Cyber crime has assumed a new avatar, with the first case of phishing in the name of refunding tax dues being registered in the city.
A senior analyst at Dell, Rajat Mondal, was in for a surprise when he received an email, supposedly from tax authorities, that he is due for a refund of Rs 18,900 from the IT department.
The address from which he got the email looked genuine -customer@ incometaxin.gov .in -with gov.in
being a government domain. He received the first email on March 30. A little over a week later, on April 8, Mondal received another one which said that his tax refund application could not be processed. The mail further said, "Click below to submit a tax refund request... and your refunds will be transferred to your ac count within the stipulated time."
The link sought Mondal's account information.
Mondal traced the IP address of the mail and informed the city police on Twitter. The IP address he traced through source code was parnasos.noc.teilam.gr (195.130.78.231).
"This is the first such case we have received pertaining to income tax," said Bhushan Gulabrao Borase, cyber crime SP at the CID. "On April 17, we registered the case following the twitter compliant and on the same day we sent a letter to the IT department asking them to verify the IP address. We are yet to receive a response from them. We're also looking at the modus operandi of the perpetrators," he said.
Rajendra Kumar Mishra, Director of Income Tax (Centralised Processing Centre) Karnataka and Goa, said: "We inform the tax payers, while filing IT returns, about the kind of fake emails they may receive and not to reveal any account details in the emails. Customers can always contact the help desk if they have any doubts on the emails. We have also started an awareness programme on our website and during the time of e-filing, to be aware of fake emails on IT returns."
The officer said that the IT department sends out emails only on particular occasions, such as if the user has not filed returns. The IT department's emails do not have the national emblem (which was present in the fake email) and contain only the first two and last two digits of the assessee's PAN.
The Income Tax website http:www.incometaxindia.gov.in is updated regularly and uses standard security measures, the officer said. "Most times, information is leaked through accountants who manage IT returns. Anyone receiving fake emails can directly check the status through our refund portal.