Online tax advice can lead to IRS problems and criminal charges

Dallas Gagnon
Masslive.com (tns)

The IRS has long warned the taxpayers of fraud that aimed at them and their personal and financial data, especially in the tax season.

The IRS reminds taxpayers of staying vigilant against all systems to try to steal their money, information and data and at the same time warn taxpayers, to be clever about the submission of decisions they make.

“Fraudsters are relentless and use the guise of the tax season to get the taxpayer to fall into a variety of traps,” said Terry Lemons, Seniation Advisor of IRS Communications.

“These red flags can lead to the fact that everything from identity theft to involvement in the claim of tax credits for which they are not entitled to.”

While fraud is always a problem for the IRS, the agency gives a warning about a “growing concern” during this tax season.

The agency warns that false, misleading and overall bad advice that is shared on social media that can cause taxpayers to incur incorrectly – sometimes on identity theft or other tax issues that can cause filers to be available due to criminal charges.

“Social -Media platforms circulate routine inaccurate or misleading tax information, including TikTok, in which people share wild inaccurate tax advice. Some contain people to abuse common tax documents such as Form W-2, ”said the IRS.

The IRS warns people not to fall on the wrong advice from people who are not associated with the IRS, tax experts or other reputable sources.

Taxpayers who submit fraudulent tax returns can be exposed to “considerable civil and criminal punishments”.

Examples of poor tax advice

A common social media fraud, which is in circulation during this tax time, is a wrong “self -employment tax credit”, warns the IRS.

Social media users claim that the non-existent credit is a way for self-employed and gig employees to achieve additional payment in connection with the COVID 19 pandemy period.

In reality, the IRS says that the loan, which is incorrectly advertised, is a much more limited and technical credit called credits for sick leave and family vacation.

Another piece of misleading tax “advice” on social media refers to the loan of employees in storage, in which some social media users incorrectly claim that many taxpayers can qualify for up to $ 32,000, if this is not the case at all.

The IRS encourages Filer to obtain further information from his website via the credits that you are actually entitled to avoid incorrect registration.

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