IRS to Allow Tax Preparers to Sell Your Info? 289
merkel writes "The Philadelphia Inquirer reports that the IRS has proposed rule changes allowing tax-return preparers, like H&R Block, to sell an individual's return information to marketers and data brokers. The proposed rule [PDF], which does contain some substantive protections for the processing of electronic returns, was published in the Federal Register on December 8, 2005. The official comment period has passed, but hearings will be held this month."
note to self-- (Score:5, Funny)
Note to self: re-read the EULA on Turbo Tax.
Re:note to self-- (Score:2, Interesting)
My credit score dropped 58 points following filing my 2005 taxes, with no information contained within my credit reports (at all three bureaus!) having changed. The only 'new' information available was that I made substantially less in 2005 than in any other previous year, but there are 'only' three parties with that information: Intuit, the IRS, and myself.
Re:that print button.. (Score:2, Interesting)
Internet Stalking 101 (Score:5, Interesting)
*gasp*
Let's narrow our fears on something a little more worrisome regarding privacy and the United States Government.
Ever filled out census information? Because, if you have, your information is available to anyone via a [peoplefinders.com] number [zabasearch.com] of [addresses.com] sites [integrascan.com]. That's right, for as cheap as an $8-$10 fee, people can find out what income range you are in along with a variety of other facts about you. They can also find out where you live for free!
I would normally thank god that I have a very non-unique name but if I enter my hometown and state, there I am listed five times with my address and parent's phone number. I was just a kid when I lived there! The best part is that if you click my name, they take the liberty to plug my address into Mapquest and Google Map bars in case you don't have the time to copy and paste it in there!
Go ahead, now try your name.
*cups his hand to his ear listening for the sound of a million nerds enshrouding themselves in tin foil*
I'm not worried about my personal information being sold to marketers
Do you know what your government is doing with your census data?
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:5, Insightful)
This isn't really much of a problem if you keep an eye on your credit reports. If something shows up that isn't yours, force the credit reporting agency to verify the entry. They'll try to avoid doing this because its troublesome for them and they don't really care if the info is right or not (as long as is right enough across millions of people to be useful to businesses). Force them to actually verify with the reporting creditor. If they verify it, contact that creditor (Via mail) and force them to verify that the debit is yours. They'll try to get out of that too, and may send you improper verification. Keep after them and force them to send proper verification and proof that they are authorized by the original creditor to collect the debit. If the debit is not yours, at this point you win.
Details about these processes and the laws that make them work can be found on the creditboards.com [creditboards.com] forums. In particular read about "Debit Verification" and the "The One-Two Punch". These are extremely effective techniques for getting inaccurate items off your credit record (or getting rid of reports from debit collectors who are not properly authorized to collect valid debits).
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:2)
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:2)
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:2)
Another good resource about credit repair is GoodMortgage.com's How To Fix Credit Report Errors [goodmortgage.com] articles.
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:4, Insightful)
I filled out the parts that are necessary for the Constitutional purpose of the census. For the rest, I amused myself by figuring out the most misleading possible technically true answer.
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:3, Funny)
It was the best answer.
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:2, Informative)
You don't need to fill out all that information. The only questions the Census needs to ask are:
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:3, Informative)
Before flat-out saying "thou shalt let black people vote" with the Fifteenth Amendment, the idea was to penalize a state that denied suffrage to a portion of its men over the age of 21 by reducing its delegation in the House proportionally (and finding out the size of a state's delegation is what the Census is all about). While it may or may not have teeth now that the Fifteenth Amendment has been ratified (though, in my opinion, this idea is far better at enforcing itself), it hasn't been repea
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:2)
The amusing thing is that the database also includes 29 entries for I P Freely.
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:2)
wouldn't you prefer a tab-separated values document (plain ASCII) or excel spreadsheeds instead? it's much easier to process! and free! [census.gov] and it's well-organized [census.gov] for ease-of-use!
disclosure: in one o
Re:Internet Stalking 101 (Score:2)
Hmmm. Maybe misleading? (Score:2)
I think it's misleading to say that information you put on your census form is given/sold to private parties. It's only made available tabulated to the census block level. A census block is chosen to be the smallest geographic area that gives respondents a reasonable level of privacy.
The highly specific information that these sites have some from credit reports and privately am
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Enough is ENOUGH. (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Enough is ENOUGH. (Score:2)
The constitution doesn't say anything about protecting people from their own stupidity. The odds are readily available and can often be found on the lottery ticket. What's unfair about that, again?
