Big Tech Companies Team Up To Share Info And Fight Patent Hoarders

IRS Employees Caught Snooping On Tax Returns

from the nice-to-see-someone's-checking dept

Thu, May 15th 2008 6:39am — Mike Masnick

Last week, in writing about the Italian government's defense of its decision to put everyone's tax returns online for everyone else to see, we noted the bizarre statement by the official who made the decision: "In the USA, tax filings are already public, check any American TV-movie and you'll see." This totally false statement didn't get much play in the American press (someone in the comments suggested that maybe it seemed so unbelievable that the press thought he was joking). However, as if to make it painfully clear how false this statement actually is, five IRS employees have been charged for snooping on tax returns they were not authorized to look at. While it is a little troublesome that IRS employees were able to do this in the first place, it's at least somewhat comforting that the IRS's auditing system seems to be able to catch people doing this, even when they're only looking at a very small number of unauthorized returns (each worker only looked at one to four unauthorized returns).

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: audits, irs, snooping, tax returns

9 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Joe Taxpayer, 15 May 2008 @ 6:52am

That's good to hear, but ...
How do you get your return to the IRS ?
If it is through one of the internet services or a tax service that uses one, your return is probably retained by them. Read their EULA. I have no idea why they think they need to retain your personal information.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
James, 15 May 2008 @ 7:10am

Hmmm..
"Somewhat comforting"... actually its somewhat-f**king-AMAZING that they caught this at all (and even admitted it no less). I'm not sure whether to be relieved or surprised.

My guess is many of the folks who work there, who have access to this information, have the same attitude as cops or people in other positions with potential for abuse.. they are "ABOVE" it. The rules do not apply to them.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
earl, 15 May 2008 @ 7:42am

opinion
i like ommelettes
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 15 May 2008 @ 7:49am

or they could have just been bored and started browsing around on their file servers seeing what they could and couldn't do. When you work in a cubical and stare at a screen all day there's plenty of things you do to pass the time, such as play solitaire, but even thats not "allowed"
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Tom The Toe, 15 May 2008 @ 8:36am

Checking Out The Documents
They probably use a vault system. If you look at a document it checks it out to you under your name. Some vaults even notify a supervisor if you check out a document you are not supposed to see. All the ins and outs of each document is kept in a locked log file for management to review so they can see who is looking at what.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Overcast, 15 May 2008 @ 8:52am

Won't it be wonderful when they have all of our medical records, faces scanned into recognition software, full financial information, buying habits, and everything else in a database linked to the RFID string implanted in our arm?

We don't have to worry about a thing then!!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Anonymous Coward, 15 May 2008 @ 9:02am

Welp, looks like it's time to abolish the IRS!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Hulser, 15 May 2008 @ 9:47am

Of course it's disturbing that IRS employees are snooping into people's tax return info, but what I find even more disturbing is the fact that someone is dumb enough to believe that "TV-movies" accurately portray American life. What, this guy saw an episode of CSI where someone hacked into a computer and leapt to the conclusion that all IRS data are public?

(When I lived in Australia, people would ask me if life was really as violent in the US as they see on TV and in the movies. My stock answer was that Hollywood is as accurate about portraying American life as they are about portraying Australian life or any other country. Having answered questions about kangaroos walking in the streets of downtown and why they weren't dressed like Crocodile Dundee, most of the time, that was all the answer they needed.)
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
sea ronin, 15 May 2008 @ 10:28am

Systems Audits
I once worked with SSA. In recent years after a breach of security by an employee the data systems were redesigned that if a person entered the file of a case not assigned to that worker, alarms went off and supervisors were notified almost immediately. We had to justify in writing why the incident occured. Curiosity didn't was not acceptable. SSA has it fairly well in control.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]