>The tax information could be used to commit tax refund fraud, according to the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, the office that conducted the

>The tax information could be used to commit tax refund fraud, according to the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration, the office that conducted the report. Of course it could be used in theory, but the fact is, taxpayer info needed to file a return (name, address, SSN, date of birth) has leaked out from many sources over decades, it's hard to see how 13-year old stale data from the IRS that is stored on ancient analog media is going to significantly increase the availablilty of leaked data. More to the point, the IRS has implemented a number of anti-fraud techniques in recent years that have greatly reduced the prior flood of fraudulently-filed returns. Both paid preparer and DIY taxpayer return preparation now requires much more meta data which software vendors have agreed to extract and provide, which makes it much easier to identify and hold up suspect efiled returns. Lastly, the best thing by far is the ability beginning several years ago for every taxpayer to request from the IRS an annual IP (identity protection) PIN which must be used to file a return, it's nearly as effective as a password. My opinion is that this particular report is as much about TIGTA justifying its existence as it is about an actual serious threat to the integrity of the income tax filing system.