About an hour ago we started to see yet another new variant of the IRS Refund Scams, this time using "Vishing" or Phish By Phone as a lure.

Here is a sample of the message that we received:

Internal Revenue Service Tax Refund

After the last annual calculations of your fiscal activity we have determined that
you are eligible to receive a tax refund of $215.

Tax Refund Number:84730004332 - Will Expire on 29 March 2008

Attention!
Tax refunds can be sent only to VISA or Mastercard DEBIT CARDS.

To receive your tax refund please call the IRS Tax Refund Department at: 602-427-5984 .


Internal Revenue Service


Upon calling the number (602 is an Arizona area code)  listed in the email you are greeted by a digital voice which introduces itself as being the Internal Revenue Service then asks you to enter your social security number, credit card number, expiration and PIN.  The interesting thing here is that the recording appears to be a poorly repurposed scam.  After asking for your PIN it tells you to please wait while it is "activating your account". 

Wait a minute!  I thought I was getting a refund!

'Tis certainly the season for tax scams and we've been seeing quite a few of them in the Threat Operations Center between the phishing scams that ask for your credit card number on a fake web site with promises of a refund to malware based scams that claim to "update the tax software installed on your computer".  We'll likely only see more of them over the next 2-3 weeks as well as the tax deadline nears.  I would also expect to see similar types of scams with promises of things like advances on your economic stimulus payments as we get closer to early May which is when the initial payments are scheduled to be distributed.