Most Obvious Phishing Attempt Ever!!

[hybrid_dogfish]

I think that this has to count as one of the most transparent phishing attempts I have ever received. Bear in mind I am a British citizen, and have only been to the US once.

Imagine my surprise when I noticed that the IRS had sent me an email (nice that they are saving money by using free webmail to contact people about these sort of things - tax - refund at gmail.com)

Notification of Tax Refund on your VISA or MasterCard Now


Dear Citizen:

After the last annual calculations of your fiscal activity
we have determined that you are eligible to receive a tax refund of $203.59.
Please submit the tax refund request and allowus 6-9 days in order to process it.
A refund can be delayed for a variety of reasons.
For example submitting invalid records or applying after the deadline.

To access the form for your tax refund, please click here :

http://BROKENONPURPOSE.us/bfd7m


> For security reasons, we will record your ip-address, the date and time.
> Deliberate wrong inputs are criminally pursued and indicated


Regards,
Internal Revenue Service


*************************************************
© Copyright 2008, Internal Revenue Service U.S.A.
*************************************************

If anyone has any ideas as to what to do with this, I am open to suggestions (the only contact I can get for the IRS is the US Embassy, which I thought might be a little extreme!)

[asterion]

I think that this has to count as one of the most transparent phishing attempts I have ever received. Bear in mind I am a British citizen, and have only been to the US once.

Imagine my surprise when I noticed that the IRS had sent me an email (nice that they are saving money by using free webmail to contact people about these sort of things - tax - refund at gmail.com)



If anyone has any ideas as to what to do with this, I am open to suggestions (the only contact I can get for the IRS is the US Embassy, which I thought might be a little extreme!)
Forward it to phishing@irs.gov More information here (http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=155682,00.html).

[Larry Mudd]

The Internal Revenue Service has issued several recent consumer warnings on the fraudulent use of the IRS name or logo by scamsters trying to gain access to consumers’ financial information in order to steal their identity and assets.I think it would be awesome if another branch of the federal government provided those "scamsters" with man-sized exercise wheels for their new cages.

[Tapioca Dextrin]

I was looking for some information on this scam when I went to went to a page that looked a bit phishy. Instead of loading the page, I got a popup with the following

Suspected web forgery

This page has been reported as a web forgery designed to trick users designed to trick users into sharing personal or financial information....

:)

[hybrid_dogfish]

Forward it to phishing@irs.gov More information here (http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=155682,00.html).


Thankyou!! That's pretty much what I was looking for. Email being forwarded.

The thing that really struck me was the idea that someone could honestly think that an email from a gmail address would be from a government department.

[Mindfield]

Wow. That one's so lame I can't even imagine how even the most obtuse neophite could fall for it.

I can't help but think that if this particular scam were pulled in the days before E-Mail, it would have been written on sheets of orange craft paper. In crayon. Including the little IRS logo, which would end up looking like a duck. And it would be signed "I.P. Freely."

[Wee Bairn]

I can't believe they think someone is supposed to excited over the prospect of 203 dollars- I'm no Bill Gates by any means, but geez, aren't you supposed to promise them a lot more to get them excited about the windfall?

[Wargamer]

If it was on orange paper, wouldn't it have been signed by 'I.P. Strangely'?

[Sean Factotum]

The thing that really struck me was the idea that someone could honestly think that an email from a gmail address would be from a government department.
You mean that isn't what the G in gmail stands for?

Well, that's $203.59 I'll never see again.

[FairyChatMom]

The thing that really struck me was the idea that someone could honestly think that an email from a gmail address would be from a government department.What's the problem? G is for Government, hence gmail! DUH!!!!




:D



Damn you, Sean!!! :p

[Sean Factotum]

Oh, so close Mom.

[Aangelica]

I can't believe they think someone is supposed to excited over the prospect of 203 dollars- I'm no Bill Gates by any means, but geez, aren't you supposed to promise them a lot more to get them excited about the windfall?

I think in some ways, that might actually make it more plausible to some folks. In the "who would bother counterfeiting $1 bills" sort of way, if you see what I mean. $203.59 is the sort of amount one can plausibly imagine the IRS refunding as a result of an error. This is the size windfall that's big enough to be worth screwing with, but not so large as to invite you to engage your critical thinking capability. Move the decimal point one way or the other and it's either not worth the bother (for $20.36) or panic-inducing (how the hell did I manage to be $2,035.90 off on my taxes last year? WTF?)

This is still blatant phishing of course :D

[Chronos]

I can't believe they think someone is supposed to excited over the prospect of 203 dollars- I'm no Bill Gates by any means, but geez, aren't you supposed to promise them a lot more to get them excited about the windfall?It depends on the scam. $200 is a plausible amount for an IRS refund, and it's enough money that folks will typically think it's worth filling out a form or two to get it. If people got an e-mail saying they were owed a refund of a million bucks, they wouldn't believe it.

I think that this particular set of scams uses a randomly-generated amount, though. I've seen versions which promise 63 cents, or some such, too.

[PuddingCat]

I think that this particular set of scams uses a randomly-generated amount, though. I've seen versions which promise 63 cents, or some such, too.

I also had this one and for the same 200 dollar amount mentioned. I sent them a few rude suggestions on thier submit form, poked about the website a little and then went to mail their netblock owner.

tim

[Beware of Doug]

Dear Citizen:

After the last annual calculations of your fiscal activity
we have determined that you are eligible to receive a tax refund of $203.59.
Please submit the tax refund request and allowus 6-9 days in order to process it.
A refund can be delayed for a variety of reasons.
For example submitting invalid records or applying after the deadline.

To access the form for your tax refund, please click here :
http://BROKENONPURPOSE.us/bfd7m

> For security reasons, we will record your ip-address, the date and time.
> Deliberate wrong inputs are criminally pursued and indicated

The IRS speaks bureaucratese, not English as a Second Language.

[hybrid_dogfish]

The IRS speaks bureaucratese, not English as a Second Language.

Indeed, I can't help but think that if a government department were to contact someone by email for whatever reason, the email would be at least 8 times as long as this one, and leave you going :confused: