Safe to use Turbo Tax?

[markk]

I used TT last year and was wondering do you think it is safe for this year regarding the recent news?

Thank you

 

[REWahoo]

Whatever problems TT had appeared to be related to state filings and the news has died down on that subject, leading me to believe they have made changes to improve security. I don't file state taxes but used TT for my Federal return (the download version) without incident. Got my small refund within a matter of days.

 

[MichaelB]

I used TT last year and was wondering do you think it is safe for this year regarding the recent news?

Thank you

Did you use their online tax filing or buy and download the SW program?

 

[audreyh1]

Did you use their online tax filing or buy and download the SW program?

Good point. We always avoided entering our tax data online.

This year we even temporarily changed our password before downloading our 1099 info into TT.

Intuit has come across as far more casual about their products than I like. They seem like a sitting duck for someone to put backdoors in both their TurboTax and their Quicken software to allow hackers to get sensitive info including account numbers and passwords.

We're taking other measures to protect our financial accounts.

 

[SteveNU]

I've filed two federal returns and one state return using TT downloaded software. The state filing was for Ohio and they sent my wife and I letters which we had to use to go online and verify our identity before they would process the return. Funny thing is some of the questions they asked required me to answer using bogus information that was associated with identity theft that occurred to me in 1991! I still have some addresses that are associated with my name that the fraudsters used back then that I have been unsuccessful in getting removed from my credit report.

 

[Mulligan]

I completed my TT online last week. No issues and have received my refund already, so fortunately for me, no one had stolen my info and filed.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[markk]

Thanks everyone. MichaelB, I download.

 

[bUU]

To be clear, there was no breach with regard to TT. Rather, put simply, TT was being used as a means to commit a breach-of-sorts at IRS. I too filed with TT and received my federal, though not my state, refund.

 

[target2019]

I used TT last year and was wondering do you think it is safe for this year regarding the recent news?

It depends on what kind of assurance you are asking for.

Filling in forms by hand and mailing to IRS is probably the most secure avenue. There are just two copies (yours and theirs). But you could be robbed, misplace the forms, and so on. Maybe that is not the most secure solution in your case.

Then there is the online version of tax software. The number of possible compromises goes way up. Are all of the network devices between here and there secure? Probably not. Will online tax company be there forever, and adequately protect your data from all foes? Can't say.

If you have the downloaded version of tax software, you have similar risk as above. But your data is stored on your computer. Plenty of risks with that approach too.

I use the downloaded version. I think I can better control the risks when I do that.

In the old days we used to say, "There are two types of users, those who have lost data and those who will lose data." To that we must add, "There are two types of organizations, those who have been compromised, and those who will be compromised."

 

[bUU]

"There are two types of organizations, those who have been compromised, and those who will be compromised."

And that includes the IRS itself.

 

[target2019]

And that includes the IRS itself.

Yes it does. I intentionally used "organizations" to include them.

 

[misanman]

I filed Federal and State returns using the installed version of TurboTax and had no issues. And I discovered a useful feature that I hadn't seen before: you can import K1's, if you partnership supports it (the three I have did). In each case the same clearinghouse called "Tax Package Support" was used, but I had to access it through the partnership web site. No idea whether this introduces additional security concerns or not.