Recognizing tax and CRA-style scams (Canada)

Key takeaways

The Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) does not send threatening texts demanding immediate payment in gift cards, crypto, or wire transfers. It does not ask for your full banking password or remote access to your PC to “process a refund.”

Red flags: unsolicited email or SMS with links; caller ID that looks official but pushes urgency; requests to install software (AnyDesk, TeamViewer, etc.) for “tax reasons”; payment only through non-standard channels.

What to do: pause, do not click or call numbers from the message; sign in to your CRA account through canada.ca in a fresh browser tab, or call CRA using the number published on canada.ca; tell your IT team if this happened on a work device; report phishing to the Canadian Anti-Fraud Centre and your email/SMS provider.

This article is general information, not tax or legal advice.