Tax filing websites have been sending users’ financials to Facebook

[Gandalf_The_Grey]

Content source

https://www.theverge.com/2022/11/22/23471842/facebook-hr-block-taxact-taxslayer-info-sharing

Major tax filing services such as H&R Block, TaxAct, and TaxSlayer have been quietly transmitting sensitive financial information to Facebook when Americans file their taxes online, The Markup has learned.

The data, sent through widely used code called the Meta Pixel, includes not only information like names and email addresses but often even more detailed information, including data on users’ income, filing status, refund amounts, and dependents’ college scholarship amounts.

The information sent to Facebook can be used by the company to power its advertising algorithms and is gathered regardless of whether the person using the tax filing service has an account on Facebook or other platforms operated by its owner Meta.

Each year, the Internal Revenue Service processes about 150 million individual returns filed electronically, and some of the most widely used e-filing services employ the pixel, The Markup found.

Tax filing websites have been sending users’ financial information to Facebook

The Markup found that tax preparation services including TaxAct, TaxSlayer, and H&R Block have sent users’ personal financial information to Facebook through the Meta Pixel.

www.theverge.com

 

[Gandalf_The_Grey]

Is this an advertorial for adblockers

Do adblockers like Adblock Plus, uBlock Origin and AdGuard block the Meta Pixel in their default configuration?

 

[Captain Holly]

How is that even legal?

C.H.

 

[upnorth]

Is this an advertorial for adblockers

Do adblockers like Adblock Plus, uBlock Origin and AdGuard block the Meta Pixel in their default configuration?

Have no idea as I don't use them.

 

[Captain Holly]

I think Mrs. Holly and I will just file directly with the IRS next year. Maybe the IRS will not send our details back to Zuck.

I said it in another thread here yesterday but I will say it again today I am getting really tired of all the tracking and having our personal info being bought and sold online.

Really tired of it.

C.H.

 

[SeriousHoax]

Do adblockers like Adblock Plus, uBlock Origin and AdGuard block the Meta Pixel in their default configuration?

Adblock Plus probably does not. By default, EasyPrivacy which is responsible for blocking facebook pixel is off in Adblock Plus.
uBO blocks them via EasyPrivacy in default settings.
After installing Adguard it gives you the option to configure additional blocking like trackers, social widgets, etc. If the user doesn't enable tracker blocking from that window then Adguard Tracking protection remains disabled which handles facebook pixels for Adguard.
So, uBO > other adblockers at default settings.

 

[vtqhtr413]

For your tax filing, use a local tax preparer/accountant, the chain preparers are crooks. Malware Tip

 

[blackice]

For your tax filing, use a local tax preparer/accountant, the chain preparers are crooks. Malware Tip

Most people don’t need a tax prep professional. Their income isn’t complicated enough to make it worth it. I say this as an accountant by education and profession, though I’m not a tax accountant. This smells like a potential lawsuit.

 

[vtqhtr413]

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) cannot locate thousands of microfilm cartridges containing millions of sensitive individual and business tax account records, according to a watchdog report.

The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration said in a report released Tuesday that the IRS cannot account for microfilm cartridges — which contain backups of tax records as required under federal law — from fiscal 2010 that were originally stored at a processing center in Fresno, Calif. The cartridges were meant to be among other records that were shipped to another processing center in Kansas City, Mo., last February after the California location closed.

The watchdog also found seven empty boxes, which could hold up to 168 cartridges total, at the Ogden Tax Processing Center in Utah. Ogden personnel did not know where the missing cartridges were. More than 4,000 cartridges containing business tax account information from fiscal 2018 and 4,500 cartridges containing individual tax account information from fiscal 2019 also could not be accounted for at the Kansas City facility, according to the report.

“The personal taxpayer and tax information included on these backup cartridges is key information that can be used to commit tax refund fraud and identity theft,” the report noted.

IRS can’t find millions of sensitive tax records: watchdog

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) cannot locate thousands of microfilm cartridges containing millions of sensitive individual and business tax account records, according to a watchdog report. The …

thehill.com