As of: January 29, 2024, 12:30 p.m
By: Marco Blanco Ucles
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A new scam has been causing a stir for some time now.
Criminals demand bank details from people via email in order to request tax refunds.
Let's be honest: a tax refund like this from the responsible tax office is something nice, especially in times of energy crisis and inflation.
Receiving unexpected money from the tax authorities – there is basically nothing wrong with that.
However, the anticipation of the upcoming “bonus payment” can quickly lead to carelessness.
Fraudsters on the Internet, who also work with fake PayPal calls, are also aware of this.
The criminals trick their victims into believing that they have to pay tax refunds - and then rob them mercilessly.
Before those fake emails – also known as phishing emails –
The consumer advice center
and the
ELSTER
company itself are now warning
.
ELSTER logo deceives many people
But what exactly happens?
First, you will receive an email with the subject “Last request – remaining tax amount from 2022”.
If you read this sentence, your alarm bells should ring and you should pay special attention.
You will then receive information in the email that you can claim a remaining tax amount from 2022.
Unfortunately, the logo of the popular tax app ELSTER leads many people to incorrectly assume that the content of the message is real.
Many fraudsters send emails that claim to come from the Elster tax app - consumers need to be careful.
© Rüdiger Wölk/IMAGO
The presentation of the false email, which is sometimes faked by large corporations such as Amazon, appears serious, the text appears coherent and sensible.
The recipient is led to believe that he or she is still entitled to an outstanding tax amount from 2022.
To request the money, a form must be filled out.
Now consumers are making the crucial mistake, warns the consumer advice center: “This is made apparent by the displayed and linked Internet address
https:// www.elster.de
.
But that's just displayed text - the actual link leads to a page from criminals asking for personal information.
They can then misuse them for identity theft, for example.”
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The
consumer advice center
recommends checking the sender carefully, as this often does not match the content of the email at all.
In such a case, the email should be moved to the spam folder without being answered.
In addition to ELSTER, the tax office or the Federal Central Tax Office are often given as the sender for fraud emails of this type.
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ELSTER itself was also on its homepage in front of the fraudulent emails, which were supposed to bring the consumer a financial injection.
The company makes it clear: “The tax administration generally only sends you notifications, but never the actual tax data or invoices in the form of an email attachment.” ELSTER also has other tips for dealing with suspicious emails that are on the published on the company homepage.
Never open attachments that you are not sure came from a trustworthy source.
Do not click on an embedded link in an email if you have doubts that the email comes from the tax authorities.
The tax administration will never request information such as tax number, account details, credit card numbers, PIN or the answer to your security query in an email.
General tips for using the Internet, as well as current warnings, can be found on the website of the BSI - Federal Office for Information Security.