Re:Enough is ENOUGH. (Score:2)
Strawman alert (Score:2)
And the whole "You shouldn't oppose X because you don't oppose Y which is also bad" argument is blatantly fallacious anyway.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Agreed... (Score:5, Insightful)
At a certain point (generally at about $100k), the vast majority people quickly stop consuming their income and start hoarding it. Oh sure, some will burn through it on booze, drugs and hookers, but most start shoving that capital back into capital. The higher that income gets, the smaller the percentage of it that is consumed. So, your "fair" tax would, dollar-for-dollar, tax someone making $100k the same as someone making $1M...and I got news for you, that "used property" exclusion? Well, they ain't makin' any new land, so guess what will happen to the price of dirt? Well, until we're vacationing on the Moon.
Business purposes = no tax? Again, people nearing or exceeding $100k routinely put their entire damned lives on Schedule C (or into corporations) for exactly this purpose. Even if they _do_ consume above that level, it will surely be claimed as business expense--and that's determined at the point of sale or are we back to filing returns to prove it? Well, guess what, if you can avoid taxes completely by claiming business expense...you're going to find a great number of entrepreneurs and if they have to file returns, what's the benefit again in terms of paperwork and complexity reduction? If they don't, how do we prove it was business-related? Hmm.
A "prebate?" So, everyone gets a monthly check for the taxes on the first $14k of income, assumed to be consumed? Gah... That is going to eliminate the bureaucracy precisely HOW? So, people under $14k will get prebates for whatever % of $14k or will they have to file returns to prove exactly how poor they are? That'll really free up the ol' paperwork and fraud burden, now, won't it? What if it's a family of 12 and all but one are saving every penny. Now do we file returns to prove our consumption of "necessities?" Oy vey.
The tax structure we have now is designed to induce certain behavior in many sectors. It is also designed to pay for certain _types_ of consumption, like gas taxes paying for the interstate pavement based on use. You consume pavement, you pay for the pavement. This sort of all-encompassing tax would shift the bureaucratic burden, it wouldn't eliminate it.
Really, I think the "Fair Tax" crowd has critically examined the current problem, which is certainly well due and admirable, but I don't think they've critically examined their solution, which on even first sight is fraught with all the same problems as the existing system -- and totally ignores a number of problems that the existing system deals with quite extensively.
Re:Agreed... (Score:2)
Who do you think opens businesses? Who do you think buys stock? Who do you think purchases big ticket items?
Re:Agreed... (Score:2)
Some clarifications... (Score:3, Insightful)
Which is otherwise known as "investing", which is generally a good thing, providing money for loans, growing businesses, etc.
"The higher that income gets, the smaller the percentage of it that is consumed. So, your "fair" tax would, dollar-for-dollar, tax s
Re:Some clarifications... (Score:3, Insightful)
a millionare has much more at stake in this country, and his property benefits on a continuing basis much more from the social services (such as defense, police forces, fire departments, roads, etc, the courts) than does the property of a person earning $100k. (let alone $30k) It are INVESTMENTS that benefit most from such services, consumed items are consumed and by definition r
You must be joking. (Score:3, Insightful)
for example, Howard Stern likes to eat at Nobu. Dinner at Nobu is about $100. He makes that in 30 seconds (24/7). I pretty routinely eat at places, say, half that expensive at about $5
Re:Some clarifications... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Agreed... (Score:2)
Really, I think the "Fair Tax" crowd has critically examined the current problem, which is certainly well due and admirable, but I don't think they've critically examined their solution
Actually, tens of millions has been spent
Re:Enough is ENOUGH. (Score:2)
I think that this plan and Forbes' flat tax idea are both excellent ideas. I think some of the benefits are (or at least can be): smaller tax burden on the poor, simpler tax code for citizens, no more tax preparation industry, which would be of great benefit to the economy since all of those people are freed up to do something more economically productive.
Here is the one bad thing I have say abou
Re:Enough is ENOUGH. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Why not leave it to the market? (Score:2, Interesting)
Well, this rule should not be too alarming -- as long as these companies are up-front about it. What I'd like to see is a premium price for privacy: for an extra $10 (or whatever the value of your personal data is), they promise to never share it. Think of it another way: there's a $10 discount for letting them share your data.
