Dear Tax Payer (This is a scam)

Recently I shared an update with you which said “Always safeguard your personal information and exercise caution if someone claims to contact you on behalf of the CRA”.

Well it wasn’t more than a couple of days later that the email below showed up in my office inbox. For a moment, I was thinking that I should open the attachment and contact this individual. It looked impressive with its “case_924523.msg (42KB)” identifier. But there was this little voice inside my head that said “Wait a minute!”. Didn’t I read somewhere that the CRA doesn’t send emails like this ? So I looked at it little closer, and noticed that there was no $ in front of the 433. And, I don’t recall ever seeing “CAD” on any correspondence that I have received from the CRA. And, when was the last time you received any correspondence from the CRA that included “With Best Regards” in the signature ?

I am fortunate that as an employee of CIBC Wood Gundy a subsidiary of CIBC, I have access to all sorts of technical help to deal with situations like this. I forwarded the email to our Technical Support team where professionals will deal with it. However, the fact that it made it into my mailbox despite all of the filters in place, gives testament to the cleverness of the criminals behind these phishing emails. Read the email below and beware !

Dear Taxpayer,

You have outstanding tax debit is 433 CAD.

You have to pay your debit, or you will be charged interest on taxes owing and any penalties charged as of the day that the tax debit was due. Notice of assessment which will explain all details of your assessment enclosed in this notice.

Your case number is 229311966.

If you have any questions and you may contact Tax Service directly, your officer coordinates are included

in statement attached.

With best regards,

Diana Barrett

Canada Revenue Agency