunity to defraud the unwary public of hard earned money.

One of the latest scams going around my home city is fraudsters sending text messages to cell phone owners, with various messages stating something about a tax refund of some sort, typically with a specific dollar amount, and asking the user to click on a link.

Of course, the basic rules of e-mail and/or text safety and security is to never click on a link or open and attachment from any unknown source. The best thing to do is flag the message as junk and delete it from your phone (or computer) but it's just my nature to want these slime-ball fraudsters to get caught, so I record the address or phone number of the culprits and take the time to report them to the authorities. This is especially more important to me when it comes to banking or government institutions, who take these matters  as equally serious of course and have specialized departments who handle these complaints and investigate them thoroughly.

If you feel that you could be or are a victim of some form of cyber crime and fraud, contact the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre.

There are plenty of other types of cyber crimes and associated scams and having knowledge and understanding of them, coupled with the use of standard protocols, will be most helpful in protecting yourself against this insidious activity.