Consumer Alert

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is alerting consumers of a spam email asserting to be from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) regarding economic stimulus checks.

The email contains information relative to direct deposit of the stimulus checks and also contains a fraudulent hyperlink to a form that requests personal bank account information. The bogus email claims that consumers' stimulus checks will be delayed if they fail to complete the form in a timely manner. Examples of the IRS spam emails are as follows: "Our records indicate that you are qualified to receive the 2008 Economic Stimulus Refund" and "To access Economic Stimulus refund, please click here."

In addition another recent attempt to extort personal information through a phishing email scam being distributed to college student email accounts (University of Illinois-Springfield). The email claims to be from the IRS with the subject line reading "IRS
- Economic Stimulus Refund Program".

These emails are not from the IRS. The IRS has a clear policy that they do not initiate communications with taxpayers via email. If you receive an unsolicited email message purporting to be from the IRS, please forward the original email to phishing@irs.gov and file a complaint with IC3 at www.ic3.gov

Additional information on scams is available at www.fbi.gov and www.lookstogoodtobetrue.com