It would be different if you had to go through these people, but since there are alternatives [TurboTax?] I suspect the market will sort it out. If tax preparation software acqui
Re:Why not leave it to the market? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why not leave it to the market? (Score:3, Interesting)
It's not your data anymore. This is like you selling me a book and then trying to dictate what tone of voice I use while reading it aloud because it's your poetry.
Say you decided to sign a contract whereby you gave them the data and allowed them to use it for various purposes, in return for $10. If you didn't like the terms (e.g. you want more than $10, you want royalties, or you don't want them to have your data at all) them you should not have signed the contract in the first place. What the law shou
Re:Why not leave it to the market? (Score:2)
Re:Why not leave it to the market? (Score:2)
Well, technically... that example doesn't completely hold water. Just because you bought my book, CD, DVD or whatever doesn't explicitely allow you to use it for a public performance, unless otherwise noted. So while I cannot tell you what tone of voice you may use when reading it in privacy of youir own home, alone, if you, say, invite a dozen f
Re:Why not leave it to the market? (Score:4, Interesting)
I've been wondering this for years.
Companies have paid lip service to "privacy" over the years. Most every website and company has a "privacy policy", that often ends with the clause "subject to change without your notice".
Is there some way that consumers can organize and make their own demands of the terms that determine who they do business with? Kinda like a union for consumers?
The only answer I've come up with is hiding myself behind a company or corporation and not personally owning any property, but is there a way to do this with other consumers that want to have the same rights?
Re:Why not leave it to the market? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Why not leave it to the market? (Score:2)
Wrong.
I _vote_ for representatives that share my views, the people I don't vote for get elected, and I suffer.
Also, in theory, the government works for me, but for some reason, I d
Re:Why not leave it to the market? (Score:2)
Any government DOES work for you, provided you make them accountable. If the majority of people are in the habit of either not voting or voting for whoever they're told to (ie whoever spent most on campaign ads) then the government will work for whoever provides them with the money to pay for those campaign ads.
If you actually cast an i
Market value (Score:2)
Another group does not wish to share their information at any price.
A Company shares your personal information without permission, how can you justify any penalty greater than the $10 your information is worth?
Re:Why not leave it to the market? (Score:2)
It isn't their information to sell. (Score:5, Interesting)
It was not acquired by the voluntary cooperation of the source.
If they want to sell it then they need permission from
the owner of the information, not the IRS's.
Re:It isn't their information to sell. (Score:3, Informative)
Filling out your Tax return is "Voluntary, but not optional"
Look it up. It's true, and the courts have upheld it. It has to be voluntary to get around your 5th ammendment rights against self-incrimination. It's non-optional because of the income tax amendment.
A somewhat weaselly explaination can be found here http://taxes.about.com/od/taxtrouble/a/back_taxes_ 2.htm [about.com]
Re:It isn't their information to sell. (Score:2)
ATTENTION MARKETERS: I am more than happy to send you a copy of my tax return as part of a special, direct-to-you, promotional offer. Because of market instabilities, the time is right to get onboard this exciting opportunity to buy a copy of my tax return.
Current price estimates are in the $10-$200 range, but I personally guarantee that will be a small amount larger than whatever number happens to go into Box 12 of the 1040EZ form [irs.gov].
Couldn't be simpler.
Social Security Numbers & Fraud (Score:3, Insightful)
What dingbat at the IRS thought this was a good idea?
You know, one side effect of this is that it might accelerate the Flat Tax [fairtax.org].
Re:Social Security Numbers & Fraud (Score:2)
Ah, yes, the return of the consumption tax. I always wondered what it was like to live in the 19th century. Why not give the modern day robber barons an even bigger help than our government already has?
"Fair" Tax != Flat Tax (Score:4, Insightful)
Flat Tax proponents want to have a flat rate tax on all income, so everyone pays a fair share in direct proportion to how much they can afford.
Re:"Fair" Tax != Flat Tax (Score:3)
Fine by me. (Score:5, Interesting)
It will be interesting to see how many people go back to paper filing their forms directly to the IRS. Should be a nightmare of un-automation for them.
Re:Fine by me. (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm extremely annoyed that the fed. gov. doesn't just set up a website for e-filing itself. It would save taxpayers and the government millions of dollars on paper forms and processing. It's a clear case of intentional government waste in order to create business opportunities for tax preparation services. Even my humble state of New Mexico has a simple, government run web form for me to file my taxes online. It's not rocket science.
My business sche
Re:Fine by me. (Score:2)
Re:Fine by me. (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Fine by me. (Score:2)
Re:Fine by me. (Score:2)
Pretty simple really - I value my time more than the money it costs to have my taxes prepared. Having done it myself both by hand and with Turbotax, etc, I know how easy it can be to do yourself -- but am still very willing to pay a reasonable fee to just make it go away.
Re:Fine by me. (Score:2)
I use paper-based filing anyway... (Score:2)
I think it's scandalous that the IRS spends tax dollars sending out mailings promoting e-filing when, according to their own description, this method of submission is available only from the private sector, as a for-profit commercial enterprise. If the H&R Blocks of the world are making money off of e-filing, let them promote it them
Re:I use paper-based filing anyway... (Score:3, Interesting)
*No need for manual entry or scanning, forms are automatically checked for accuracy, etc...
CPA (Score:4, Interesting)
CPA's ethics guidelines limit who and how a CPA share your information.
-Peer review
-Court order
-and such
It is a lot worse loose your CPA license than if a evening tax preparer to have to pick up a seasonal job. I doubt HR block would sell your info though even if they could.
Grammar Correction! (Score:2, Offtopic)
H&R Block litigation re refund anticipation lo (Score:2)
They already do. And they've been in serious trouble for it. [nixonpeabody.com]
What this is really about is "refund anticipation loans", which are incredibly profitable. Right now, the tax preparer can only sell those if they're "affiliated" with the lender. Under the new rules, any tax preparer can use any lender.
From TFA: (Score:4, Informative)
"The normal interaction is that the taxpayer just signs what the tax preparer puts in front of them," said Jean Ann Fox of the Consumer Federation of America, one of several groups fighting the changes.
You can't expect to protect people from their own stupidity. If the preparer can't get the tax return data this way, they can just have their customers fill out a 'financial worksheet' and sell that instead. If you're stupid enough to 'just sign' anything, you're going to have your privacy violated. This ruling is moot.
Re:From TFA: (Score:3, Insightful)
There is a difference between protecting people from stupidity and protecting them from naivety. No-one is an expert in every field, and no-one has time to make themselves into one. The law should encourage/require popular services to work as the public would expect, not encourage the exact opposite.
Re:From TFA: (Score:2)
I'm sorry, but you don't have to be an expert in *anything* to read a document before you sign it. Not reading a contract before signing it isn't naive, it's stupid. That goes for things as simple as a credit card receipt, and should be obvious for something as important as your tax return.
The law should encourage/require popular
Re:From TFA: (Score:2)
Re:From TFA: (Score:2)
Re:From TFA: (Score:2)
Yup. Recently in fact.
If so, did you read every line of fine print in the 30 or so pages put in front of you?
Much to the dismay of the bank's closing attorney, yes. It only took a few hours. If I were using an attorney that I knew personally and trusted, I would have let him do the reading and sum up for me, but my bank insisted I use their lawyer, and I wasn't going to pay two, so he had to wait. Most of the stuff isn't even that complicated, discl
Lets get this straight (Score:3, Insightful)
The IRS wants to make it easier for people that I (may) do business with in processing my taxes to sell my tax information to marketers and whatnot?
Let me think what is on my tax info (I'm not rich and don't have a tax accountant, and I'm ignorant of needing such additional stuff).
My SSN.
My income.
My major debts (mortgage interest writeoff and student loan interest writeoff).
Doesn't equifax, and the other companies that collect and sell this information already have that and more?
My tinfoil hat might be suffering from a large dose of gamma radiation, but isn't this stuff already public knowledge?
Granted, the additional provisions for more people to be able to sell this information does absolutely nothing to my benefit, but I see where having more avenues to get to what is already practically in the public domain already is going to harm me any more.
Re:Lets get this straight (Score:4, Informative)
Those credit card offers in the mail that offer pre-approved cards are often based on information pulled from lists created and sold by the credit reporting agencies. This is an opt-out list, if you haven't told them not to sell your info, they are selling it to credit companies, insurance companies and debit collectors.
If you are interested in privacy, opt out now.
Re:Lets get this straight (Score:2)
I don't live at the United States, so I may be completely wrong here. But I think you should add "every single stuff" that you own to that list. Also, I don't think those are really at the publick knowledge, several people complain about giving their SSN here on /., and the others should be know only by your employer (#2), the banks that you have debt (#3), and the government (all). Nobody else should know that.
Re:Lets get this straight (Score:2)
Your credit report is not "public knowledge".
Re:Lets get this straight (Score:2)
Its more public knowledge than it is my knowledge.
A nominal fee gets you the contents of my credit report. So, no I guess its not public knowledge, its publicly available knowledge.
Re:Lets get this straight (Score:2)
No, actually it doesn't.
Re:Lets get this straight (Score:2)
OK, then how does Equifax, Experion, and whoever else stay in business?
You and I are not their customers. Until recently, they did not have consumer level services like identity theft insurance or whatever they sell.
From what I knew, they sold the information to businesses. I've seen at the bottom of my credit report before where people have checked it in the recent past.
Am I missing something? Or am I way off base here?
Excellent! (Score:3, Funny)
Why not? (Score:3, Insightful)
nothing is personal anymore (Score:3, Insightful)
Sadly, nothing is personal... not your ethnicity, not your income level, not your educational background, not your browsing habits, not your spending habits, not your tv viewing habits, etc... Maybe this will wake enough people up to change the way data about our lives is traded and sold to anyone with some green.
Re:nothing is personal anymore (Score:2)
Those credit card offers in the mail that offer pre-approved cards are often based on information pulled from lists created and sold by the credit reporting agencies. This is an opt-out list, if you haven't told them not to sell your info, they are selling it to cr
How evil is H&R Block? (Score:5, Interesting)
Key point in the article (Score:3, Insightful)
So, I don't see a problem. If for some reason, say free preparation, someone wants to give away this information, isn't that their choice? As long as I have the ability to say no to this, I don't see a problem.
Personal information is a commodity today. If you want to sell it, you should have that right. If you want to keep it private you should have a choice to do that as well.
Re:Key point in the article (Score:4, Insightful)
Sorry to flame, but that's one of the most irresponsibly simplified statements I've seen in this thread.
Do you think a company like H&R Block is going to hand you a neon orange sheet of paper with 172 pt. font that says "DO YOU WANT US TO SELL YOUR PERSONAL DATA?"
No. They're going to hide it in one subclause of a 14-page contract agreement, tersely worded so that it doesn't even mention "selling", "personal data", or "yours". It's probably gonna be a single sentence like "Applicant surrenders all rights to proclude the preparer from providing gathered data to third parties." Taxes are stressful enough without having to become a lawyer to avoid being bilked by corporations.
Wake up and smell the slap in the face.
Land of the free? (Score:2)
That was a loooooooooooooong time ago!
Bad News for Nerds (Score:2)
"That's a disturbing trend among Washington officials lately," McConnell said. "They'll offer a modest consumer protection in one area in exchange for dramatic weakening of consumer protections in another area, and then try to convince the p
It's already against the law to share your stuff (Score:5, Informative)
GLBA was passed in 1999 to modernize aspects of the banking industry. Title V prevents financial institutions from selling consumer data without consent from the consumer. Remember a couple of years ago every bank, credit card company, loan agency, and anyone else who touched your money flooded your mailbox with Privacy Policy notices and "opt-out" statements? That was GLBA.
The best part is that GLBA classifies tax preparers as financial institutions [ftc.gov], so H&R Block must provide the same protections to your information that a bank would (or should).
The proposed IRS rule change [slashdot.org] under section 1 specifically cites GLBA and points out that this rule change has no impact on the GLBA requirements.
Sorry to all you privacy alarmists out there, but this "Privacy Bomb" for the IRS is a dud.
More Info = Greater Chance of Identity Theft (Score:2, Informative)
The more information someone can gleen about you the greater chance they can go out and get a car loan, house loan, access your bank accounts, or get various other forms of cr
Here's a different way to look at that: (Score:4, Insightful)
or
Suddenly tax-prep gets more lucrative. Of course, if they ever come through with that "flat tax" all those guys'll be out of business overnight anyway (and then I can ride to work on a flying pig every morning...)
A date which shall live... (Score:2)
"The proposed rule [PDF], which does contain some substantive protections for the processing of electronic returns, was published in the Federal Register on December 8, 2005."
image word: "magnetic"
BOTL'd up (Score:2)
So how did we not hear about the comment period until after it had expired? Another instance of public information protected by "Beware of the Leopard" signage?
already leaked social security numbers this year (Score:2)
Yet another reason... (Score:2)
Re:Customer data? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Best deal ever!!!!! (Score:2)
We still lose badly.
$100 each, in aggregate for 100,000 people, is a lot of money.
$10 back to you or I is chicken feed.
Re: (Score:2)